Smash Halloween Pumpkins: The Challenge feels like something you would find in one of those "Over 1000 Games" shovelware CDs in the 90s that was loaded with shareware\Freeware\demos. It would probably be one of the better titles, but that’s not saying much. There isn’t a lot of content – most of the levels are very small and aren’t much of a challenge at all. There are only a few actual levels with some moving platforms and strategy involved (showcased in the game trailer.) Only 2 weapons – shotgun and rocket launcher. The boss battles are simple as well – just mash the fire button at them while collecting health and ammo that respawns. It starts out with a story and a short cut scene, but there is no more after that – completing the game just brings up the credits screen.

The biggest challenge is trying to play the game while it hides half of the screen with info boxes. Pick up ammo, health, or even starting a level causes a large info box to popup for a couple of seconds. It has other bugs like when an enemy is hit the flashing sprite stays in place so it looks like there are more enemies than there really are. Overall, it might be a short time waster if you can get it in a bundle, just like how it would have been sold back in the early 1990s.

Its an ok little side scrolling shooter thingy, its ok but the game gets super slow whenever you try to jump or are just in the air in general which ruins it, its also dumb that you have a health bar since only projectiles damage you, just touching any enemy kills you instantly, would also be useful if there was a crouch but whatever, for what it is its worth a try.

https://youtu.be/hb7oPnw-P2g

Without the ability to interact with the numerous ladders the level design feels flat and one dimensional. Enemy AI offers no directed challenge at the player except for their death touch.

It looks and plays like the game form 90's, and not in a good way. It's dated in every possible way, the controls are basic, the animation almost non existent, the overall quality of art and style is mediocre to low, especially the enemies that looked like the child drew them.
It's not necessarily a bad game for the lovers of this genre, but for me there was nothing interesting in it, uninstalled it after a couple of levels.
The game came in a 2$ 50-games-bundle from e-bay, otherwise I would never pay for a game like this, not even a cent, to be honest I don't think I would play it even if it was free but that is just my personal taste. I've got one more game from the same developer in that bundle and basically it is the same game but this time with Christmas theme instead of Halloween. There are better games to find for free, with all due respect to developer, the quality is too low to be charged for...

2 / 10

This really isn't a very good game. Each level (except for a couple of boss levels) is just killing a certain number of pumkins (which keep spawning until you reach your quota) and then rushing to the exit. There story is barely there. There are a few different types of pumpkin footsoldiers and only two weapons. The engine isn't great and can be a bit buggy, and every time a punpkin touches, you, it's an insta-kill.

This is like an early-2000s freeware game. If you were on the Clickteam/Gamemaker scene at the ime, you've seen many games like this, and better than this, for free. Not super bad or unplayable, just amateur and too generic. The sort of game programmers make to get experience and hone their skills

8/10 the "story" alone had me cracking up. I'm god-awful at platformers, but this was more than enough fun it was worth dying for. Perfect for Halloween, and any other day you want to shoot pumpkin-mutant-zombies, which should be EVERY DAY imo.

Simple, easy and short shooting platformer with only 15 levels.
A full playthrough should last around an hour.
The achievements come naturally.
Everytime you beat a level, you are able to load the new level through the main menu.

Don't bother. This game should run fine on a potato, but manages to not work properly on my 6-month-old gaming rig. The first level is impassable because the enemies don't spawn fast enough. I can't imagine the rest of the game will work as it should. I believe this will be the second game I've refunded.

nice cheap game

Fun game, occupies my time, Great for that halloween energy