Portent

Well I’ve been attacked a few times but having joined a big clan TIE-II – currently 8th in the ratings) helps. If I notice an attack on me, I can request help and repulse the attacks (hopefully!)

There’s a lot of resource management though not quite as much as Inselkampf. I’ve now got 4 villages. The first took 5-6 weeks to get it to the point where I could establish a second one. Now it’s about 8-10 days to create a new village (it’s constrained by culture) and I’m near to maxing out at least one village. You can’t build all building types so I’ve got one big military city and the rest are resource feeders.

The capital village can have resource (Wood, Clay, Iron and Wheat) producers raised to level 20 (That will take a long time!) whereas all other villages are limited to 10.

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It’s only three weeks since I joined but I’ve now moved up to position 2614 which is an improvement on 5622 that i was in the first report!

I got through the being picked on stage by building Crannies; these are secret stashing places. Most people attack to nick resources (Wood, Clay, Iron, Wheat) but if you have sufficient cranny capacity they get nothing. Also a spot of psychological warfare helps: I renamed the village to Multi Crannies Ville. That really rolls off the tongue!

Of course writing about it here does rather lift my head above the parapet but onwards and upwards I hope. I’ve also joined an alliance N E 1 which seems as if N O 1 is in charge. So if you’re on server 6 and anywhere near me (at -22, -85) and not in an alliance, please join, we need all the bods to help the alliance move from being 90th to top! (Yes I can dream).

Most of the game so far is just expansion and a bit of military building to strengthen the defences. Soon though the time for military action will be here…

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A couple of years ago I started playing Travian, a free browser game of expanding your village and attacking other players set in the time of Rome with you being one of three tribes (Romans, Gauls or Teutons). I got knocked out but eventually realised, I’d been playing blindfold with one arm tied behind my back.

So I’ve rejoined and things are progressing slightly better. One thing I’d missed out on were the quests. Click the Soldier on the right to get these as you can earn grain, iron etc and speed up your growth.

Anyway, more as I progress. I’m only at position 5622 in the table so room to improve. I’m playing on server 6 under the name Portent.org.

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As you can see, compared to previously, things are looking a lot greener. However let’s not get complacent.

In case you’re new, I’m playing in a sort of Flash Sim City where the more visitors improves the city. Currently there are three places you can visit: (I get no reward except satisfaction).

• Increase Population
• Increase industry
• Improve the road network

Of course you can only visit each link, once per day…

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Just as everyone probably has a novel in them, I think there are those with a boardgame design. Producing them is not so easy though as you have to design the game, test it, make the game bits, buy in the parts then try and sell it. A mate of mine John Harrington (who I haven’t seen in 10 years) of Fiendish games produced his own games. Lots of Blood, sweat and tears.

This site provides such a service. Actually they seem to do everything (you still have to design and test it), but after that it’s print-on-demand and order fulfillment. Similar in its way to lulu.com which does print-on-demand books. GameCrafter also do a fair bit to market your game via the site and trade shows.

While you are prototyping you can buy game bits from them. Unfortunately at the moment, it’s a US service only; so US customers may be able to buy a game that you produced but you can’t if you live outside of the US! Given that Europe, well Germany is the main source of good boardgames it’s to be hoped GameCrafter will start providing an export service. They take 50% of the price which gives you more of the pie than through traditional retail outlets which they say (and I believe them) is 30%.

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Popularity: 1% [?]

It’s back again! No I don’t have any involvement or stand to get anything from having people click through, except it improves my mini-city. Someday I’ll be able to look at my Metropolis and think why?

It’s currently traffic jammed up; I know the feeling! More visitors paradoxically frees  up the traffic jam. That’s video game logic for you!

I’ll give you a clue, green is good, red is bad.

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Popularity: 2% [?]

Though the title is from Star Wars, the game design is the old Defender game where aliens are capturing humans and taking them into space.

This would be well done in Flash but for JavaScript it’s excellent with what looks like 50 or 60 moving objects on screen (explosions bullets etc) and a parallax scrolling mountains. I’d also suggest you try it in the chrome browser because that has a very fast JavaScript engine. i have only one minor criticism and that is you can easily miss the ship at the start (it’s in the bottom left corner- blends in well with the mountains!). If you really need it, read the game overview on his blog.

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Popularity: 1% [?]

Mafia Respect & Retaliation is quite stylish looking and has a completely graphical interface. It also has a shooting range, where you tilt the iPhone to aim, and I suspect a little more depth than the other games. I found the shooting range a little tricky but with practise…

I’ve had a message pop up offering me a fight on occasions at which I am usually totally floor wiped and robbed of some cash.

