Looney Tunes Cannonball Follies Hands-On

Historically, the Looney Tunes license hasn't fared well on mobile. After all, 2003's Looney Tunes Zany Racer continues to dwell in infamy as one of the worst branded games in mobile history...but that was before Warner Bros. Online demonstrated a newfound dedication to the medium by putting out the halfway decent Constantine action adventure game earlier this year. Now, the company has turned its energies toward rehabilitating Bugs Bunny, Daffy Duck, and friends, starting with the diminutive firebrand Yosemite Sam. Looney Tunes Cannonball Follies is shaping up to be a simple, enjoyable puzzle game, which will hopefully provide a great start for the new Looney Tunes content suite.

Yosemite Sam, the mustachioed madman that's always out to blast holes in Bugs Bunny with his trademark six-shooters, has access to a somewhat higher-caliber weapon in his new game: a cartoony cannon mounted in the back of a rowboat. The idea in Cannonball Follies is to launch one of your cannonballs into a bucket located somewhere on the level, usually behind a bunch of cleverly placed obstacles. Each level has a "par" number of balls you're expected to meet, as well as a bunch of bonus materials, like coins, jewels, and special types of ammunition.

The cannonballs in this game are fired out of the cannon at a surprisingly low velocity, so they will bounce off of walls and through pipes on their way to the bucket. The idea is to adjust the trajectory and power to get the ball moving in the right parabola, and then let gravity take over. Every time you lose a ball, Cannonball Follies marks the spot at which you aimed your cursor with a little X, assisting you in the fine-tuning process. The five levels featured in our N-Gage QD demo included some fiendishly difficult trick shots through gaps in floating walls, as well as a couple of switch puzzles. The game's special cannonballs are limited in number, but can be quite useful when applied correctly. For instance, red balls are about twice as heavy as the gray defaults, making them ideal for lower-trajectory shots, while green balls produce a tracer line along their path.

We had some fun fooling around with Looney Tunes Cannonball Follies, and we even wish that our demo version had a few more levels, perhaps including some live targets. We especially enjoyed the game's look, which is a great mobile representation of Tex Avery's Technicolor style. We suggest you brush up on your artillery skills in the few weeks that you have before the game's release later this month--the little redheaded fellow has quite a temper.