For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out Cat Garden - Food Party Tycoon from developers Daerisoft . I Played this on my iPhone 14 Pro.
The art for this game caught my attention, like it has with other similar games, but what i was most curious about was whether or not it could stand out from the other idle games with nice art or if it would have the same grind issues that Cats & Soup, https://youtu.be/B5_zo0ov4IM, Cat Snack Bar, https://youtu.be/hhqyaTmhXw4, or if it had some interesting ideas to beat the grind like Animal Restaurant, https://youtu.be/DZhTicMX4Bo, had.
in Cat Garden - Food Party Tycoon, the grind does come fairly soon. the pacing isn't bad but it's not quite right either. i could feel the grind a little before the next thing would unlock. It does have some interesting ideas to help break up the grind, but they don't feel finished. for example, there's a whole fishing aspect to the game that has no tutorial and seemingly little to no impact on the game. It sticks out the most because the tutorial, whilst a little forceful, is mostly great. i don't appreciate it wanting me to share a photo tho.
Another plus for Cat Garden - Food Party Tycoon is that there are no intrusive adverts. it's our choice if we want to watch an advert and we get in-game rewards for doing so. that's amazing and somewhat rare in idle games. this is a game good for commuters as i played it with one hand throughout and your "turn" can be finished in just a handful of minutes, then you put it down and come back to it later. adverts can be frustrating as they break up that flow but also use up data. for example, i would chose not to watch adverts whilst out and about but at home i wouldn't mind watching an advert via my wi-fi for some in-game benefits.
The nice artwork in Cat Garden - Food Party Tycoon isn't enough to make this a great game. it needs it's other ideas to be fleshed out more and the game to get a little bit more balancing. What is here now is fine and very playable and could be enough for idle restaurant fans. but if the developers can continue to improve and add to it, it could become a much better game.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out Oops Dragon. I Played this on my iPhone 14 Pro.
There are two reasons why i decided to try this game. the first is the name. it's fun and ridiculous. I was very curious how they were going to refer back to the name in the game. Honestly, in this video i don't think i get an answer about where the name comes into it other than there are dragons to fight. The second reason why i wanted to play this was to see if this really is a game or if it's one of those "scam" games that are mostly adverts with some gaming inbetween. Oops Dragon's iOS page doesn't have any in-game screenshots, it's just artwork, so i didn't even know how it'd look. at least with this, i can say that yes it's a game.
It's not the most complicated game, but what's important is that they got the basics right and have a great platform to build from. there's a decent, if a little slow, tutorial that showed everything we needed to do. The game's idle mechanic didn't get in the way of gameplay and whilst i quickly understood the loop of the game, it took around 40 minutes before the grind, and the need to turn it off and wait, emerged. Another great feature about this game is that there are no intrusive ads. the game has some self promotion, which i wasn't too concerned with, but other than that there were no ads in this video. the game gave us the choice to watch them, and would've rewarded us with in-game benefits if we did.
Oops Dragon is a game that can be played on handed. coupled with no ads and no additional downloads, Oops Dragon comes across as a great choice for commuters or casual players. there are some "auto" features, too. the main aim of the game is to collect vases, break the vases, and equip better equipment. in doing so, we're able to progress further into the game, level up, and get better vases. We're able to automate most of this. the game plays itself in the background, we can automate vases being destroyed, attacks are automated to. what's left for us is choosing whether to equip the better equipment and to level up stuff.
Oops Dragon does have a couple of minor issues that don't really get in the way, but stick out mostly because of how solid the rest of it is. The one that annoyed me the most was the lack of a countdown timer for when things recharge, or an in-game tutorial explaining how to recharge them if it's not a countdown timer. The other is the music and sound effects. each area as a different song, but it's fairly obvious when it loops. and the sound effect of breaking a vase was grating so when i found out how to turn it off, i did. the tutorial could've pointed us towards the settings as it's not in the most obvious place.
Oops Dragon is certainly one of the better idle games i've played this year and a solid choice for younger gamers, casual gamers, but i would say it's got enough depth for more "seasoned" gamers too. I do recommend downloading it and trying it out.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out the newly globally released Devil May Cry: Peak of Combat. I Played this on my iPhone 14 Pro.
It was surprising when i saw in the charts Devil May Cry: Peak of Combat. it looks like it had been out either in beta or in out in a couple of countries for some time and now got it's full global release. But i hadn't heard of the game prior to it's release.
I haven't played a Devil May Cry game since DmC on PS3 so i don't know what the story is at the start of this game and the game itself does a poor job of setting the scene. Once you start the game, download an additional 40MB of data and sign into an account, the game just goes and doesn't really stop until the end of the first chapter.
One of the issues with the game's story telling also applies to the games tutorial. both aspects of the game feel half finished at best because how both are implemented in the game are only half as effective. for example, with the story there are some fun cutscenes, that look low resolution, that are voice acted and match the level of gameplay well. But then the game tries to tell some story with text boxes on the left side of the screen, the same way it tries to add additional tutorial information. these boxes are small and are sometimes blocked by the dynamic island. It feels like a game designed on either other #Apple phones or #Android. The combat is so fast and fluid that my attention is solely in the middle of the screen watching it, not what's happening on the periphery.
