Masked Shooters is a multi-player, online first person shooter for Windows Phones where you can compete in teams or in a free for all format.
The game has a wide range of graphic quality settings to help optimize game play speeds and a modest selection of weapons to use as you try to blast your opponent into the netherworld.
Available for low-memory devices, Masked Shooters has potential but hard to see graphics and cumbersome gaming mechanics hold this Windows Phone game back.
There's not much to the layout
Masked Shooters menus are minimal and offer options to jump into game play, access the game's settings and view the about screen. Options deal with movement sensitivity and graphics quality.
Masked Shooters offers you the choice to create a battle room or jump into one already created. Rooms vary with their environment that include a bunker, factory and city settings. While you can boost the graphics quality in the game's settings, I found it challenging to pick out targets in most of the gaming rooms. Most rooms were simply too dark to distinguish an enemy target from any other object laying around. It often takes your opponent to shoot at you (you can see the muzzle flash) or run across the room before you can pick them up. I don't think everyone should be wearing bright orange vests but there does need to be a bit more contrast between the background and your enemy.
And that brings me to another nit. While the screen will flash with blood splatter when you get shot, there is no way to tell which direction the shots are coming from. I would have liked to have seen the blood splatter only appear from the direction of the shot to give you a fighting chance at the game.
Game Play - Let's shoot up the place
On-screen gaming control line the bottom of the screen. A directional pad sits in the lower left corner the controls your forward, backward and side movements. Fire controls and zoom controls sit in the lower right corner. The zoom control will pull your weapon up to eye level or pull up a scope view (depending on the weapon type). Speaking of which, you can be armed with anything from a sniper's rifle to an assault rifle to an RPG (the Rocket Propelled Grenade type). If I'm not mistaken, your armament is selected at random.
In the upper left corner of the screen is your health meter and gaming stats (who kills who) runs down the right corner of the gaming screen. There is a RPG (the Role Playing Game type) element at play where you will move up in rank the more kills you tally.
While the D-pad controls your player's movement, you will need to swipe at the screen to control your players orientation. This makes the mechanics rather cumbersome and don't be shocked if you accidentally hit the fire button. This isn't a big deal unless you're playing on a team and accidentally blast a teammate to shreds.
The object of the game is, as you would guess, kill your opponents before they kill you. Should the latter happen you will re-spawn to a random spot on the battlefield and you get another chance at taking out your enemy.
The game does have plenty of secret passages, tunnels and other back door approaches to help you with tactics. As with your enemy, at times these passages are difficult to pick up on (I guess that's why they call them secret).
Overall Impression
I liked the concept behind Masked Shooters but the execution needs a little fine-tuning. The positives include a challenging game format, plenty of competition and team members (there was never a shortage of players when I tested the game) and some interesting weapons choices (going toe to toe with an RPG is never dull).
The negatives include cumbersome mechanics and hard to pick up graphics. Do either take out Masked Shooters? I don't think so but it does make game play frustrating. If the developer cannot brighten things up a bit and dial in movement mechanics, that frustration will likely cause players to shelve the game.
Again, Masked Shooters has the potential of being an entertaining online, multiplayer game for Windows Phone. As is though, patience and an eagle eye are required.
Note: While Masked Shooters is available for low-memory devices, it is a little laggy requiring you to dial down the graphics quality and even then, it isn't the smoothest experience.
- Masked Shooters - Windows Phone 8 - Free - Store Link
