Space Spacy - The videogame equivalent of being punched

Space Spacy is Space Invaders, only you’re the invader, have no mates and, worryingly, no weaponry and no fuel. Planning, eh?

The only way to defeat your foes is to fire up your propulsion system, and ram the nasty critters shooting at you into oblivion.

Right from the off, Space Spacy feels like a kind of intergalactic game of chicken. It’s heavy on risk, doused in a kind of hardcore gaming brutality, but has a compelling edge that will have you coming back for more.

For the most part, the mechanics of the game are very smart. Enemies fire upwards, and you deftly dodge their projectiles by tilting your device.

Simultaneously, you have to grab gold coins falling from the top of the screen, five of which are enough to give your ship a short boost downwards on a tap.

It’s also pretty clear this isn’t a game that takes itself too seriously. All manner of space garbage floats through the void, and much of it can be used as a temporary shield.

You’ll often find your little astronaut clambering aboard a flying carpet or broomstick, zigzagging back and forth like a maniac, desperately avoiding the bullets littering the screen.

There are a couple of mis-steps. You start right at the top of the screen, making the beginning of every stage overly difficult, purely because you can't predict where the gold coins will appear.

Only when you’ve performed your first boost do you have a fighting chance. The game as a whole continues this insanely hard trend.

It says something that having finally emerged victorious from two standard levels and the very first boss battle, then getting my spacebutt kicked on the fourth level, I checked Game Center to find myself ranked ninth out of nearly 7,500 players.

Perhaps a less crazed difficultly level would have allowed Space Spacy to chime with a wider audience.

As it is, this title will find favour with a small hardcore of players who like the videogame equivalent of being repeatedly punched in the face, and it has just enough charm to warrant the punishment it dishes out.