Small steps with big feet
My most played ios games of 2011
The past year, the Apple marketing machine finally cracked me. From being a linux fanboy, I switched completely. I now provide shelter for a MacBook, iMac, two iPhones and two iPads. Anyway, I love these machines, and the appstore already has made a good profit on me. I use the iPad practically every day, mostly for reading books and reading stuff on FlipBoard. As I’m also an avid gamer, here’s my top 5 of ios games I played the most the past year.
5. Majesty: The Fantasy Kingdom Sim (iPad)
Majesty is a port of a pc title from around 2000. The cool thing about Majesty is the non-traditional approach to the typical strategy paradigm. Instead of building stuff, train units and move these units around to attack your enemies, you put out rewards and bounties. You want a certain ‘Lair of Zombies’ gone? Put up a decent bounty, and your troops will definitely go after them. You build the infrastructures (houses, barracks, etc.), but you don’t control what the troops do.
Majesty felt pretty short (around 10 missions, some of them around 1 hour to finish), but you can replay the levels on harder difficulty and unlock extra levels. Kept me thorougly enjoyed, so definitely worth the money.
4. Neuroshima Hex (iPad)
iPad adaptation of the board game. I’m a big fan of board games, and definitely if mixed with some fantasy/sci-fi. NeuroShima Hex offers both. Altough I typically prefer the non-digital versions of board games (call me old-fashioned), Neuroshima is an exception. It is a very fast-paced game, and the cpu really helps in checking all the rules and not forgetting any unit (which I would imagine, happens probably in the real version). Very crisp and fitting graphics. The single player is ok to practice, but I prefer playing it with real people. The multiplayer supports up to 4 persons, and you just put the iPad in the middle of the table.
Certainly not for everyone I would think, but if you are into board games with a fantasy/sci-fi theme … don’t even think of not buying it!
3. Jetpack Joyride (iPhone/iPad)
I admit, I’m a Halfbrick Studio fan. I buy every games they put on the app store without reading any review (I also love Raskulls on the Xbox360!). Jetpack is the latest game of Halfbrick which I bought on the release date. Since then, I think I play it at least every three days. The goal is simple: bring our hero – Barry Steakfries – as far as possible using a jetpack (or one of his cool vehicles) while dodging fire, rockets and other malious things that want Barry dead. Yes, it’s pretty much the same as Monster Dash – except you’re flying now, but I don’t care. I just love the humor and the pick-it-up-and-play-ability of the game.
The developers also totally rock, as they keep adding stuff to the game with every update. The latest update – the Christmas update – included for example a jetpack that is actually a christmas tree that blows christmass balls to keep Barry in the air.
If you don’t have it – seriously ? – go get it! At the time of writing it’s even free!
2. Game Dev Story (iPhone)
Game Dev Story is a ‘game company simulation’ game. You start out with one or two crappy developers in a small brick garage, and must code, market and sell games until every game you produce brings in the millions of dollars. There are plenty inside jokes in the game if you know a thing or two about gaming history.
The game is challenging in the beginning, but once you pass the million mark for a game, it gets pretty easy. Still, the game is incredibly addictive, and I have spent way too many hours with the game.
1. King of Dragon Pass (iPhone)
King of Dragon Pass (kodp) is a difficult game to describe. It is a mix of RPG with create-your-own-adventure and civilization. Basically, you are the leader of a tribe in Dragon Pass. The end goal is to become the king, uniting the tribes living in Dragon Pass. You start out with a few people, some warriors, sheep, cows and food to last for the first year. From there on, it’s up to you. You can be agressive, and try to drive away your neighbours with force. But that won’t help a lot in the long run, as the other tribes won’t likely will make you King.
The game proceeds in the seaons of one year, and every season you can choose a certain action (harvest your crops, send out warriors, go exploring, go trading with some other tribe, and many other things). Also, every season some event can occur. These can be not important, like a married couple in your tribe is is publicly fighting. But they can also have a serious influence on the future game. For example, in the beginning of the game one of my tribesmen stole a horse from another family of another tribe. This dispute went on for many years, and even after the original members of the familiy had all died, the kids went on fighting, eventually ending in the death of many of both tribes as they were dragged in a big battle. If I would have given back the horse in the first place many years before, I would have saved many of my people in the long run. Not to say my relationship with that tribe was damaged forever.
The learning curve is very high. You really have to read a lot of text, and learn and understand the lore and universe of KODP or you simply will lose all of your games (and you will lose your first games).
But the game is really rewarding and freaking huge for an ios game. I put in around 30-40 hours already, and I didn’t yet make it to king (almost there, I swear!). Replayability is baked in the core of the game. It’s a bit pricey for an iPad game. It’s definitely for a niche market (dare I say even a niche in the ‘geek market’), but if you’re into this stuff it is worth every penny!
Altough it is an iPhone game, I play it on the iPad using the magnifier. There is just too much text to make it comfortable in the iPhone. But the developers have promised a universal version soon! Damn, there goes my sleep again….
