Sheep

Pros • Very cool cinematics • Different breeds of sheep act differently • Creative, colorful worlds and levels	Cons • What sort of a collection of legendary sheep herders doesn’t include Babe? • Mouse and Keyboard controls are occasionally frustrating
Bottom Line A gem of a puzzle game in sheep’s clothing. The way I hear it, sheep have long served as an entertainment substitute. Long, cold, isolated nights in the mountain pastures, where there’s only one thing soft, warm, yielding and able to overlook your cross-eyed, putrid herdsman stench; Pucker up and say, “baaAAAAaaaaaa!” Dealing with sheep is always pretty straightforward; herd the fuzzy little flockers from where you have them to where you want them. Sheep is exactly that, a sheep herding game, only instead of passing peacefully through pastoral mountain pastures, you’ll be herding sheep through danger-filled farms, castles, space stations, factories, cities and other sheep-hazardous environments. It’s an effective little puzzle game reminiscent of Lemmings.

A large flock of sheep is a fractious thing, likely to spook and be frightened off in all directions, while an individual sheep is a timorous, unwise creature, more nervous of the approaching shepherd than of giant hammers, threshing machines, butchers, high voltage, or even shark-infested ice cream vats. And, Little Bo Peep, can hardly leave them alone to drag their tails home behind them, since they are being rounded up from their homes and they don’t know where they’re supposed to be going. In a strange twist on Douglas Adams’ Hitch-Hiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, it appears (through brilliant computer-animated cut-scenes), that those docile, pastoral little ruminants are, in fact, an intergalactic space-faring species, come to Earth to observe; but like absent-minded professors, content to graze and enjoy the bounty of the Earth, they have forgotten the purpose of their visit. Perhaps due to the failure of the Kyoto Summit, and the general human-induced decline in the Earth’s overall environment, the mother ship has returned to reclaim her flocking, fuzzy children. Then again, it may have something to do with the evil goats!?

In any case, the game, Sheep consists of a chain of levels in differently themed worlds, through which the shepherd must guide a flock of sheep. No easy task considering all the hazards, even if you are Bo Peep.

Each level takes a little puzzle solving, reminiscent of Lemmings, and some careful herding to get the required ten sheep safely to their waiting transport. One misstep can see twelve sheep squashed under a car, huge wooden mallet or to some other gruesome death. With the careful herding required, occasional frustrations with the controls arise, especially if you’re trying to use the mouse or keyboard, but overall, the game is quite successful, particularly in the artificial stupidity department; the sheep seem to react like sheep. It won’t grab you by the lapel like, say, Tetris, and compel you to play for mind-numbing hours on end, but it will keep you coming back, frustrated, yelling, “flock!” as your sheep do something stupid again and get themselves killed. Sheep is straight-forward, fun, and original gaming, well worth a look.

Info & Screenshots