This is a free game or you can pay up to £30 (in the app store) by buying respect in the game. You can also top this up- $99 gets you 2,500. Who says you can’t buy respect! It is though quite a stylish interface in red, black or white. I think there’s a bug buying stuff- it seems that the 1 quantity is disabled and you have to select 2 then do it a second time and change it back to 1. Not a big bug.

I do like this interface with a scrolling right hand list. Another suggestion though, some of the buttons respond when you press them by changing colours but the Job buttons don’t which makes it tricky to know if you have pressed. That would certainly enhance it. Player interactivity doesn’t appear to be as intense as iMob Online but otherwise this is a 7/10.

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PS. In case you’re wondering, I have no financial gain from any review or links to the App store. The adverts money pays a bit but that’s it…

Popularity: 2% [?]

iMafia was my least favourite game for just one reason. Every time you did anything, you’d see a Connecting to Server for 4-15 seconds on 3G, a bit shorter on WiFi. It’s very distracting and put me right off this, which is a shame as otherwise it looks quite reasonable.

This game follows the standard model of game play but makes it more interesting my having all of the actions done through clicking on a building. There are 9 buildings spread over the two screens (The picture btw is my combination of the two screens, normally you only see the left half or the right half. ). Clicking on for example the Police station gives you a list of targets to hit, and the reward offered. Loyalty/Respect points are called Honor points in iMafia. You get some to start with and can have more than 1 gang member; I’ve got 2 now. There’s also a set of 10 tutorials to speed you into the game.

If they could fix the Connecting to Server Message then this would be as good as the others and it is a free app, but for now I give it just 4/10.

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Popularity: 2% [?]

This is the only paid one in the four reviewed: Mafia Live which costs £1.79, or about $2.99 (I guess). I have to say it is my favourite of the four but it has a basic flaw in the game design. It relates to recruiting members.

To get more mobsters into your gang, you have to get friends or acquaintances that you know to join.  Not exactly viral marketing but that sort of thing and it involves them basically being slightly spammed by you.

Not everyone has lots of friends who want to join up so if you haven’t then you are doomed to fight alone in your one man gang. This affects your combat strength as only one your best rated vehicles can be used – if you’ve bought say a town car and a BMW M3, it’s the M3. A gang with 2 members uses both cars.  It also stops you doing bank jobs etc. I can only steal or trash cars, shop lift or at best rough up rivals.  Bigger gangs can do bigger jobs which net them more money and experience.

I spotted this flaw early on so gave up trying to win fights. I armed myself with the minimum needed to conduct beat-up rivals missions, let everyone beat me up and concentrated on building up my property portfolio. After 4 days I have acquired 5 Hot Dog stands and 2 Gas Stations and quickly expanded up t0 ten jewelry stores. The bigger weapons and vehicles will milk you dry in support costs so I figure expand first and then arm myself to the hilt.

I’ve also been attacking against stronger gangs to lose and to lower my health. Below about 20 (of 100) no one can attack you. It’s an essential part of money management and you lose health when attacked or attacking. You heal a point every 290 seconds.

Every 50 minutes (real time) all my properties give me cash. If I’m attacked with money on me I lose some of it (about 10% per attack!) so I have to pay it into the bank for safety 1losing 10% in fees. In iMob the banks charge you 15%! I lost $125K while asleep last night. So every 48 minutes I log into the game, beat up as many rivals as I have energy points and pay all of the resulting cash into the bank. When its enough, I withdraw it and expand my property empire.

This isn’t the best looking which is probably iMob Online. Mafia Live uses a web page for its controls (Don’t believe me? Keep your finger pressed on a link like Banker and you’ll see the URL popup). To give it its due, you don’t see the network connection animation when it connects and it’s pretty quick, even on 3G.

I’m now at Level 29 with each level taking more and more points to get up. This comes from the experience gained in missions. Levelling up gives you 5 Zen Points to spend on improving your attack/defence, energy or stamina. It also brings newer weapons and vehicles every 5 levels. Most of mine has gone into energy which recharges at the rate of 10 points every 50 minutes.

Overall I’ll keep playing this for a few days more but its not the most interactive game. I also discovered a way to make a lot of money from one player which nobody else has done on me! If you attack someone and beat them you get money. If they have a lot of money you get a fair whack- my biggest is 55K. So long as you have the stamina and health and they have the health, (both healths must be 20 or higher) you can go to the My Hood tab, view the fight log, click on the link showing the player you last beat up and then fight them again and again and if your health goes to low you just pay to have it restored. You can’t attack anything except other gangs.

Be great if you could trash cars or blow up their buildings and increasing gang size without spamming your friends…  Rating 7/10.

Popularity: 3% [?]

I like Mafia games, I’m working on one for the iPhone and there are now at least four Mafia games, 1 paid and 3 free. So this is a group review of all four of them with lots of screen shots.

