A Green Mushroom

I've been sampling some little mobile time wasters lately.  Not many of them have stuck, but I played Guild of Dungeoneering for a long time. It's an interesting mix of roguelike, card based combat, and deckbuilding.  It's kind of a weird blend.  After a few weeks I'm at the point where I feel like I've seen most permutations but until just now I was having a lot of fun with it.  It was totally worth the time and effort. In Guild of Dungeoneering you draw up a hand of cards and use those cards to build a dungeon as you're exploring it.  So, you basically set the difficulty level and rewards on the fly based on what you lay down.  When you get into combat your currently equipped items determine the cards you have to work with to defeat the enemy. Plus there's a whole other level on top of this one that involves base building and recruiting different characters to go into dungeons. If you ever see this one on sale you should grab it and try it out...

I really like Super Mario Run.  It's a great first real game for Nintendo to put on iOS.  It really feels like a Mario game even though it's kind of an infinite runner.  But it's not an infinite runner.  It's Mario. It was definitely worth the $10 price to open up the whole game.  One playthrough to the end of the levels doesn't take too long but the added value comes from the challenge of going back through the levels to gather colored coins.  If you manage to grab all 5 pink coins in one run you get a chance to try for the purples.  If you get the purples you can go for the black ones and those even remix the levels. There's also a Toad Rally if you feel like competing for style points against other people on the internet.  I did a bit of that one, but Mario for me has always been about the single player platforming.  That platforming definitely finds a good home on iPhones and iPads. Now I'm just really excited for the Fire Emble...

Reigns is a really fun and fairly simple mobile game.  I've been playing it on iOS and I love it but it's also on steam and android. In it you are king and make decisions for your kingdom by swiping either left or right.  You're given one choice at a time and every decision impacts one or more of the four pillars of your society.  They're represented by bars at the top of your screen.  If any of the bars gets all the way full or all the way empty your king will get killed. But then you get to start over with his heir and give it another try. I love the simple gameplay loop and the fact that every decision is a simple swipe left or right.  This falls into the category of games that are definitely designed for a touch screen from the ground up, mobile is a perfect fit for it. The other amazing thing about Reigns is that it's $3 .  I highly recommend you pick it up on your smartphone of choice.

Battlelore has been an iOS strategy game I've been meaning to try out for awhile.  It's actually the digital version of a board game I thought about picking up, but I ended up getting the iOS version to play around with instead. The first thing that really surprised me is that it's essentially built on the same basic gameplay as Memoir 44 , which is one of the big name strategy board games out there at the moment.  Units are commanded in lanes and you can only control a certain amount of units in certain lanes depending on which set of orders you choose.  It sounds like it might be complex when I write it like that, but it's super simple when you see it in action. The main differences are the setting and the "lore".  The setting is fantasy and the "lore" is essentially magic spells.  These change up the game enough to make it feel like it's own game apart from the base they're working from.  I assume it's pretty much a straight po...

Severed is a game where you use the touch screen in a first person view to both navigate the world and swipe to attack.  It's unique feature is that much of the game is about severing monster limbs.  Not to mention that the setting is creepy but interesting.  It's a cartoony game but it's stylized in a way that really works for it. Severed originally released for the Vita but it just came out on iOS for around $5, which is when I grabbed it. I had a lot of fun with it for a few hours just sinking into the world and getting a feel for the combat... but then things started to feel samey.  The game is a fairly linear experience and there's almost no story or explanation after the initial premise.  I felt like I needed more motivation to keep going. So, Severed will probably become a little mobile time waster for me now.  Instead of sitting down with it for extended periods like I have been doing I'll probably play it in little five minute session...

Mecha Ace is the latest interactive fiction that I finished reading.  I haven't read one in awhile, but these are the interactive novels put out by Choice of Games LLC and I've found a bunch over the past few years that I like. Mecha Ace is all about being a Mech pilot fighting for the rebellion against an evil empire.  Sounds like a fairly standard setup but the actual missions and choices in the novel are fantastic.  I loved this author's work and I need to find out if he's written any other interactive fiction that's been put out through Choice of Games. I really like finding good ones put out under the Choice of Games label, but honestly the hardest part is finding a good author and then finding their other content.  It gets buried under the general catch all label too often. Anyway, Mecha Ace is really good, so if you're into interactive fiction or have ever enjoyed a choose your own adventure game you should give it a shot.  You can read/play it...

