Don’t Shoot Yourself

LQ: 9.3

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Brain grade: 9.5
Fun score: 9.1

Game Type: ESRB Rating: N/A Platform/Console: , LWK Recommended Age: 6+ Thinking Skills Used: , ,

iTunes

Don’t Shoot Yourself is a unique puzzle game that appears simple but proves quite a wonderful surprise for those who enjoy a fun, puzzling challenge. Your ship, which is confined to a unique space within each level, is firing out one shot after another, and you must avoid getting yourself shot if you’d like to stay alive! Bullets are always reacting with something, like (in)visible walls, portals, and barriers. They may ricochet off walls and come at you with force, or they can soar from one end of a portal and out the other end. All you have to do is stay away until the clock runs out. The use of speedy reflexes, strong awareness of your surrounds, and cunning strategy, are all important parts of success in the game. Each level delivers a new shape and new rules to create an exciting new experience. Considering the simplicity of game controls and the wide range of acceptable time scores for making level progress, Don’t Shoot Yourself can be enjoyed by players six and older.

 


THIS GAME IS GOOD FOR KIDS WHO NEED HELP WITH:

Flexibility

Adapting and adjusting to changing conditions and expectations.

photo 3Each level of Don't Shoot Yourself presents a new challenge for the player to overcome. For starters, the shapes and interacting objects/walls are always different. One level is a Figure 8, while another is a Ying Yang. Furthermore, the way shapes behave can even be unique from each other. Take the Ying Yang: in the blue half, bullets move quickly, but in the red half, they move very slowly. In another example, the Radioactive level has borders that expand and shrink in various places the whole time. Between levels and even during crazy ones like Radioactive, the player has to assess the situation and think of the most appropriate way to respond to it, in order to do well. Strategies may overlap, but she will ultimately need to come up with a lot of different methods to avoid getting shot, level after level. Sometimes a method that worked in a previous level might be ineffective in a new and/or more complex level. Being able to think intelligently while sometimes reacting on the fly when situations keep changing, will help her do well and collect maximum stars so that she can keep unlocking new and puzzling adventures.

Planning

Developing a systematic approach for setting and achieving goals.

Before starting each and every level, it's important for her success to make an assessment of what the best way to move about the shape is going to be. This includes considering possible pitfalls and also ideal areas to aim for. She may want to move horizontally, in a zig-zag fashion, up and down, or any number of ways, all depending on what she is faced with in each unique level. Making a plan on how to get around without getting hit by her own bullets is a smart way to save energy on wasted efforts and give her a better chance at earning two or even three stars each time. She must take many factors into account when developing her methods and strategies, but doing so will allow her to avoid mistakes and earn more stars than if she blindly approached every level (and basically ran around frantic and hurried).

Focus

Getting started and then maintaining attention and effort to tasks.

A great deal of attention goes into keeping an eye on what feels like a gazillion bullets ricocheting off walls, flying through portals, and chasing you within the confines of a unique shape. A second of distraction could be quite fatal, which makes maintaining focus on the game ultra important. Also, the way that movement is controlled can take a bit of getting used to, since it's done via a split screen or a virtual joystick, and you aren't really touching anything within the level or shape itself. Some levels can be just plain hard, too, so Focus skills are useful in keeping the player "in the game" and motivated to overcome the challenge. She might have to keep at it but with some trial and error, and especially with the addition of Flexibility and Planning skills, she will earn three stars for every level that she wants it.

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