Savage Moon

The interface for all of this - as well as upgrades, research and the useful 'hurry next wave' button - is all accessed by a press of the X button and a quick poke around the d-pad, which is simple and intuitive and doesn't complicate the heat of battle unnecessarily. As solutions to the problem of RTS-style controls on consoles go, developer Fuzzylogic has hit upon something elegant and functional, although scope for use in anything more complex is perhaps limited.

In fact, despite the massively hectic nature of a great deal of the gameplay, the clean-cut menus ensure that you never feel swamped, lost or out of control. Placing and upgrading turrets is generally a quick, accurate process and uncomplicated HUD bars tell you when research is complete or when a new wave will begin. It's slick and crisp, contrasting nicely with the swarms of beasts being disgorged in the background.

Graphics all round are relatively functional, and, although pretty enough up close, strategy dictates that you won't be making the most of them if you want to know what's going on in the bigger picture. There are some nice animations though, especially during tower upgrades. The sound also deserves a mention for its hoarse squeals, techy whines and satisfying booms, but you'll not be overwhelmed.

Inevitably though, there are some niggles. Target-selection is ruthlessly automatic, and very nearly dead enemies are sometimes abandoned by turrets in favour of a healthier, more distant bug less likely to sneak into your mine. It only causes real problems a few times, but is enough to frustrate during tougher sections. Towers exhibit idiocy in other ways, too. Mine-laying towers often spend time deploying on the rocky outcrops, where the mines explode instantly and harmlessly, and other towers go into 'sleep' unless constantly stimulated by attackers, and will waste a precious second or two warming up and aiming again.

The occasional 'boss' enemies are also something of a bugbear. They'll follow unpredictable paths toward your mine, completely ignoring the routes taken by the rank-and-file, and therefore avoid most of your defences. Annoyingly, if they then destroy your base it's game over. If you don't take note of their route when you first encounter them, and defend appropriately, you'll end up repeating the same level more than once.

Repetition is a factor throughout. There are only so many mindless chitin monsters you can mow down before you start to not care, and there's certainly less incentive to defend the game's faceless planet-rapers than the cute-faced villagers of PixelJunk Monsters. Each moon, whilst being slightly different in colour and having different arrangements of paths, is also pretty similar to the last, and drab with it. Even the wide array of weaponry doesn't really alleviate the duplication; simply adopting a shock-and-awe strategy with a huge number of mortars is more effective than spending the time and resources researching the more esoteric turrets.

Replay value is increased at least by the punishing Vengeance mode, where the waves keep crashing against you no matter how many you destroy. It's unlikely to rekindle the flame of your interest if you get bored before you finish the worlds available, however, and only the most obsessive will find long-term pleasure in racking up high scores, despite the online leaderboards.