Sheep

The Good
Well, when I first found this game it looked very much like one of my favourite games from younger days, "Lemmings". Guide sheep across different worlds to the exit using a human or dog "herder". The storyline also looked cool - I still like the idea that sheep are an alien race who came to spy on us but grew stupid over the generations. The music is also incredibly cool, I ended up singing along as I played which is a good sign. Graphics are nicely done.

There is a system of seven worlds, each with 4 levels which can be completed in any order before starting the next world. The exception is world seven which has only one level. This was quite a nice concept allowing some freedom of choice of levels, although not exactly original.

I also liked the Replay system. In Sheep once you complete a level you can't play it again - in Standard mode. However Replay mode allows you to play all the levels you have already played and there is a separate high-score table for each level in Replay mode as well as the overall Standard table.

Oh yes - and the bonus games are also VERY cool - a nice addition and often more fun than the game itself! There are six of these, one per world, which can only be accessed if the special gold sheep is collected in each level in that world.

The Bad
Pretty much anything else. Firstly as mentioned above this game seems like "Lemmings". It isn't. In the Lemmings games you knew exactly where the lemmings would go, and any mistakes you felt were your fault, or the mouse's - but never the game's.

Sheep, on the other hand, is very unpredictable. The general concept is that moving towards the Sheep scares them away, but this makes it impossible to control large groups of Sheep. The general feeling is of "you stupid * sheep! Don't go that way! There's a trap there..."

Traps - the other major problem. Far too many traps and monsters which will either kill or turn over your sheep - which means you have to pick the damn things up.

Carrying your sheep is also fairly easy - useful when you need one sheep to sit on a button, say, to open a door. But on a large number of levels I simply found it easier to carry the sheep one by one to the exit. This works fine on the Easy difficulty, but above that there are too many sheep and not enough time. ("Easy" is not, by the way - I have not completed the game even on this difficulty).

Apart from the difficulty though, some things were pointless. For example you have 4 herders and 4 types of sheep - you have to use the same herder each time and each breed once per world. Supposedly the breeds and herders have different characteristics. As far as I could tell there was no real difference between the breeds apart from appearance, and the only differences between herders were speed. This was an area which I felt could have been much better done - make choosing which breed to use more of a strategic element.

The Bottom Line
Similar in concept to "Lemmings" but much harder and not properly thought out. A shame really as the concept is quite neat - if only the control system were a little easier to understand and the breed system better planned this could be a nifty little game. As it is, I would only get this if you have an inexhaustible supply of patience - you'll need it.