There are a few things in this game that also feel not finished or not fully implemented. the next main one would have to be the gamepad controls. ASTRA: Knights of Veda, https://youtu.be/kzt0SEuitI4, has so far had the best implementation of gamepad controls and whilst i wasn't expecting Devil May Cry: Peak of Combat to copy it, i was expecting something more than nothing. When you start to use the controls, nothing changes on screen. the game doesn't tell you on screen what buttons do what. you have to go to settings, select the gamepad you're using, and read an onscreen picture. But even then the controls didn't fully work for me. there were times i had to manually touch the screen to progress so i gave up using the controller and finished the game using the touch screen controls.
It's disappointing that a game that's been worked on for so long comes across as being half finished. they got the core combat design and failed to build a game around it. I would like to say that maybe they can rework a lot of the game and bring it up to a better standard but i'm not so sure they can or will. Devil May Cry: Peak of Combat is fun to play, but not for long. but it might be worth keeping and checking what the updates to the game bring.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out the newly released ASTRA: Knights of Veda, from developers Flint and publishers HYBE IM. I Played this on my iPhone 14 Pro, but it's also out on Android and Steam.
ASTRA: Knights of Veda came out this week and shot straight to the top spot in the Action Genre charts and got some impressive ratings. I hadn't heard of this game prior to seeing it top the charts so i was eager to try the game and see what the fuss was all about.
But let's talk about the single biggest issue about this release. The game is already a 3.58GB download and after you create an account to play the game you're forced to download a further 5.7GB of data. When games have an additional download they often give us a video to watch or pictures to look at or even tips and minor story stuff to read. With ASTRA: Knights of Veda there's the same picture and looping music. it took about 13 minutes to download and install all that data. I firmly believe that any mobile game should download all it's data at the initial install and there should be no further downloads. Game updates should be used to add additional data to a game. By having such a massive additional download, the game is essentially unplayable without Wi-fi. i dinged Honkai Star Rail, https://youtu.be/g5wTksigHyU, for this last year. i didn't think that game was Game of the Year material so it only got a mention. But ASTRA: Knights of Veda has the potential to be 2024's Mobile Free to Play Game of The Year and with how my rankings currently work, the 5.7 GB additional download makes it illegible.
The additional data download is probably the only bad thing worth mentioning as the rest of the game is fantastic. the music is very good and a soundtrack i'd be happy to own for sure. the graphical art style looks familiar to Vanillaware games whilst also feeling entirely unique. I was very impressed how ASTRA: Knights of Veda incorporates the game mechanics into the story itself, something that's rare to see and one of the reason's last years Free to Play Mobile Game of the Year winner was Fortress Saga: AFK RPG, https://youtu.be/YzOEz4T_PkE.
I was hooked right from the beginning and there are long periods where i'm so focused on the story and gameplay that i forgot to commentate. The story is very well told with amazing cutscenes and in-game cutscenes. when we played in game, the controls were smooth, responsive, and well taught to us via tutorials. Game Pad controls need some tweaking as the icons get a bit too small on my phone screen and my TV and there were a couple of occasions where i couldn't find the correct button to press but this wasn't a big issue as i could touch the screen to switch it to touch controls and manually do what i needed.
ASTRA: Knights of Veda call's itself a "Beautiful yet Brutal 2D RPG" and this first hour has the body count to back that up. there are large numbers of enemy soldiers to fight and large numbers of your own fighters strewn about the battlefield. It may look like medieval world but the story quickly turns into fantasy with a mad king, undead, a goddess, magic, and more. and yet, it never feels out of place nor over the top. everything is explained, history is told, and the game carries on as if this is how the world is with such confidence that there's no doubting it.
I highly recommend ASTRA: Knights of Veda, it's a must download. BUT you must start the game on wi-fi. Other than that, it's faults are few and far apart.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out Block Cat Jam, also known as Box Cat Jam : Block Match, from developers Actionfit. I Played this on my iPhone 14 Pro, but it's also out on Android.
I had been wanting to play a puzzle game for a little while now and i was curious about this one. it was being regularly updated and the screenshots in the app store showed some interesting ideas. But it turned out to be a bit more basic than i anticipated.
One of the first things i noticed was how the Dynamic Island got in the way of the icons at the top of the game screen. it was clear that this game had been designed on another platform and then brought across to the iPhone, or an older model of iPhone at the very least. For some reason, the music was turned off by default and what i assumed to be the vibration never seemed to work, tho it's possible it was soo weak that i just didn't notice it.
What tutorial there is is fine. it's just text across the screen. it could've been more in-depth with videos or even a gif, but at first this is fine. where this hands off approach goes wrong is when power-ups are introduced. it wasn't clear until the level they're introduced was over that you have to pay for them. often, games will have special built levels and force you to use one as an example, saying that this first time is free to practice and then you'll have to pay for them. this is a simple thing this game misses out on as each level has 3 stages, so they could've introduced the power-up on the first stage and got us to use it as practice on the first and second stages, leaving the third stage to see if we could work it out for ourselves.
This type of missing out is noticeable throughout this demo. there are soo many areas where things could've been improved or added to. for example, the cats on the home screen can't be interacted with, nor can you interact with the cat tree. one easy change would be to interact with them, but there's more you could do like having collectables in levels that can be used to customise the home screen. The music and sound effects are far too repetitive, and the cats are mostly the same base design with different colors.
