- Meteor Dash manages to make dodging falling meteors a calm experience.
- The UI suffers from a lack of pause and back buttons.
- Hitting cacti to score points is incredibly rewarding.
Meteor Dash is a new endless runner that has you dodging meteors in a race for survival. You will travel through a natural desert, putting the pedal to the metal as you collect coins, earn points and avoid accidents at all costs.
Meteor Dash lets you dodge falling bits of asteroids.
Meteor Dash Keeps things simple; Your goal is to cross the desert dodging cars, meteors and other obstacles for as long as possible. You start out as a burnt orange VW Beetle driving down the road in the middle of the desert. However, once you get enough points you can unlock other fun avatars, like rockets and even a flying creature.
There are two things you’ll need to collect while traversing the dangerous landscape: Points and Coins Coins contribute to your high score, so the more you collect, the better. Points, however, are very lucrative.
Earn points to unlock the new Meteor Dash avatar.
You can use the points to buy new avatars from the game’s store. Don’t worry, Meteor Dash is refreshingly free of in-app purchases. So, the only way to get a new avatar is to get enough points. However, how you earn points isn’t immediately obvious, and the game doesn’t give you any clear instructions here.
You may be tempted to stick to the relative safety of the road as you dodge a meteor shower from the sky. However, if you want to earn points, you’ll need to do some off-roading. On either side of the road is a patch of desert where street lamps and fire hydrants live and cacti flourish.
It’s the cacti and fire hydrants that are of interest here, as killing them will net you some sweet points. Of course, you’ll still need to keep an eye out for destructible comets and avoid street lamps, as hitting one breaks your car and ends the round. After earning some points, you can head to the store to buy avatars ranging from a DeLorean to a UFO.
Choose your control style.
If you’re having trouble with the default controls, just go to the Settings menu. Here, you can choose between button, joystick, swipe and tilt controls. This convenience feature is much appreciated as not everyone has the same control preferences. You can also increase the difficulty from casual to standard or hardcore to test your ability to clear obstacles.
Meteor Dash’s UI issues
A few things keep this charmingly casual game from reaching its true potential. For example, you can access the settings only when you launch the game. There are no pause or back buttons within the game and no way to access menus between rounds. So, if you want to change your settings, you have to close and reopen the app. Also, to leave the game store, you have to choose an avatar, which is not immediately obvious.
While the game’s user interface needs some work, Meteor Dash provides a Zen-like experience. Despite the looming meteor threat, the game’s low-poly 3D graphics and soothing soundtrack keep things feeling cool. The game is not complicated, yet it offers an enjoyable gaming experience.
Meteor Dash proves itself to be an attractive casual runner that is good for playing on the go. Would you like to play for hours? maybe not; However, it’s great for short gaming sessions when you want to relax as well as have fun. The UI could use some improvement, and some initial direction on how to earn points would be helpful. Still, Meteor Dash’s simple gameplay and laid-back atmosphere make it worth your time.