Space Giraffe

Space Giraffe does an incredible job of tying score to performance, and the feeling that there's always a way to squeeze a few more points out of a level provides amazing replay value.

Space Giraffe doesn't just hand out achievements. When you finally get one under your belt, you feel like you've earned it.

Feels amazingly fresh and new. [Issue 26, p.118]

Just as the film industry has had David Lynch and Stanley Kubrick, or the music industry Laurie Anderson and Phillip Glass, or the art world its Salvador Dali, so to does the videogame industry have its own creative maverick in Jeff Minter. I'm glad he exists and I'm ecstatic that he's still doing what he wants, how he wants. Best 400-points I've ever spent.

Original, often breathtakingly beautiful retro-styled shooter. [Nov 2007, p.85]

This is a simple game at heart, a game about learning the rules, becoming really good at manipulating the elements, and then getting a huge high score to brag about. And who could argue with that? [Oct 2007, p.98]

Its uniquely British humour and gentle progression system (the ability to restart levels with saved high-score is a hugely welcome feature) provide light relief to what is, essentially, one of the most unorthodox and alien gaming experiences you'll ever have.

Play it until the scoring system clicks and it'll have you forever. At 400 points, it's a bargain. [Nov 2007, p.96]

Space Giraffe won’t appeal to everyone. It demands you play by its rules, adjust to its learning curve.

It’s hard not to think of Space Giraffe as one of the best value games currently available. [Nov 2007, p.126]

Space Giraffe is the type of game that high score tables were made for, but only if you have the patience to figure it all out.

As much as I personally love it, there are plenty of people out there who will outright loathe it. Many won't manage to see past the colors and will simply be unable to play the game. It can also be deeply unforgiving, and while there are concessions in the form of the automatic save, you'll usually advance two or three levels and then hit an absolute brick wall of a stage that will take multiple tries to finish.

Space Giraffe is an extremely weird and well-designed arcade game, but its unique brand of madness isn't for everyone.

The game offers a very frustrating learning curve but once you pass that you’ll uncover a pretty decent game with a lot of replay value.

A game that benefits from extended demo play before taking the leap to the full version.

When the (catchy) electronic music is pounding and you're in tune with the game, it's an exciting, transcendent few seconds; it just never lasts, as you're brought back to earth by the sheer inanity of what you're involved in.

The game is simple to play, but unfortunately nearly impossible to master, due to the overwhelming amount of swirling colors on the screen.

Ultimately, the game falls apart when the player is bombarded with harmless background colours and life-sucking enemy bullets at the same time. The two become almost indecipherable from one another.

It’s absolutely functional and undeniably one of a kind, the product of a truly creative mind - but it’s so atypical and requires so much effort to appreciate that very few will find it truly worthwhile.

Maybe if the gameplay were more endearing to the casual gamer, or if the visuals didn’t make half of the people who play the game foam at the mouth, or perhaps if the levels weren’t designed to cheat the player, then maybe, just maybe Space Giraffe would have been as cool as its designers had hoped.

A game that will only appeal to a few people. These players will have to be dedicated to the task of figuring this thing out, like a grueling math problem or logic puzzle.

We say the gameplay is 'deceptively simple', because there's effectively two buttons. [Nov 2007, p.106]