The APPera

**Update: Zen Bound Currently at Top 10 US Paid Charts**

What do you do when you meet perfection? Do you say hi? Do you ask why and how? Well you guys should come prepared to answer that because Zen Bound, my friends, is perfection.

Zen Bound ($4.99)

Those darn Apple guys took forever to approve arguably the finest gem on the AppStore currently. Zen Bound which is a take off from the PC game Zen Bondage involves tons of 3D wooden objects in which you wrap rope around to. Secret Exit teams up with Chillingo to deliver this one heckuva game…

Zen Bound started creating  noise the moment the first screenshot was released. Many have called it “pushing the iPhone gaming envelope”. Even a couple of award giving bodies have chosen to officially merit Secret Exit’s efforts:

• IMGA Excellence in 3D
• IGF Mobile Audio Achivement and Best iPhone Game Finalist

Calm Your Senses

The gameplay is very simple. You are given a specified amount of rope and you wrap it around 3D wooden objects.

It is not timed, and you are scored depending on how much you’ve covered the object. 70% is the minimum to be able to unlock other levels.You move the object left and right with one finger, two fingers to fully rotate objects in any direction. Using accelerometer, the gamer can vary the location where the rope starts. Levels are grouped into three trees (the third tree being released as a free update in March).

Amazing Sights

We tell you, the graphics and animations on this game ARE something. Zen Bound has the greatest looking level selector ever. It is fully interactible and the elements surrounding it are injected with great polish and physics up to the smallest details.

Levels are contained inside the little level boxes dangling off trees. Flowers bloom depending on the amount of completion per level. (Tip: Pay attention to the bloom animation and how it shoots off golden bubble thinggies) With the Main Menu alone, you’d know Zen Bound is of a different level:

As the rope touches the surface of the wooden object, the object gets painted some color. When you finish a level by wrapping the rope around the finish nail, the object glows and you exit out of the level:

Soundtrack

The outstanding soundtrack is by Ghost Monkey which is available as a free download to all Zen Bound buyers. It is comprised mostly of down tempo beats and rhythms that just taps into your soul thus providing the zen like feeling.

Ghost Monkey’s composition simply complements the gameplay and provides a rather soothing and unique iPhone experience.

Future Zen

In the future, we would like to wrap around the nail once to finish a level. With the current end level implementation, you simply have to touch the finish nail once and then the level exits. We have touched it accidentally a couple of times and had to restart the level.

Speaking of which, there should be an option to be able to start on the current wrap percentage. For example, if you left the level at 71%, we would love to be able to go back and start in at 71%.

Besides these two minor blemishes, Zen Bound is nothing short of perfection. Secret Exit managed to provide us with a very unique and innovative gameplay that is sure to rock the AppStore and the world. We mean tons of people anticipated the game with only screenshots and videos to work with, let alone a release to finally try it hands on. The level of finesse the game has is insurpassable at the moment.

We highly applaud  Secret Exit for giving us such a high quality app. With it’s first version release, we could have easily waited for the game a couple of months til the inception of the Premium AppStore, and we’d be more than happy to pay big bucks for this game.

What are you waiting for? Go grab it!

Related posts:

1. Zen Bound: AppStore Turns 1 Giveaway 1
2. Zen Bound: Secret Exit Takes Two Steps Forward
3. Zen Bound Lite OUT!
4. Zen Bound 2, The Sequel To The iPhone Hit, Heads To The iPad!
5. **UPDATED**Breaking: Zen Bound Currently Top 54!!!