Rolando is a quirky mixture of puzzle solving and platforming, as you try to lead the Rolandos and their prince, the royalty and rather gluttonous king, to safety. Rolando was developed by HandCircus and it was published by ngmoco, Inc. This game was released for the iPhone on 18th December, 2008 and it uses the Box2D game engine.
Rolando's gameplay turns around navigation of the ‘Rolandos', little ball-shaped creatures, all over a fictional world called as ‘Rolandoland'. The game has received usually positive reviews by the video and phone game community, and a follow-up, ‘Rolando 2: Quest for the Golden Orchid' has as been released.Third edition has also been announced.
The aim of the game is to protect and save the Rolandoland from an attack of the small shadow creatures. The people of Rolandoland are known as Rolandos that are small ball like creatures. Rolandos have to be directed to protection by tilting the iPod Touch or iPhone and using several bonus stuffs like conveyor elevators and belts.
Each level has a vital number of Rolandos which have to escape, if the player needs to advance to the second level. Players could control objects in the Rolandoland world and could tilt an iPod Touch or iPhone to move the Rolandoland people through the stage. The player rolls the Rolandoland people either one by one or in teams, chosen by drawing boxes over the targeted Rolandos. In order to make the selected Rolandos to jump up, the player has to swipe their fingers. The player gets assist from an elite team of sticky balls who are known as Rolando commandos, which grip surfaces and resist gravity. In contrary to usual Rolandos, these sticky creatures could also stick to the upper limit or ceiling. The Rolando game also features tutorial stages in the first round. These do a big job by providing information about the controls and how to play to the game. One might be very familiar with the controls; however it will take a lot of time to master them.
The music for the Rolando is mainly from the discography of a British DJ known as Mr. Scruff, who lent several of his songs to several games. The entire art of the game was done by an illustrator known as Mikko Walam, who is based in Finland. Simon Oliver who is the creator of the Rolandos sent Walamies videos, development media and level layouts without ever meeting the illustrator in person. Walamies is the person who made available high-resolution art from the Rolando on his website in 2009 February.
Rolando presently has a four out of five star rating on the U.S App Store. The game received 9.5 rating out of 10 rating from the IGN. The Rolando was voted as the Best iPhone Game of the year 2008 by the VentureBeat, 148 Apps and Boston Herald. Rolando also won the PocketGamer's Platinum Award. On 21st April, 2009, the version 1.2 was released, which had new two levels.
