Insaniquarium! Deluxe

The Short


Pros
- Raise fish to get money, get money to get more fish, all for pointless consumerism
- Unlock a collection of "guest" fish that will help you in levels
- Fight aliens (?!) by...clicking on them?
- After a while, this game really does become an insane aquarium. Or, dare I say, INSANIQUARIUM?!


Cons
- Why on earth is the Deluxe version of this game still $20?!
- The basic Java version/demo/whatever is just as good as the paid version, almost
- Those aliens are jerks and they eat my fish :(
- Also, why the crap isn't this ported to iOS yet? I had it on my ancient Palm Pilot and it was awesome.
- There really isn't much of a game here, but hey...whatever.

That fish's eye is really starting to freak me out. 

The Long

Are regular aquariums too boring for you? Are you tired of the soothing lights, the fish that just sit around and do nothing? Do you wish your aquarium was more INSANE?! Well, dear reader, I can't help you with that, since real fish are boring. But digital fish, however, can be totally bananas! And the game that lets them be totally bananas is Insaniquairum! Deluxe.

Insaniquairum is yet another PopCap game about fish eating other fish. I swear, somebody must have been hungry one day or something, I dunno. The point of the game is simple: have the most insane aquarium ever by raising fish, keeping them healthy, and harvesting cash money from them. Because, while in in the "Real World" fish don't poop gold and diamonds, in the INSANE AQUARIUM they totally do! Man, real life sucks.

This isn't insane! I want my money back!

So the game is pretty dang simple. You have unlimited food that you can drop into the tank, and the fish will eat it when they get hungry. After a while they'll grow, and then they'll start popping better coins. You use these coins to buy more fish, which you then have to keep fed, etc. You can also upgrade how much food you can have at the same time, buy better food to keep them fed longer, etc. It starts simple with just a few fish that just sort of swim around, but before long PopCap ups the ante!

HOLY CRAP IT GOT INSANE

Eventually you get fish that eat other fish, fish worth more money, etc. You'll have to work hard at keeping everybody happy or else they'll go bottom up, which will mean less money for you, fool! You unlock more fish by beating stages, which get harder as time goes along. Eventually you are just tapping/clicking the screen like a madman in an attempt to make sure everything is fed. Which is fine, I guess, but hardly fun.

You can also get special "helper" fish, unique ones that carry between levels, like a snail that gathers coins (the snail makes a return appearance in Plants vs Zombies) or the best one: a "pregnant" fish that makes baby fish every few seconds, which are good for both money and feeding the fish-eating fish. There really isn't much strategy here, to be honest, but hey...whatever. The goal is to just get enough money to buy the egg and then you win, and you do that over and over. But wait...stuff's about to get INSANE. 

WTF ALIENS?!

Yep, ALIENS. Apparently the aliens want your money-spawning fish, so they'll randomly show up. They float around and murder all your fish, so you have to click on them a boatload (less if you upgrade your laser gun) in order to fry them. OH YEAH, SUCK IT ALIENS. The Insaniquarium is like the Thunderdome: Two men enter, one man leaves. Except one of those men was an alien. Or something.

Anyway, that's the whole game. Buy fish, feed fish, shoot aliens. Repeat over a bunch of levels with more fish being added, and you are done. It's alright, I guess, in a weird addicting way (like all PopCap games), but this is hardly deep or anything. 

Hur, "deep." Fish jokes. I LOVE 'EM.

At least they mix up the tanks. 

The "Deluxe" version is basically like the free demo you can probably find online, with a few more features. More fish are available, more levels, and the option to make the game run as a screensaver (OH BOY!). However, for some unexplained reason this game is STILL $20?! Speaking of insane, is PopCap? How the crap could this game be worth that much? Answer: it isn't.

I mean, the game looks ok and all (though very much like a flash game) but come on. To be honest, I'm really surprised they haven't just ported it over to iOS as a $1-$3 app. I had a copy of this game's demo on my really old color Palm Pilot (that I only used to play this game and then swiftly lost) and it worked really good with touch controls (stylus, but whatever). So PORT IT OVER, POPCAP. I'LL BUY IT. BUT NOT FOR $20. 

Buy more crap from a really scary mermaid. 

Anyway, I'd just suggest either playing the free hour demo or the online Java version you can find around. It isn't a bad game, and it's a great time waster (or if you hate fish you can buy them, not feed them, and watch them die). However, for $20 that's...way too much. WAY too much. Actually I just found out it's $10 on Steam, which I guess is a little better, but paying more than $5 feels stupid. I'd probably grab it during a pack sale on Steam (they were selling all of PopCap's games for like $40 the other day), but other than that...stick to the demo.

But seriously...put this on iOS and Andorid. It's a perfect game for it, and those platforms thrive on time-wasters like this.

Three out of five stars. WHAT AN INSANE SCORE.

HOLY SHIIIIIIII