Phoenix (kind of) rises for the iPhone and iPod Touch

Galaxian, this is all your fault. If you hadn't taken so many quarters from me in my youth, why I could turn a blind eye to all of the similar games that have followed. But no. I vow to avenge my lost quarters and tokens by beating all of your spawn, one of which is the subject of today's video review: Phoenix.

Phoenix has the same hero ship-at-the-bottom, enemy swarm-at-the-top gameplay as Galaxian and other games. What it adds is a ton of fire power, as in dozens of incoming enemy fireballs, bombs, etc. The good news is, unlike some of those other games, you only need to protect the relatively small area of your ship's cockpit from the barrage to stay alive.

Despite great graphics, and what should be near non-stop action, there's something flat about the game. Maybe all that firepower right from the beginning doesn't give it anywhere to go, or maybe a few early power-ups would move things along. Still, you could do worse in the app store....

Here's a look:

Phoenix in the App Store.