Random Dice 2 - A Dice Themed Tower Defense Game With Some Interesting Ideas - iPhone Friday

For this week's iPhone Friday i tried Random Dice 2, from 111%, on my iPhone 17e. This was recorded using the phone's screen recorder function with my audio recorded onto my computer.

THIS GAME IS NOT OUT IN THE USA (at the time of uploading)

I quite enjoy tower defense style games. with this game having it be dice themed, i was quite interested to see how it would work. i don't think the screenshots in the app store quite got across what sort of game this would be. 

It starts with the tutorial. i thought it was very good. everything was clearly explained and we were shown the basic loop of the game right from the beginning. But the first stage i played without it had weird crystals on it and the tutorial didn't come back to explain this new game mechanic. this was true for the rest of this video. i unlocked a supporter towards the end of the video, and again the tutorial didn't start to explain this new gameplay mechanic. 

Random Dice 2 does try to be helpful and tell us what's happening when things are activated during a run, but they appear at the top of the screen soo briefly that i don't think i ever fully read any of them. the game really needs to pause when these appear so we can learn how things work. there were some modifiers activated throughout this video where i didn't fully understand how they worked.

Thankfully, the core gameplay loop in Random Dice 2 so well taught in the opening tutorial, that i was able to just keep on playing. it seems like you're not meant to win. you're meant to make progress forward, earn gold, and use it to level up so next time you can make progress. Thankfully, we're not on our own. in all modes i was joined by, what was probably, Ai team mates and, i'm fairly sure, real world team mates. This was a fun addition to the game. it's clearly shown which of the two is doing the most work. sometimes it was my team, sometimes it was the co-op partner. i don't know if there was a way to interact with them, but it was needed as our goal was the same, last as long as possible.

Random Dice 2 is a recent release but it's been supported a lot with updates. there were features of the game i wasn't able to check out in this video but it's clear from the skill tree that they are expecting players to play it for a long time. i don't recommend games for their potential, but with how the game currently is i would be happy to recommend this to gamers. i know i'm not going to delete it after playing it for this video.

Version 1.1.2 Played 

Mobile Friday - Dice Kingdom - An Accessible Tower Defense Game Playable With One Hand

For Mobile Friday this week i tried out Dice Kingdom – Tower Defense on iPhone 14 Pro. this game is from 111% and is also out on #Android.

I wanted to play this game because i was curious how the dice element would work in a tower defense game. i had played Crystal Defenders not too long ago, https://youtu.be/CPxDtTKcWJY, and even though it's an older game in a different style the basic elements between the two of them seemed very similar.

So the dice are your units. they have different types. at first these are elemental, but as i progressed in this video i unlocked rarer types like sniper. so far, that's fairly typical for a tower defense game. the cool way that the dice are used is that the number on them reveals what level they are. it's a very easy way of visually seeing the levels of your units. Other than that, the dice theme seems more of an aesthetic choice rather than something that affects gameplay. 

the biggest surprise for me is how accessible the game is to play. it has useful tutorials, you're able to click on the dice and get a video showing how they attack, and it guides you very well through the opening stages of the game. it doesn't feel patronising either. a very cool way the game is accessible is managing your dice units. the game shows this in a tutorial, too. you can press a button and the game selects the best team and puts them on the map. a second button clears the map of your units. the final button auto merges your units. for example, two level 1 fire dice can be merged into one level 2 dice. When you can't merge the units any more, you hit the first button and your best team is placed onto the map. 

Whilst i was playing the game i realized that i was only using one hand. the game smartly uses the space available on the screen. there's nothing up top that the dynamic island could get in the way off, and it's the same at the bottom. everything i needed to click was down in the lower half of the screen and before long i was playing the game singlehanded. this coupled with how sort each of the monster raids are make this a great game for commuting. 

I recommend players get Dice Kingdom. it's very accessible, easy to play one handed, and not a bad introduction to the tower defence genre. the game has other game modes to help pass the time and by the end of this video i hadn't unlocked them all. there are a lot of dice units to unlock and find so it's a game you can come back to again and again.

(Version 1.1.0 Played)