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I've been trying to think up one word to accurately describe Flyspray, the the best I can come up with is "Dopey." It's a dopey game. But it's also the sort of game that makes me smile. It's flawed in just about every possible way, but it's so endearingly flawed that it's very nearly magnificent. And I don't mean this in a cynical "ha ha this game is so bad that you have to laugh at it" way. Flyspray is like that affectionate old dog your cousin has that keeps chewing up furniture and peeing on the carpet. It's bad, but you can't help but love it anyway.
I'm not entirely sure how to categorize Flyspray's gameplay. I guess it's sort of a minigame collection, although there are only about 5 "minigames," 4 of which are nearly identical. Basically, there's a mode where you defend your restaurant from incoming flies using a can of flyspray or a flyswatter, and mode where you defend your restaurant from incoming flies using high-tech deployable turrets--overkill, maybe, but pretty awesome nonetheless. The flyspray/flyswatter mode isn't really all that impressive: flies swarm towards an open door on the left side of the screen and you have to spray/swat them before they get inside. Once all the flies are dead, you progress to the next "level." It's moderately challenging and entertaining for about a minute or so, but it's nothing that's going to keep you playing for days to come. The turret mode would fare a little better--it's just a generic but playable tower defense game--save that it's way WAY too easy. Like, easy to the point where I literally placed a few towers, and went off to play Quake for about five minutes. When I came back, nothing had managed to get past my defenses. I actually stayed up late seeing how far I could get without dying, and I got up to something like 500 flies killed before I gave up and went to bed. If you want to crush your enemies with ease, this is the mode for you, but those looking for a challenge should seek elsewhere.
Graphics are...meh. They're functional. The Flyspraying animation looks pretty good, but everything else is just your basic MSPaint images without any real sense of style or consistency. And there are some noticeable "chinks." For instance, there's no sort of swatting animation for the flyswatter, or even an accompanying sound effect, and in tower defense mode flies stay facing the same direction no matter which way they're walk...err...flying.
Sound effects are also pretty sparse, although there's nothing terribly wrong with what's there. There's a "swooshing" noise for the flyspray can and a few lazer blasts for the deployable turrets. And considering how many fantastic YYG games I've played that didn't bother adding sound effects, it's nice that Advanced Electronic Games did even the little bit he did. Now the music...ahh, the music. There's no way to describe the music except to say that it is absolutely sublime for all the wrong reasons. Now as a composer myself, I know how deceptively difficult it can be to create your own musical tracks, especially using the midi keyboard improvisational technique that Advanced Electronic Games was obviously using. And...well, let's just say that Flyspray's music exhibits the toll of this difficulty.
But now here's the catch. I love Flyspray. I really do. I mean, it's just about the most flawed YYG game I've yet played, and probably deserves a low score and a dismissive review...but it's got so much enthusiasm and almost naive joy behind it that it's literally impossible to hate. Flyspray is like a crusty old man with a fiddle, sawing out "Orange Blossom Special" and "Cripple Creek" at a breakneck pace. Sure, his intonation may be horrible and he may have no sense of musicality, phrasing, dynamics, or anything like that...but to apply that sort of criticism would be to completely miss the point. It's the same way with Flyspray. So, despite my better judgement, I'm giving it a 3/5.
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