The Short
Pros
- Eat fish to get bigger
- Dodge sharks, or bite their tails for bonus points
- Eventually you will rule the ocean
Cons
- Score based (like most old games), so that's basically it
- When you die you lose your size
- Feeding Frenzy totally ripped this game off. Not even kidding.
- You don't actually play as the shark. How can you have it twice in the title and not give that option?
 |
| I only have three screenshots, so this review's gonna be fast. |
The Long
So the Intellivision is actually before my time, but weirdly enough I remember playing this game at some point. I don't remember why. It's also currently available through Xbox's failed experiment Game Room, where I kind of want to buy it now for some stupid reason (even though that would be dumb). Point being: if you got all excited because I'm reviewing an Intellivision game and think I'll be reviewing Atari games or something: I'm sorry. My gaming experiences really started with the NES, so this will probably be the last really old game I review (until I buy an Atari. Which won't happen).
Anyway, Shark! Shark!, aside from having an awesome title, is literally Feeding Frenzy. Or Feeding Frenzy is literally it, since this game came way earlier. Also, Odell Down Under, while I'm referencing games I've reviewed that are just fish eating each other.
Shark! Shark! is easy enough. You start as a tiny fish, and can only eat other tiny fish. The more you eat, the bigger you get (and more points!). You can also bite the named shark's tail for more points (a tactic blatantly ripped off in Feeding Frenzy 2), which is awesome.
 |
| HE IS GROWING. |
The controls are worth mentioning. You tap a direction with the D-pad and the fish will dash in that direction. He'll keep going in that direction until you tap it another way, clearly accurately simulating how to really control a fish in the treacherous ocean. You can also press A to dash in the current direction you are going, so long as you don't have the D-pad pressed. So it isn't 1:1 stick controls, which makes the game a bit more difficult and fun!
An annoying thing is that, when you die, you lose all your size. So you keep your score but basically have to start over. That straight up sucks, so don't die.
Sound effects are what you'd expect from an ancient Intellivision game, and they are fine overall. There is only this one screen you see above, so I hope you like it. Since this is an old points-based arcade-esque game, I guess whining about not having multiple stages is stupid, but seriously...there isn't much to this.
 |
| KING OF THE OCEAN. |
In a really simple way, Shark! Shark! still remains a bit of fun to this day. It also has an awesome title (it just sounds exciting) even if it's stupid that you can't play as the shark. Though it does get massive after 100,000 points, which is great.
Anyway, it's like $2 on Xbox 360's failed Game Room, so if you like eating fish, go buy Feeding Frenzy 2 instead. This game was actually massively popular back in the day, but now it's just...you eat fish. That's it.
Giving this game a score is stupid, but hey...I still liked it better than the original Feeding Frenzy, so it gets Three out of Five. Suck on that. At least it doesn't look like a Flash game.
Skip to 6:44 for some Shark! Shark! action.