After writing about Dragon Quest 3 last week I followed it up by trying on Dragon Quest 8 on iOS since I already owned it anyway. It's better.  It changes up the exploration, look, and feel of the game a bit because of it's transition from 2D to 3D.  I thought because of this it might hold my attention for awhile and maybe it could even become the second Dragon Quest game I finished fully. But after only a few hours with it I was done.  It was quickly obvious that the same exact battle system and underlying mechanics are the same here as they are in every other Dragon Quest.  There's nothing new and exciting to switch things up outside of the jump to 3D graphics and that's just not enough for me. It looks like I'll mostly be sticking to Final Fantasy games when I want to go back to older JRPGs and not venture much more into Dragon Quest.  One of the core concepts of Final Fantasy that I've always loved is the constant reinvention of itself.  Somet...

After loving the Final Fantasy series so much I thought I should go back and check out another famous JRPG series with Dragon Quest. I played around with Dragon Quest 1 and 2 awhile ago and wrote about them.  While I liked DQ1 and finished it when I got to DQ2 it felt like more of the same, only paced much worse. Whenever it was that I bought these I also picked up Dragon Quest 3 and 8 since they're out for iOS too.  I finally got around to giving DQ3 a try and... it's ok I guess. It again feels like more of the same.  Nothing new or innovative.  Nothing close to the reimagining that Final Fantasy undergoes with every entry.  But it's ok I suppose.  I played it for a few nights, leveled up my party and completed some objectives... then set it down.  I probably won't pick it back up. Most people I've talked to about the series say that it doesn't change much from game to game and that's part of the appeal.  I need more variety than that...

999 is a game I struggled to get into on DS and eventually gave up on.  The final game in the series came out recently so I went to take another look and a friend mentioned there's a visual novel version of 999 on iOS that would fix most of my problems with it. I tried it out and found it mostly enjoyable.  The main problem I had was with the overall quality of writing and dialogue between characters.  They never use one sentence to explain something when they could use fifteen instead.  But the plot hooked me enough to push on to the end. And then I found out it had different endings, six in fact.  And a flowchart to let you jump around the story and get to all the different endings easier!  So, I finished all the endings and unlocked the "true" ending. That's when the game totally jumped the shark.  A bunch of stuff happens that doesn't make any sense and then right when it feels like the game might explain itself... it ends.  With no ...

Final Fantasy Brave Exvius is another Final Fantasy mobile title that I really wanted to like.  I love the series and I keep waiting for them to release a good mobile game in the spirit of Final Fantasy. Instead, they keep releasing these BS F2P games that are designed to prey on our nostalgia and get us to pay money for random heroes or items or whatever it is this time. I hate it.  I hate that they keep doing this. I want to pay them for a Final Fantasy mobile game and play that game on my phone.  I don't ever want it to ask me or prod me into paying again.  I want it to be a complete game that I can buy once with interesting mechanics not designed to extract as much money as possible from me. *sigh* This game was super disappointing.

Galaxy Reavers is my latest little mobile time waster on iOS.  In it you get a squadron of ships to command on an isometric 2D plane in real time. It's basic ship to ship combat stuff with the hook of upgrading your ships or swapping out their equipment between battles. It's pretty fun and I played it for a week or so before slowly pulling away from it. It suffers from the typical free to play catch of having a ton of downtime between activities at higher levels.  Or you could just pay to skip that.  Or pay for a random chance at some better gear.  Or pay to unlock a new ship.  Basically, it really wants you to pay. So I'm done with Galaxy Reavers but if real time ship combat is your thing it's free to try out on iOS.

Inks is another in the line of mobile titles I'm constantly picking up, playing for a few days, and then setting back down (maybe forever). It's a "fun little time waster" but it didn't have any long term hold on me. Basically, it's pinball with a cool aesthetic.  To complete a board you have to hit the pinball into all of the ink containers which splat when you touch them.  That ink is then splattered on the board but also picked up and rolled around by the ball.  It's cool and visually appealing for sure. But I don't like pinball that much.  I'll throw the occasional quarter into one if it's around and I'm bored but... they aren't even around that much anymore.  I think I might just be the wrong target demographic here. I can say for sure that if you like pinball you'll find something you like in this game.  Check out Inks if you fall into that category.

The Whispers of the Old Gods expansion is out for Hearthstone!  The new cards are fun, but the thing I'm most excited about is actually not the cards. Right around the time they launched this expansion they put out a new "Standard" and "Wild" format for Hearthstone.  Wild is what we had before, where all cards ever released are available but standard format only allows cards from the past few expansions plus the core cards from the very base game of Hearthstone.  This means the designers can finally redesign the game for balance regularly while keeping a few cards from dominating every deck. Long term the move to a standard format is a great move for Hearthstone. They also put pre-constructed decks in the game for each class.  You have to own the cards to create the deck, but if you do it only takes one click in the deck creation screen to have one of their pre-made theme decks. Personally, this had gotten me to play the game a ton more.  I love pilo...

