Flock was riotously satisfying. You’re a member of an alien species and it’s your job to abduct Earth’s wildlife by any means possible. In its simplest state this involves using your UFO to scare/heard sheep back to the mother ship but, at its most complex, it turns into a Rude Goldberg device that would make Mousetrap cower in fear; dozens of things may have to happen in sequence all for the minute pleasure of beaming some livestock back to the mothership.
Played from an isometric point of view, the interface is remarkably inviting. In the demo, my only means of interaction was to use guide my UFO over various plots of land. This action would always terrify the sheep below me, and they would always cower in fear and run the hell away; the choice was clear, push them back to the mothership.
This became slightly more complex when I had to lead a set number of sheep back to the same area. Suddenly I found myself forcing two sheep to mate, thereby instantly creating more sheep, and then herding all of them back to the same ship. Later I was doing things like soaking them with water (so they would shrink and fit through a fence), and leading a half dozen males around in pursuit of one particularly attractive female – all while trying to avoid the typical pitfalls associated with inauspiciously plentiful Mole Hills/holes in the earth.
It’s a relatively simple mechanic that’s been wonderfully translated to a title ripe with humor and focused objectives. A price point hasn’t been announced yet, but I wouldn’t be surprised to see it on the cheap side of XBL and PSN. No matter what it’s sure to be a value for this charming title.