But the thing that frustrated me the most are the adverts. if this game had kept the bottom adverts, i would've probably been fine. i would've liked the bottom buttons brought up a little higher away from the adverts to avoid mis-clicks, but for the most part those adverts were simple pictures or gifs. things that typically won't eat much into mobile data plans. but then the game introduced full screen video ads or ads you can play. these came with no warning whatsoever so already it came across as rude. but the frequency of these adverts was also frustrating. everytime you went from the home screen to a level, there's an advert. every time you finished the 3 stages in a level and moved to the next level, there's an advert. There are so many that i'm concerned that they'll eat into mobile data plans.
Having two sets of frequent adverts, especially the full screen ones rudely interrupting my gaming experience, coupled with the basic nature of the game and repetitiveness of many of the assets, made me come away from Block Cat Jam feeling disappointed and frustrated. i can't recommend this game, the gaming experience is just too negative and there maybe other games doing this style of puzzle better. best to avoid it.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out Call of Duty: Warzone Mobile from Activision. I Played this on my iPhone 14 Pro, but it's also out on Android.
Whilst the game had beta's and a limited release, it has now received a world wide release so i would consider this game for 2024 Game of The Year. Except, it has the dreaded extra download. it's already a 3.93 GB download from the app store but then there's an additional 3.3 GB to install before you can play it. There's no warning about this additional download so do not play this game for the first time on a mobile network. But throughout the game it reads as if the game is downloading higher quality graphics to your phone as you play it. It's possible that because i'm using an #iPhone 14 Pro, it had to downloaded higher quality graphics whilst i played. This is a big mobile cap killer which makes it even more difficult to recommend as a mobile game.
Call of Duty: Warzone is out across PC and Consoles, i gave it a go on #PS4 https://youtu.be/-F5LygJiO2U, when the 2.0 version came out over a year ago. the biggest takeaway from that video was that it wasn't welcoming to new players like myself. I genuinely hoped that time, a new platform, and a new audience meant that Call of Duty: Warzone Mobile was going to be a much better experience. Unfortunately, it's still unwelcoming.
The extra download at the start is one hint that perhaps #Activision wasn't going to maximise the potential of this new player base. that feeling continued throughout playing the game. the only tutorial was the controls, even tho it asked me twice if i played this games and i knew Warzone. i said i didn't know either so what i wanted was an in-depth tutorial of the controls, home screen, menus, goals, etc. what i got was how to control the game.
There is a positive in that i was allowed to play the game as a "Guest" and not link any Activision accounts to the game. But there aren't many other positives about the game. The graphics didn't wow me, the controls are fine but there's no rumble feedback. The user interface was crowded and it felt like the icons were poorly placed. the game never pointed us to the options to help fine tune the game to our needs, but there wasn't a way to try out the changes even if we did make some.
I could go on, but what Call of Duty: Warzone Mobile feels like is a tool for Call of Duty: Warzone on other platforms. It isn't a mobile Call of Duty: Warzone game but rather a Call of Duty: Warzone on mobile game. It's really hard to recommend this to new mobile players, but for those who already play Warzone and are looking to play on the go, then this is fine as it's what they play but on mobile.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out Idle Lumbercat - Wood Games, also known as Lumbercat: Cute Idle Tycoon, from @treepllainc6467 . I Played this on my iPhone 14 Pro, but it's also out on Android.
This isn't the first game from treeplla that i've played for Mobile Friday. Last year i tried out Cat Snack Bar, https://youtu.be/hhqyaTmhXw4, but the grind in that game came fast and it started not being fun to play. i wanted to know if things had changed after a year in terms of their game design.
From the beginning, it's clear that their character design hasn't changed and i personally think that's a good thing as it helps their games stand out more against all the other idle games with animals as part of the story. I like how bold and bright the colors are in the background and how clear everything is. Whereas the cats themselves are a little more muted or pastel in color. they're also not as clear and sharp as the background but i think it works as it gives them more of a "fluffy" feel.
But by the 10 minute mark i was already feeling the grind. there is a lot of depth to this game and much more to unlock than what is shown in the video. but it's that initial pacing that they don't get right. Many idle games have the same problem, but i feel they tend to succeed in hiding the grind through things such as an expanded tutorial that helps the player not only through the first stage but also into the second stage, using the second stage for reminders.
Whilst i was making some progress, it was also starting to be clear that progress was slowing down to such an extent that it was like the game wanted me to put it down. the amount of money needed was just getting too much. But there's another element that didn't get enough of a tutorial and that's the mangers. I don't know if you can only get them via loot boxes or not. I'm not even sure how or when i can get loot boxes in game outside of the store. The store wasn't introduced and when i opened it there wasn't another tutorial detailing what each of the currencies were and what they did. These are things that could be delt with better that would also help cover the grind.
The only obtrusive advert i came across was from the game itself. i don't mind self promotion, but if that promotion has currencies and things we've yet to be introduced to then it's poorly timed. I do like that there are optional adverts and the game has some interesting benefits for the player when using them. i felt that these were rarely obnoxious and mostly clear. so some room for improvement but what they have is good.
Idle Lumbercat - Wood Games is a fine idle game. it's pacing makes it feel like it wants the player to play in short bursts and that would be good for people who are commuting. there is a lot left to unlock, i just worry that it'll take a long time and feel like it took a long time.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out Eternal Crypt – Wizardry BC from Drecom. I Played this on my iPhone14Pro, but it's also out on Android and PC via Chrome.
This is much more complicated than i expected. i didn't fully read the App store page for Eternal Crypt – Wizardry BC, so i went in just expecting a dungeon crawling clicker game. But after recording the video and looking more into it, there's much more about this game than i thought. But, in a way, this confusion is also a criticism of the game that in the near hour i played in this video it failed to convey what it actually is, but it's also praiseworthy because what Eternal Crypt – Wizardry BC also is didn't get in the way of gameplay.
