There's quite a few twin stick shooters on the App Store, but Meteor Blitz is up there with the absolute best of them. It's super slick, with near instantaneous load times, and maintains a constant, fast framerate throughout. It also doesn't let up on the amount of visual effects such as particles, explosions and bright flare like sparkles, and the overall graphical quality is superb. In other words, it completely outdoes our expectations.

Because Meteor Blitz is hard to capture in a single screenshot (or even a gallery of them). Meteors are hurling downwards towards you from the sky, fading into view with a little red circle denoting where they will land, enemy ships artfully land and form kaleidoscopic patterns, and just about everything on the screen is combustible. Blast a meteor and it will break down into smaller pieces, much akin to Asteroids - and shoot down the smaller pieces or enemy ships and you'll collect rings.

Rings can be used to upgrade six areas of your ship - your four guns, the boost power of the craft, and the maximum speed. Each of the guns has it's own strength - the laser gun that is a great all rounder, the flamethrower that's great on icy meteors, and the ice gun which is great for hot, volcanic meteors - finally the gravity gun is an attachment for all three of the projectile launchers and is activated by a double tap on the fire wheel. Basically, it sucks a helpless enemy or asteroid in and lets you throw it out at enemies for brutal damage. In addition to your unlimited arsenal, the game also offers a limited supply of devastating bombs that clear the screen, activated by shaking the device - and a boost power that allows you to zip across the screen very quickly for a brief second or two. This has a medium recharge time.

We are incredibly impressed with the game's save anywhere mechanic. Combined with the extremely quick loading times it made for some great pick-up and blast action - indeed, the game also has a handy auto pause feature, that immediately pauses when the touch sensor loses both of your thumbs. It made taking these screenshots very easy, as it literally freezes the game mid frame. Of course, this doesn't work for every game - but because it's so fast and fluid here (simply return your thumbs to the control sticks to resume) it feels wonderful.

It's not often that you'll get such a high level of quality in a game like this...

And you'll need auto pause too - to give your digits a quick breather. The action is swift, and you'll have to make the best use of the tools at your disposal - quickly reacting to enemy traps by a shake, using the boost to get out of a sticky situation, or just by intelligently using the right weapon at the right time. Even though you can upgrade these weapons and craft enhancements, the difficulty of the game isn't easy.

You get two modes to play in, Arcade and Survival. Arcade has six different planets to play through, and survival is self explanatory - one arena that keeps increasing in difficulty until you lose all your lives. Lives can be picked up from the bonus spheres that drop down, as well as bombs, and two handy special powers - a slow powerup that slows all the obstacles on the screen for a few seconds, and a rings powerup that makes your ship a ring magnet until you die or the round is over. This is one of the most useful as you'll need all the rings you can get to upgrade. You can also find a bonus that restores your shield, which allows one direct hit without loss of life.

The gameplay alone is enough to pick up Meteor Blitz. It's not often that you'll get such a high level of quality in a game like this, especially considering the low price point. An impressive featureset that boasts one of the best pause/save systems that we've seen, achievements, global and local high scores makes this title one we'd highly recommend - to anyone and everyone that's a fan of arcade shooting games.

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