This is my latest little time waster of an iOS game.  I love finding good full games to sink my teeth into on iOS but sometimes I stumble on a simple time waster that clicks and I play it for a couple days. As of me writing this, I've been playing for about 2 days.  I'm probably going to get another day or two of enjoyment out of it and actually be done with it by the time this post actually gets published. And I'm ok with that.  For now, it's just fun being a mouse on a giant tortoise shooting a machine gun at incoming bugs.  You can upgrade things, add units, go to a new generation of tortoise for permanent bonuses and other stuff too. But the main part of the game is being a mouse shooting a machine gun off the top of a giant tortoise.  If that interests you, take a look.  If it doesn't... I really don't know what else to tell you.

Creatures Such As We is another interactive novel from Choice of Games and again I really enjoyed it. I guess I've never truly outgrown the choose your own adventure game and I love this modern incarnation of it. Creatures Such As We finds you as a tour guide of a space station on the moon.  As your next group of tourists show up you learn that they're the main development team of your favorite video game.  The story goes from there. It's hard to review the story in any real way since it's a choose your own adventure game and can go a bunch of different ways.  That being said, I was happy with the story that was told in my playthrough. If it sounds at all interesting I suggest you check it out !

I love mobile games but unfortunately for me most of them are little time waster games.  I love the ones that really dig in and try to do something new and, honestly, I browse the app store every Thursday for new releases but most games aren't this. A few weeks ago I had a run of Thursdays where nothing looked interesting.  So... I resorted to the "Top Charts" gaming section and picked up a couple games there I hadn't tried. Mostly these were duds but a few of them have been fun enough to keep playing. Alto's Adventure is a low key take on infinite runners.  You're a skiier going fast down a hill trying to catch caribou (or something) and your only controls are tap to jump or tap and hold to backflip.  If you're looking for a new infinite runner or just a game that's fun in small 1-2 minute bursts then Alto's Adventure might be for you. Goblin Sword is a sidescrolling platform/adventure game.  It has some basic fighting and platforming ...

I have a tendency to browse the app store every Thursday when it updates and grab at least one game to try.  Some weeks nothing catches my eye but most weeks there's at least one game that looks interesting enough to try out. Clash Royale is the latest of these.  It pitches itself as real time strategy in a compact package where matches last around 2 minutes.  That's all I needed to know to try it. I loved my first couple hours with the game.  I was playing these short little real time strategy battles, getting new cards that contain abilities or units, and customizing my deck for the next match.  The core of this game is solid and fun. But then the F2P mechanics reared their ugly head.  The main progression in the game is done through opening chests to get new units and abilities or getting duplicates of ones you already have which will allow you to upgrade.  But, once you're out of "gems" you can only open chests in real time.  This me...

This is an iOS game that I've been playing a lot lately when I have a spare minute or two.  It's actually the digital version of a board game that has been on my wishlist for awhile. In Tsuro you start with your stone on one end of the board and choose/lay a tile in front of you.  Your stone follows the path on the tile all the way to the end.  Everyone takes a turn and then on your turn you choose and lay another tile.  The goal of the game is to be the last stone still on the board. As the board fills up it gets harder and harder to lay a tile in front of your stone without it connecting to an already existing tile.  When that happens your stone follows that path all the way to the end as well, which might send it right off the board. It's been nice to finally play it a bunch against different AI levels.  It's fun and scalable.  I like how it's simple enough and complex enough at the same time. Now I really want to pick up the board game ...

I heard some good things about Punch Club so without really knowing what it was I picked it up on iOS since it was only a couple bucks. Punch Club is about training, improving stats, getting new abilities, and then using all that against other opponents in a fighting league.  It kinda has a Rocky vibe to it.  That underground old school boxing training.  Kinda. But really, at it's heart, Punch Club is an optimization engine.  It's for people who love to optimize everything.  If you're a theorycrafter or optimizer I can't think of a better game for you. While I like RPGs that allow me to find efficient ways to do things... there really isn't much more here.  It's just an optimization engine.  That's not enough to hook me.  It doesn't help that the setting and themes are ones that particularly appeal to me. But if you're someone who loves to optimize the hell out of your RPGs, you really should take a look at Punch Club.

Desert Golfing is a mobile game I've heard about off and on for awhile.  It's a deceptively simple concept.  You use trajectory aiming on a 2D plane to hit a golf ball into a hole... in the desert.  Hence the name. The complexity comes in because some of the holes get extremely tricky.  And holes never repeat. I was really confused after hole 18... there was no menu, no stats screen, no selection options... it just went to hole 19.  Then 20.  Now I'm on hole 503 and I thought it was time to write some thoughts on the game. Honestly, this isn't ever going to be a game that you monotask.  That is to say, this is a perfect game to play while doing something else like listening to a podcast or watching TV.  It's great as a second activity when you're doing something that doesn't take up all your mental RAM. It seems like this desert goes on forever.  So, it's a game I'll keep picking away at over time.  It's pleasantly simple. ...