Doodle jump is one of those games that you hear people say clich� things like �easy to pick up, impossible to put down.� Or sometimes �A game you can quickly get a handle on but a lifetime to master.� You have heard them before, but it really is true about this one.
The game is very simple to explain. Take your little green alien looking creature and jump as high as you can, while avoiding obstacles, enemies, and falling past the bottom of the screen. The gamplay is akin to old school arcade games like Q-Bert and Pogo Joe for the C64. The built in accelerometer lets you tilt your device left or right to direct your creature to either side. Also the screen wraps around, so you can make a hard left off the screen and end up coming back from the right side of the screen, and vice versa. It took seconds to get a grasp on the controls, and was easy to get to a certain height. Then once I realized that if I tapped on the screen my alien would shoot pellets straight up, that would in turn destroy other creatures, I was able to get much higher.
The visuals all have that �hand drawn� look to them, which is where the �Doodle� comes from in the title. Also as you get higher and higher, holes start to appear in the virtual paper than you can fall into. Most of the time you jump from green platform to the next green platform to get higher. There also are springs that will make you jump much much higher than a regular jump. Pitfalls are also in the game, like the afore mentioned alien enemies, some that move and some that are stationary. There are also moving platforms as well as brown platforms that will break as soon as you land on them sending you falling off the screen to your doom.
The sound is very simple, nothing much to mention about it, Though it is the source of my only gripe with the game. The lack of itunes music support. I find it odd on any game released now on the iPhone and iPod Touch not to allow you to listen to your own music library. It's a small issue, but one worth mentioning.
The replay factor is the big seller for this type of game. Play once to get used to it, play again to get better, then the hooks are in you. Doodle Jump makes it easy to track how well others are doing in the game. As you ascend higher and higher, you will see usernames to the right of the screen marking the height of previous players. High scores are also tracked through a leader board found in the menu.
For such a low price of 99cents you could do a lot worse. This game creates that �I can do better this time� feel, and is so simple to enjoy that you will want to play it over and over. It's a cheap game that is well put together and well developed.

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