The gameplay is what i came to the game for. in the App store what caught my attention and why i wanted to play it was the claim that "...you can play endlessly with strategy and taps." i wanted to see how that would work. The game starts like many clickers i've played, with one character on screen doing damage and my clicks doing damage. what's striking is the character art and the style of the game. the backgrounds work well with the theme of the game, the monsters all look interesting, but our character design did remind me of My Sims Heroes with how square the heads are.
But it works and it does look great. the U.I is a little busy and cramped. One reason is that this game doesn't make full use of the iPhone screen. It's a little surprising how little it uses. On one hand it might be to make it easier to click on the screen where the action is taking place, but i would also say that it kinda works with the top of the screen and sets the mood for a dungeon game. But i feel the bottom of the screen could be used better.
Another issue the U.I has is that it isn't fully explained. The game does have a tutorial that, for the most part, offers help through to the end of the first play through. But then it stops just as more icons appear. I also started to unlock new things and there wasn't even a simple finger pointing, like it had been doing. I'd argue that the tutorial needs to continue for the second play through to explain not just all the new things but also to help offer some reminders on how the gameplay loop works.
The loop is typical of a clicker game. in Eternal Crypt – Wizardry BC you go into a dungeon and defeat monsters. you earn money from it which can be spent making your clicks more powerful or you can make your heroes stronger. Like typical clickers, there becomes a point where you're unable to make any further progress. In Eternal Crypt – Wizardry BC, you're meant to leave the dungeon and go back to town. this will earn you rewards which can help improve your team for the next dive into the dungeon.
What i noticed about how Eternal Crypt – Wizardry BC differed from other clickers i've played is that in this whole video i never found anything that would click for me. Nor did the game indicate that there would be anything that would be click for me. there was only the damage my team mates were doing.
But there's a whole another aspect of the game that it only teased when i played it. i wondered why it wanted me to make a wallet, but i thought it was perhaps something to do with an in-game bank mechanic that it failed to tell me about, like how in some roguelikes you're able to bank money. But actually it has something to do with the Blockchain!
It's surprising how this unique feature of the game was never explicitly mentioned in my video. It's possible that i just didn't reach where the blockchain stuff becomes a part of gameplay. But i would argue that after an hour and a couple of returns to the town, it should've been part of my game already. it feels like a pacing issue or possible a balancing issue. It could also be a tutorial issue, or a lack of a tutorial issue.
As i didn't come across the blockchain in the game, i don't fully understand it. You'd have to go to Eternal Crypt – Wizardry BC's website, like i did, to discover what it's all about. Or try to. the website tells but rarely explains the how, why, or how it's incorporated into gameplay. It could be a translation issue, but it's frustrating as a casual player how it's not incorporated into gameplay, not explained or detailed in a "casual" way.
So, as a clicker Eternal Crypt – Wizardry BC is fine. it has some nice graphics, but there are many aspects of it that haven't been detailed so it feels like i'm not getting the full experience of the game. this is doubly true when it comes to the blockchain also not being detailed or part of gameplay. It is a new release, but even the roadmap on their website doesn't make it clear if improvements to the basic elements of gameplay are coming.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out Slime Hunter: Monster Rapmage from Rainbow Rabbit Games. I Played this on my iPhone 14 Pro, but it's also out on Android.
Typically, i'm not a fan of roguelike games. often, they can be quite difficult and not very accessible. But on the Appstore, Slime Hunter: Monster Rapmage lists itself as a "Hyper Casual Shooting Roguelike" and i was very curious about this claim so that's why i wanted to try it.
For the most part, i think that it does succeed. it starts with a "cute" video and carries that into the tutorial with a Slime acting as your teacher. graphically, it's not highly detailed but it all works together. Even the music comes across as casual. So in playing it, i didn't feel the pressure and frustration that often comes with roguelikes.
But where this game stumbles is another important aspect of roguelikes, it fails to explain the loop. In roguelikes, there's often a reason why your character fails. sometimes it's how you learn what comes next, whether that's in a level or what a boss does next. in other games, you use the time between loops to level up and improve your stats by spending a gathered material. In Slime Hunter: Monster Rapmage, you're collecting money, equipable items, and materials for those items. But the game never tells you to go and equip, it never tells you to level up items, and it never shows you how to do either.
The tutorial had been so good so the fact it stops at such a critical point in the game is a big mistake. Slime Hunter: Monster Rapmage's loop is simple, you do a level and get as far as you can. If your character levels up, you can improve your stats. if you have collected an item, you can equip it, and if you have collected materials you can use them to improve those items you've equipped. Once that's done, you go back in with the aim of going further.
During these journeys in the dungeons, the controls are nice and simple. your character will shoot it's weapon when it's not moving and you move your character with a single finger touching the screen. by double tapping, tho sometimes i felt like this didn't work that well, it activates a super attack. This one handed gameplay is great for those commuting but also means it's very accessible for a larger audience. Helping you are relics. at certain points in these dungeons, you will unlock 3 relics and get to choose 1 to equip. there's a large variety of them and they affect gameplay in different ways, but typically either attacking the enemy or boosting your stats. These are random so each run in a dungeon is going to feel different and helps mitigate the repetitive nature of roguelikes.
