The Blue Flamingo

It is a surprisingly solid indie shooter with an interesting visual presentation based on real models imported into the game. While the gameplay is indeed rather basic, the fundamentals (skate-y movement not withstanding) are mercifully solid thankfully all things considered. Enemies go down in just a couple of shots and while movement is less than precise as previously noted, meaning you are likely to inadvertently collide with enemy ships and bullets occasionally. The game wisely works around this for the most part by giving the player a fairly forgiving health bar and a recharging bomb. Generally I might scoff at these kinds of simplifications, but in this case I really thinks it it works to the game's credit given the relative lack of additional gameplay depth.

This game went on my wishlist after seeing it on an episode of Ross's Game Dungeon. Eventually got it on sale for super cheap. Definitely not worth full price. It plays like an old Flash game. Very rudimentary shoot 'em up with minimal enemy variety, zero weapon variety, no powerups, and "upgrades" between levels are nearly useless. The idea of the level backgrounds being live action dioramas is novel, but unfortunately they didn't film these in a high resolution or framerate so it looks awful in any resolution above 720p. Honestly the art direction ends up hamstringing the game. Fun for a few minutes, but that's it. Disappointing overall. It really looks like the developers put a lot of love and effort into it, just not where it counts.

[h1]The Blue Flamingo — I'm recommending the craftsmanship, not the game[/h1] [b]TL;DR: Thumbs up, but conditionally. The game itself is a very basic shmup. What earns the recommendation is how it was made.[/b] [h2]This thing was built by hand, physically[/h2] Might and Delight, a small studio out of Stockholm making games since 2010, didn't model this world — they built it. A roughly 32-foot (about 10 metre) handcrafted set was constructed specifically for the game, along with countless props and vehicles. All of it was then filmed and photographed, green-screened, and turned into sprites. The vehicles were pulled along on strings and magnets. Every explosion and rocket flare in this game is an actual firecracker going off on a model set. [b]That is the entire reason I'm giving this a thumbs up.[/b] In 2026, in the middle of the AI era, that kind of stubborn, physical, handmade work is genuinely rare, and it deserves applause. They didn't have the budget for something bigger back in 2014 — but they made something real, and I'd rather reward that today than pretend it doesn't count because it's twelve years old. [i][Screenshot 1: the train running along the desert stretch in …

Cool art, boring gameplay,

Basically a shoot em up done with a particular graphical design. While it's cool at first to look at the real life set design that was created, the action, the levels, and more just aren't fun, are very repetitive, and the controls are rather stiff and weak. It's a great concept demo for the type of game the developer was trying to make, but to make a game with entertainment that brings you in, slowly adds more gameplay gimmicks and such, it needs to be more developed. What you get is what you get from the first time you leave the hangar and take flight. I'm seeking more in a game and would encourage you to seek a different game if you're looking to be entertained.

Ok