Bowmasters 2.14.8

I have played many bow shooting games, and the one thing that bothered me with all was that they looked bloody awful. Stickmen shooting lines is not exactly my idea of eye candy graphics. In this respect, Bowmasters swept me off my feet with its colorful display of puncture-violence and varied characters.

The concept is easy to understand. You swipe to set the power and angle of your shot, release, and hope for the best. You will always know the angle, speed, and distance to the target, as they're displayed on the screen so, unless you have an acute attention deficit disorder, you can adjust your aim very easy.

Bowmasters is no Worms: Armageddon, but getting hit will throw you around a bit. So you'll often need to re-estimate the trajectory. The situation gets even dire the more fights you win. However, winning will unlock more game modes. From shooting birds and apples to multiplayer via Google Play Services, which in my experience crashes the app when accessed.

There are reasons to dislike Bowmasters. Firstly, the app often suggests you purchase specific characters and refusing this is not a matter of clicking an X, as you'll need to scroll back to your preferred character every time. Also, if you play Bowmasters for a while, you will see how various free features suddenly become ad-depended, while mandatory ads are starting to creep in between screens and during actual play. This system of reducing resources coupled with an increasing amount of ads is very annoying. It's like they're trying to acclimatize you before going all-in as they would have anyway.

Final Thoughts

Well, I can't say I loathe Bowmasters. I had my share of fun before the AI opponents started becoming auto-hit superheroes. The multitude of ads and ad-dependent content is a letdown, yes, but Bowmasters can be a fun time killer, at least during the first three or four hours of play.