I do recommend Slime Hunter: Monster Rapmage. it is disappointing the tutorial stops at the critical point of explaining the loop of the game. this will put some people off. but with a little exploration of the menus, many will work out what to do. It's a recent release so there's a good chance things will get even better. So i would recommend it to play now but also to keep on your phone and check out it's updates to see if they do improve the tutorials and make things easier enough for you.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out Boori's Spooky Tales: Idle RPG from SuperPlanet Studios. I Played this on my iPhone 14 Pro, but it's also out on Android.
I was really interested in trying out this game after seeing it in the app store. it's name got me curious is if was an idle game broken up into stories or if story telling was a big part. Idle games do have story, but often it's just a basic premise to justify the idle game play. Looking at the screenshots, it was clear that it looked like a good game, too, with some ideas and themes from Japan or the Asia region. I was really interested in how it would bring it all together.
The main menu screen was the first hint that perhaps it wasn't as polished as i had hoped as the background animation didn't loop. it gets to a point, stops, and restarts from the beginning. This is something that happened with the music in the sections where you learn magic as it's really noticeable.
After, there's a nice introduction that got my hopes up as it seemed to align with how i thought the game was going to tell a story. we're an exorcist who's trying to defeat ghosts and find their body. Whilst there are some specific boss level ghosts we encounter, what it actually meant was the enemies we're fighting are all ghosts.
One little quirk about the idle fighting is that if you get to a level you can't beat, instead of repeating that level over and over again as i expected would happen, you actually end up being sent back a few levels and have to work you're way back. It's not a big deal, just something that caught me off guard.
In general, the idle part of the gameplay is solid. you earn money from defeating ghosts. the money can be spent on getting stronger and gaining more health, which in turn means you can defeat more ghosts. defeating them also completes missions which earn you gold, as do other specific things. you spend the gold on "loot boxes" to try and find better gear. by equipping said gear, you get stronger and can go further. There's another currency that can be spent on upgrading the gear.
There's also another currency that unlocks magic. these seem to fire out at when their cooldown has finished but they seem to fire randomly and during the boss encounters they didn't seem too useful compared to our main staff attack that seemed to have better lock on and Ai behind what it targeted. Another aspect of the game that seemed to suffer from bad Ai was the ninja style teleport move. Like a lot of things in this game, it wasn't really explained or given an in-world explanation. so pressing the button seems to move our character to a random near by location. i tried to use it when my character was getting swarmed, but it rarely sent me anywhere i thought was useful.
Whilst the gameplay was fine and mostly easy to understand, the lack of "why" and in-game reasons did start to get annoying. Our teacher is also the tutorial character and whilst they are useful in pointing us the to the right things to press, they're painfully silent and it just feels like a wasted story telling opportunity. The further into the video i got, the less useful that character became until he stopped showing up leaving me to try things out for myself. For example, the equip menu has something called "Synthesis" and i have no idea what it does. maybe it gets rid of duplicate equipment, but if it does i don't seem to get anything for doing so. there was simply too much left unexplained. other games put it in a tutorial, others put an "i" on it so the player can press and read what it does. this game, at a certain point, just seems to stop helping the player. it really sticks out because the game tries to help out early on.
And there's the story. we get a bit at the intro, and that's about it. when we're given tasks to defeat bosses, it never felt like we're being given story. it just felt like we're given a quest. The is titled "Spooky Tales" but other than maybe our goal to find out body, i don't remember any other tale being told. i can't workout how the game's title applies to the game. Maybe it's a translation error?
Boori's Spooky Tales: Idle RPG has got the basic gameplay correct. it's just the game built around it doesn't quite match it in quality. there only seems to be one song but thankfully it's decent. the art is mostly fine. i do like our character, but there are a few enemies who don't seem to look quite right in this style, namely the fox ghosts. If you're into gameplay, something quick to play for a few minutes then Boori's Spooky Tales: Idle RPG is a good choice. but if, like me, you came to it expecting something unique and deeper, you'll probably be disappointed.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out Disaster Town Tycoon from Rogue Harbour Game Studio. I Played this on my iPhone 14 Pro, but it's also out on Android.
The screenshots and video on it's app store page make it look fun and inviting. It certainly got my attention. But it also left a lot unanswered and i was very curious about how a lot of the game would actually work. So i went into this looking for answers and i would say i came away with plenty.
As ever, one of the first things i look for is how the screen is used. all to often, games are ported to Apple from Android and things like the UI haven't been changed to fit iPhone screens. That's not the case here. the Dynamic Island has plenty of space at the top and never gets in the way and at the bottom, the Dock has some room too and i never caught it instead of hitting a button. Another important answer i want to know is how the game integrates adverts. Once again, it's a positive answer in that they're optional. we're given bonuses for watching them and none are forced upon us.
Something many games get wrong or fail to see through to a logical conclusion is the tutorial. If a game has one, they're typically too short and/or lack all the information you need. In Disaster Town Tycoon the tutorial takes you through a lot of the early game. it often simply explains things as well as showing how the game is played. Every new menu is explained, too. if i can complain, i would say that the tutorial could tell you to click on things to get an explanation and that it could be expanded at the start to help explain how to complete certain tasks.
Disaster Town Tycoon is one of the most polished games i've come across. it did come out in 2023 and it has been updated a lot, but i think it does the basic well enough that it would've been in my 2023 Free To Play Mobile Game Of The Year Awards, https://youtube.com/shorts/bF8H8VqQVVQ. The game is colorful and it works great with the art style and building designs. the characters have a fun look to them that doesn't look out of place. I even enjoyed the humour and greatly appreciated how it told us near the beginning why there are people living in a disaster prone city. that was such a small detail that really helped create a world and a reason why.
