The APPera

Normally I’d warn people against using stairs, but with Secret Exit’s second iPhone game I say jump on right in!

Stair Dismount ($2.99)

This dev team’s first foray in Zen Bound was both a critical and iPhone community success and thankfully, Stair Dismount doesn’t let us down. It’s another perfect little time waster made with finesse that should keep you glued for hours.

Presentation

There’s nothing to cry about here. They opted for dark colors and different textures for the theme which I must say look pretty cool. I can’t say I’m surprised as this is what I expected from them basing on their previous effort.

Controls

The control is fairly simple. Drag the arrow around any part of the body you want to apply force to then just tap the orange circle. The pink bar above the orange circle tells you how much force exactly is to be applied.

Look at the bottom right… camera button. At any point, you can simply tap this and take a photo of your dummy dangling down the stairs. And oh! You can even email and publish the photo to Facebook.

Gameplay

Stair Dismount is pretty straightforward: toss your dummy off the stairs and attempt to break his bones the most you can. Analyzing the perfect hit location, force applied and of course practice makes you a pro in dismounting.

There’s currently a total of 6 different stairs to dismount your dummies on. Each stair varies in color and difficulty. Some have gaps in between the stairs while some are spiral. Like I said, multiple tries get you best scores.

The other fancy feature this game has is the ability to choose a photo from your media library OR your friends’ default Facebook pic as the dummy’s face. Resize it as you wish and voilah! Throw your enemies of stairs.

Suggestion

I thought the whole upload photo system is broken and a little weak at this point. Reason 1) why can’t we use the camera and THEN use the photo? Why do we have to exit first, take a pic then use it. Reason 2) Why is the shape of the face square? I was hoping a little more oval-ish.

The biggest letdown for me however is online leaderboards. In a world where we have numerous social networking platforms for the iPhone, it’s somewhat unacceptable to not have this feature. Use a platform or create your own. Stair Dismount needs it bad.

Conclusion

With a few tweaks, Stair Dismount can really level up to Zen Bound. There might have been a few misses, but we get where Secret Exit is coming from and are very addicted to the game.

Even at the game’s current state, Stair Dismount is still the best “dummy” game in the store. The dummy’s renderings to overall presentation is A++. I mean really?!? Who can pass up the chance to virtually toss your enemies (or even friends) off stairs? WHO?

Related posts:

1. Stair Dismount: Secret Exit’s Follow Up To Their Hit Game Zen Bound
2. Stair Dismount Wins IGF Mobile 2010 Award, FREE Version Released
3. Max Injury Will Cause You Great “Pain” For FREE Today Only
4. Indie Developers To Langdell (Re: EDGE Trademarks): S-U-C-K IT!
5. Top 50 iPhone Games 2009, Part 5: The Rest Of The Best!