Rescue Party Facebook Game Review

Rescue Party is a new Facebook game sporting a rather generic name but being a unique offering combining aspects from “gotta catch ‘em all” type games, farming foods (that you use to rescue creatures on different planets), to village decoration, crafting items, and space exploration. It is addictive and well rounded with the inclusion of missions to complete.

The basic gameplay formula consists of planting your crops (which aren’t the usual farming crops but instead are items such as Meatballs or Flour Power), each appealing to different species of creatures and some being more effective at different planets. When the crops are ready you harvest them and that’s where the real fun comes in in Rescue Party.

Using your energy:
Most actions take energy. Energy regenerates over time, can be bought or requested as gifts. Traveling to planets takes energy, plus dropping each food. Flying back does not cost energy. Harvesting crops takes some. Some interactions with your creatures will also cost you energy, such as recieving a present from one.  Almost all of your actions will gain you experience, and as you level up you will gain access to more items, ships, foods, etc.

Going to space:
You have a space ship that will let you travel to other planets that have endangered creatures. When you’re there you use energy to drop a food of your choice and a little creature will come and eat it. The creature will then get beamed up into your space ship’s cargo and you can take it home. Only some creatures will stay with you (if hearts appear when the creature is beamed up that means it wants to stay with you). However each one you rescue counts towards the individual species’ rescue status. All start out endangered, but once you’ve rescued five of one species they will be “At Risk” and so on. This is a fun formula and having that special creature want to come home with you is exciting. You can’t rename your creatures, but it makes finding the perfect creature all the more exciting!

Beware the Evil Weevils:
Sometimes they will try to steal the food you drop, be quick and whack ‘em and they’ll drop that food! They’ll also sometimes appear at your planet making your animals rather scared so be sure to whack them then too!

Your ship:
When you first start out your ship can hold only four creatures per trip, but you can upgrade your ship to hold more and you can upgrade your ship’s tier which will help you rescue higher ranking creatures. Your ship can be customized with alot of different looks that are purely aesthtic.

Back at your planet:
All of the creatures you’ve rescued will wander around, sometimes interacting with other creatures. They are interesting as they usually stay near their home (if you’ve made them one) but do venture away.  You can pet your creatures to make them happy. Once they are happy they will have give you random presents ranging from coins to rare items. You can usually get a present from each of your animals about once a day.

Getting more creatures:
If you’ve reached your current animal limit any new rescues will wait outside the fence of your planet. You can either release a current creature you have to make room for a new one, buy an animal house if needed to house more of the same species, or upgrade your planets size and creature limit.

Houses:
You can ony have one of each species until you build a species house. The houses are all very nicely designed and unique for each species. Once you’ve built (and aquired the building materials from you’re friends) you can then move in up to two of that species. Each house can be upgraded to accomadate three of a species. Each upgrade takes more materials that you will need to have gifted to you. You can of course post requests via your Facebook wall feed.

Cooking items:
You can also cook special rare recipies in the cooking pot. These are the only way to attract the rarest creatures. You can buy a spice grinder that will make spices to use in the cooking pot. These will need to be upgarded with materials too so you can make harder recipies.

The store and money:
The store is stocked with a nice amount of items that can be bought with coins, and there also items to be bought with cash. You earn one cash for each level up and also by logging in and collecting the daily bonus on the seventh day if done without missing a day, or purchased with real money.

Interactions With Friends: 4/5
The feeds to post to your Facebook wall are nice and varied, with the typical level up bonus or request for items, plus more unique ones for achievements and short videos when you’ve rescued a certain number of a species. They aren’t however over intusive with constant “Would you like to post this to your wall” messages.

You can also visit your neighbors and fertilze their crops and collect an item daily from their house. You won’t see them when they come to visit you though.

Graphics: 4/5
Would be a 5/5 but the lack of a full screen option hurts the game. The graphics are all very nice and the animals move and act well. A top-notch looking Facebook game.

It may look too cutesy for some, but this isn’t a generic “rescue animals” game. It starts out with a Star Wars “In a galaxy far far away” intro and has a Pokemon “gotta catch ‘em all ” feel to it (without the battles).

Hookability (How well the game keeps you entertained and wanting to come back for more): 5/5
It is very addicting trying to get the best looking planet among your friends, leveling up, and most importantly having those special creatures at your planet. That alone should keep most people hooked but the additional missions, farming, and crafting items is enough to keep anyone busy.

Overall: 5/5
The developers are active on their discussion forum, answering questions and taking into consideration players’ feedback. They are constantly making improvements to the game. This is an up and coming Facebook game that should be able to challenge the big ones as it gains momentum. Definetly give it a try!