I hit the grind by about 20 minutes but was able to continue for a little while longer before needing to stop and wait. In some games that's come across as a lack of things to do and that the game doesn't have much depth. I didn't get that from Disaster Town Tycoon. more than once it tells us that we could come back later for free stuff and the pacing of the game goes very naturally from somewhat speedy to somewhat slow so that when the grind starts it feels like a natural time to put it down and let it idle.
I highly recommend Disaster Town Tycoon. I also think it would appeal to more than just the idle crowd. the graphics, the art style, the humour, and more importantly the initial tutorial make this one of the most approachable games i've played on iPhone.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out BirdHeroes from RYUJI KUWAKI. I Played this on my iPhone 14 Pro, but it's also out on Android.
I had previously played SubaraCity and was eager to try out this new game. Unfortunately, it doesn't start off great as it immediately puts you into the game without any instructions on how to play it. i only had a vague sense of what happens because i had seen the screenshots and video in the app store. This is something that continues throughout my experience with BirdHeroes and it became a big frustration.
There are some tutorial sections, but they often came after the section where the mechanic was introduced. There are other tutorial levels, but it's not immediately obvious they're levels you can select and not just trees that are part of the background. When you start them, the English is sometimes vague and even unhelpful at times. It's a sign that this newly released game needs more work and maybe got released too early.
I had issues with the tutorials, issues with the translation, and issues with the game mechanics. i had guessed a lot and was mostly correct with what happens. but actually doing it proved to be the issue more often than not. With nearly every bird i tried to ride, when it came to sections off the bird i was mostly unable to get back on it. All the birds move, some more unpredictable than others. But the game says there's a 5 second window on these sections when the game is essentially paused. so there's a rush to collect as much fruit and get back on your bird. But your bird may have other ideas and is moving around, flying behind the stage, or just darting unpredictably. i honestly have no idea how it works. sometimes i feel like the bird moved to grab me, other times i fell right beside it. sometimes the bird was quick to get me back, other times it felt too long for it to grab me. i didn't like these sections when ever they came up. even after this video, i still don't think they've been fully explained either.
So with these puzzle platforming sections slowing me down, i came to a point where i couldn't beat any of the levels. these are start of the game levels and i could not get better than 2 out of 3 stars. Unfortunately, the game does nothing to offer hints or tutorials on what to do or how to get better. there is a Upgrade Building i got to, but i have no idea how it works. i couldn't access it. i don't know if that's because i've not done something, if i've not got something, or if it simply wasn't accessible.
With such a large part of the gameplay becoming very quickly frustrating, it was almost inevitable that the game would have intrusive adverts. Thankfully, these adverts are short. but they appear seemingly randomly after some levels with no warning.
Perhaps i came into this game with expectations too high. It does look good. the music is good, too. the screenshots and trailer looked like fun. but actually playing it simply became frustrating. I do think there is potential with this idea, but with the game in such a bad state right now i simply can't recommend it. It needs far too much work for me to even suggest downloading and waiting because it's just not worth playing right now.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out Dream Detective: Merge Game, from Century Games on my iPhone 14 Pro. This game is also out on Android and PC.
The app store page for Dream Detective: Merge Game immediately grabbed my attention with it's beautiful colorful art. i was instantly curious whether this is purely for the app store or if the game looked this good. from the screenshots i instantly knew what kind of game parts of it would be, but i was keen to find out how it could combine detective gameplay with merge game play. But the developers #CenturyGames also make another game i'm familiar with called Whiteout Survival. I've been bombarded with ads for that game for a long time now and it had garnered a reputation that the ads don't match the gameplay.
Thankfully in starting the game it was clear that the artstyle is used in game and it looks fantastic. unfortunately, that's about all the praise i can give Dream Detective: Merge Game. the tutorial is bad and seems to give up almost immediately. in about 15 minutes i had finished what i could do in the game. it left me with the choice of waiting 2 hours or paying with gems to continue. This sucked for me, someone who was starting the game for the first time, as the game had done nearly nothing to prove to me that i should continue and not delete it.
And that's one of the games biggest problems. i only knew about the size of the game world because i had a look, the game did nothing to convey it to me. the game has done nothing to show off the detective gameplay teased in the app store pictures. the game has done nothing to explain the 3 currencies in the game. i've worked out 2, but i have no idea about the third. Because the time was soo short, the game hadn't really begun and it was already asking us to wait or pay to continue without ever justifying why.
Dream Detective: Merge Game is a game i can't recommend unless you're OK playing the game for 10 minutes every few hours. It's introduction to first time players is almost rude in how poorly designed it is. in this series, games typically allow players to do a lot in the beginning before slowing down and a grind beginning or the player running out of energy. often that's about 30 minutes, plenty of time for players to learn the mechanics, get the back story, and have an idea where things are going to go forward. But Dream Detective: Merge Game gave me none of that, and even less when you compare with what's seen in the app store.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out Space Intern, from Oaky Games on my iPhone 14 Pro. This game is also out on Android.
There's a lot i liked about this game, but lets start with the bugs. i've never seen a game with the flickering bug that this has. around the edges of the screen whilst in a level, it continuously flickers. it's hard to describe how annoying it was. as i've never seen this bug before in any other game on my phone, it is possible this is a bug specific to the iPhone 14 Pro and the HDMI Adapter. In my conclusion at the end of the video, being aware that this big bug maybe really specific to my situation, i compromised by saying that it's worth downloading and trying. if the bug persists, i would still keep the game and await and update.
I did have fun with the game. the levels are a good length for a mobile game whilst also providing a good puzzle platforming challenge. there are things i would change to make the game more approachable as it's currently a game where you will die, learn, and make progress. i'm an experienced gamer so i was able to work things out, but having a little more tutorial in the early part of the game would be nice. the characters do talk so they could offer some hints early on as to what's ahead. But in these types of games, they're not typically designed to be accessible. the point is to die and learn and make progress.
Space Intern does have adverts. i'm not impressed how they're seemingly randomly inserted between levels without warning. I'm not saying it's wrong to have adverts, i just feel it could've been handled much better. if the adverts aren't random, then all it needs is for the character you meet at the end of the stage to say "...and now a word from our sponsor" and in the way this game is written it wouldn't be too out of place and easy to explain. thankfully, all the adverts i came across were short so those with data plans may not have to worry immediately.
Something i'm not sure if it's a bug or a design choice is the jump. in the video i show how it has a weird lag between when i press it and it happens. so i would touch the screen, the jump button on screen would then animate, and then my character would jump. whilst i was able to mostly adjust to it, it's not expected in a puzzle platformer like this so it sticks out. But when i played with a bluetooth controller, the timing of the jump felt much better and when i pressed the jump button.
There's a lot of this game left to unlock. but for me, personally, i'm not going to go back and play it until it's patched. what Oaky Games have here is something with a lot of promise. but you shouldn't get something because of the promise, you should get it because of what it has. But i would recommend you download the game and check it out as the bugs might be specific to my phone or my recording situation. the graphics are great, the music is limited but each track is good and appropriate. the levels are mostly smartly done and there's reason to go back and try them again. But if it doesn't work, don't force yourself to play through.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out Flat Machine, from Zxima, on my iPhone 14 Pro. This game is also out on Android.
On the Store Page, Flat Machine is described as a Gatekeeper Adventure and that got me excited. i haven't played a "Gate Keeper" style game since Papers Please on the PlayStation Vita but i do enjoy that style so i was excited to try this game.
The biggest disappointment whilst playing the game is the tutorial, but having played and beaten the game i will accept that having such a poor tutorial could be a deliberate choice. But i found it frustrating as it took at least two deaths to learn the basics before i felt i was actually playing the game. the game could use it's world and characters to create a good tutorial. The village chief is a character, he found us, he put us there, so it feels like not having him with us before, during, and after the first battle as a tutorial, is a wasted opportunity.
There seem to be two goals, levelling up and beating the Flat Machine. Levelling up wasn't detailed until it happened, but it did happen it seemed like doing so is one way to make beating the Flat Machine easier. In this video, i beat the Flat Machine and it turns out it was 1 of 7 possible endings. what's great is that the game gave hints as how to get the other endings so there is replayability in not just levelling up but also in trying to find all the ways to beat the game.
I would've liked a little more BGM, but the battle music and Flat Machine music was cool. i did enjoy the character art, it looked big, colorful, and detailed. but maybe a little more variety in enemies would be nice. What i did appreciate was how the game delt with in--game ads. the game made it our choice. if we wanted to, we could watch an ad and be revived. or we could watch an ad and have a bonus. it's respectful to us the player, our data plans, and gaming on mobile.
Flat Machine may not be the best game, but it is a satisfying one to play and one to keep on your phone as it's getting updates. so i do recommend Flat Machine, but the beginning is a little rough with it's poor tutorial.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out Fake Future on my iPhone 14 Pro. This game from Sentai Inc is also out on Android.
From the Store page, i couldn't work out what this game was. But i could see that it had some great pixel art and that was enough for me to give it a go. But it will download extra data when it starts with no warning. be careful, do not play this game for the first time on mobile networks. start it on wifi! thankfully it's not the GB's the last few games have needed. but 67.86 MB is still a chunk of data.
The next weird thing is the song that plays. it seems to have no connection to the game. the lyrics don't seem to match the gameplay and it's weirdly upbeat and long for a screen that's not around for long. The music in the game is generally all over the place. none of it is bad, but it feels out of place more often than not.
Next is a section where the translation wasn't finished. something that also happens a few times in the video. i think the lack of a translation here, especially, was one reason why i never quite grasped the story. here and there issues weren't really a problem, but right here in the beginning when the game is trying to establish the story was. the game moves onto it's goals and this was another example where the game never explained the "why." I'll do what it asks, but the "why" typically is the story element. Why was i creating a character, why do i have to do these things. After an hour i'm not sure i have a decent answer for that.
Then we're on the main game screen. we have a character called Victor and not the character we created. it's confusing as we don't end up using our character for a little while, instead we have Victor. Again, there's no why, no story element. we just go and do stuff.
This lack of why, the disconnection between the music, story, gacha, game mechanics, and game story really detract from what good there is with the game. I did like the pixel art, i liked the story from the past, i liked the intrigued set up by what happens to Victor, i liked the world i saw. but it didn't seem to have any relevance to anything i did in the game.
I only played an hour and it could be this is actually part of the game. right at the beginning, "Discover the truth of this world" is teased. it's possible the whole disjointedness of this game is part of it and something we uncover as we play. but after the first hour i spent with it, i'm not willing to put in the extra time needed to find out. Fake Future isn't a mobile game i would recommend.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out Dynasty Warriors M on my iPhone 14 Pro. This game from Nexon is also out on Android.
Going in i was a little unsure about this game. it has a small file size, which made me worry there would be an additional download, and there were a lot of things you could buy for it, so i was concerned it would push me towards the shop and/or be full of ads. In the end, it was only the file size i had to worry about as in my time with the game, it never pushed any shop stuff or adverts on to me.
But the additional download at the beginning is a let down in more ways than one. it's not great that a mobile game needs an additional 4.5GB of data. at the very least the game warns you about it and your data limits. it took over 7 minutes to download that data and all i had was the same looping video and music. some other games have longer similar sequences, whilst others use this time to introduce backstory, characters, or even a glossary. it's a wasted opportunity and a waste of my time to sit through it.
That additional install might be the only big complaint i have with the game. there are a couple of small ones like poorly implemented controller support, and on occasion it felt like i had to press things a couple of times before they would register. but on the whole, for a game that recently came out, Dynasty Warriors M felt quite polished.
Once it became clear what type of game it was, i was eager to see if the game would have framerate issues when there were a large amount of enemies on screen but i never noticed any. the switching between characters also felt very smooth and seamless. i particularly enjoyed the auto battle option. as someone who uses trains and busses to commute, there are times on my journey when i need to put my phone away or use it. so having an auto battle is great.
There are a few little touches like that that make the game feel like it was designed for mobile first. another i liked was how the game tried to tie in it's gacha mechanic into the game's story. it's a bit tenuous, but i appreciated the effort.
The only confusing thing for me was that we weren't playing as the characters on screen. it took a little while to understand that the story on screen wasn't exactly being represented by the characters we were battling as. to me, it made following the story more difficult than it needed to be. There is a chance that things will be made clear further into the game. but that coupled with the additional download probably means it's not making the top of my game of the year list, but it might've done enough to get on there!
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out METRIA The Starlight on my iPhone 14 Pro. This game from Asobimo is also out on Android.
My fears with it's small file size were true as there was a further 738MB once the game is opened. Whilst that isn't a surprise, with many other RPG's seemingly doing the same, what was a surprise were the frequent loading screens. i can't remember a game i've played that has needed to do as much loading as this game does.
An hour isn't really enough to judge the story of this game as i feel like it hadn't got going. Some interesting things had happened and others had been teased, but an hour isn't long enough for this game to judge whether the pace of the story is slow in general or just slow at the start because they have to do tutorials and character introductions. Both are handled well in the hour i played.
I was genuinely surprised when the game introduced two gatcha mechanics completely out of the blue and then never went on to give an in-game universe explanation for them. this game also seems to clutter the screen more than other games i've played. the right side of the screen had a lot of buttons i could press. most of it is accessible, but they started to get in the way of camera controls as a few times i pressed a button instead of moving the camera. I don't remember if it's possible to move the buttons to the left side for left handed players.
*I APOLOGIZE THAT THE QUALITY OF THIS VIDEO IS POOR. I DIDN'T NOTICE MY CAPTURE CARD WAS HAVING A DIFFICULT TIME WITH THIS GAME*
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out Vampire Survivors on my iPhone 14 Pro. This game from Poncle Games is also out on #Android and consoles
Vampire Survivors was released last year to much fanfare and praise but i held of from playing it because it looked like a console game ported to iPhone rather than being designed for it. A long time has passed and this hasn't changed so i decided to just try it.
Unfortunately for the game, it still looks and plays like a console game ported to phones. it got off to a bad start when it glitched the first time i loaded it up vertically as the final few pixels at the top failed to load and left me with a black banner. most of the game feels too small, and due to the games artstyle, not very distinct. the enemies are perhaps the only highlight because they're bigger than my player character or visually distinct from each other. tho there were some that i couldn't make out what they were.
One option would be to zoom in. but the area i saw on my phone already felt smaller than normal, more so when the game put up borders, for no apparent reason, that gave it a 4:3 feel rather than making full use of my screen. it's a baffling choice that irked me throughout my hour with the game.
This game is also not very accessible. it tells you nothing about how to play it or how to make progress in it. The garliclike genre is fairly new and the team are making some big assumptions about mobile players and the time they're willing to put into something in comparison to console gamers. it's so bad that i wouldn't recommend this game to any casual gamer unless they're playing one of the many knock off games.
the real frustratingly thing is that the gameplay is great. i've got enough experience to know what the gameplay loop is, that and i heard about this game across many podcasts. it's a bit uneven at this early point in the game and i wonder if it'll ever balance itself once you buy upgrades, but once you get going with more upgrades and abilities it gets really fun.
It's just nearly everything else around it holds it back from being truly great. it's not a complete package. But it's fun enough that i won't be deleting it either.
For Mobile Friday this week is i tried out Fortress Saga: AFK RPG on my iPhone 14 Pro. This game from CookAppsGames is also out on #Android.
Fortress Saga: AFK RPG has risen to the top of the gaming charts on #iOS so i was keen to see what it was about the game that was so popular. i cam away from this hour with the game very impressed with it. the team at CookAppsGames have created a highly accessible game, one with a great soundtrack, and even managed to combine the tutorial into building how the world works. Fortress Saga: AFK RPG also makes smart use of the phone's screen, making sure to not only avoid the dynamic island but also the curves at each of the four edges.