As a game designer I find that all of these games are somewhat derivative and a bit one dimensional. They are similar to many the web based mafia/gangster type games. But these are Al Capone type gangster games, not the modern “Rapper/Hos/Pimps” genre. The four reviewed are

1. Mafia LIVE
2. iMafia,
3. Mafia Respect and Retaliation (Henceforth known as Mafia R & R) and
4. iMob Online.

I didn’t review Mafia Boss which seems a different type of game. Of these four, Mafia R & R is also available in various paid versions with the amount of respect points (called Loyalty in Mafia Live, Honor in Mafia R & R) varying according to how much you paid. These points get you extra men or money so you can start with a big advantage. The 1250 point version costs £29.99 about $45!

Essentially these are all spreadsheets. You have some cash and use it to buy weapons and/or property. Weapons and manpower let you undertake more interesting and gainful missions that brings in more cash and experience that is used to level up. Property gives you income and several of the games use the binary model of having to buy land and then develop it by building Hot Dog stands, Jewelry shops, malls etc. You also have a stamina that is decreased by undertaking missions and increases with time.

I’ve split this review into four posts and will put them up over a day or two.

Popularity: 3% [?]

If you remember MyMiniCity, a site where each visitor generates a newcomer, well you can see from the photo that things aren’t going well there.

These stats speak for themself- 47% unemployment!

So anyway, if you click on the top picture and visit the employment site it’ll get the jobs up at portent999. Click the stats box and it’ll increase the population. Or you could just visit MyMinicity.com and have your own city.

This is just for fun btw, it doesn’t earn me any more, fame or glory!

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Popularity: 5% [?]

This is a bigger review than usual, complete with animated gif which I’ve put together from screen dumps. I’ve been playing LootWars for a week or two now on my iPhone so feel qualified to give an in-depth review.

Its a Multi-player Mobile Game (MMG or MMO?) which is significant itself and not that expensive at just over £1. the object is to get to the top of the leader-boards by picking up scrap and bashing othr people to steal theirs. But you are limited to holding just 6 pieces of scrap.

Gameplay: After you run the App you get the first screen with rusty logo. Top right is your three important stats: A for attack total, D for defence and E for energy. the latter is important as it maxes out at 20, is used when you scavenge or fight and only recharges at the rate of 1 per 20 minutes of realtime. The game is server based but plays over 3G, Edge or Wifi.

At the start you loot (2nd icon) and when players trash your items after they beat you in a fight. The 2nd screen shows my player (portent by the way!) not looking too healthy because I’d just scavenged two low power items. the attack is the sum of the 6 items attack, defence is the total of the items defence. Scavenging gives you the odd good item but mostly crap so you have to beat people and swap your inferior items stuff for their better ones.

Fighting takes place in the arena. You can search for players matching a name (or part name so a matches a number) but you only so 24 or 25 maximum. It would be better if you could see more or there was a next button. If you put in a and search you get the first 24 that match a every time. Press refresh and you get a random selection. Once you pick someone- I picked ordieth who was a lot stronger than me (the colour codes show green weaker, yellow about the same and red stronger) a fight takes place which I won. Items always seem sorted by total value with weakest at the top. Ordieth had what I call a 80-93 spread. His weakest item was 80, strongest 93.

After I defeated him, I swapped my weak Sheriff badge (26) for his strong DVR box (93!) that must have pissed him! (There are over a 1,000 items with levels and other factors that are hinted at in the help. You can trash someones items rather than swap yours with theirs.

So it’s a simple albeit repetitive game that is quickly played. I tend to leave it for a few hours, do a few fights to recover what I’ve lost and hopefully get stronger. I get the feeling that the creators are tinkering with the game. Some people were dropping crappy items so they couldn’t be attacked. If you have 5 or 6 items you are vulnerable. 4 or less and you can’t be attacked. But they have stopped players dropping items temporarily.

I think that with a few minor tweaks they will have a better game; its not bad now but could be improved. I could think of a few different ways to improve it but they can’t make big changes suddenly. for instance you can visit the town to mingle and swap items but I’ve never seen that work. Some more info on the item colours would be good.

So my experience has been scavenge to get initial and replacement (for trashed ) items then fight to improve items. I’ll keep you updated on how this progresses. Currently I’m starting to find it a bit stale. But I think it will improve so I’m hanging in there. They do encourage feedback but haven’t responded or acknowledged mine. You can also visit the their website.

Graphics are very nice though are just window dressing. It works well even over edge and they’ve just changed servers which suggests they’ve got overwhelmed with players. It’s significant as one of the first wave of multi-player games for the iPhone. So if you like games and have an iPhone, give it a try! Rating 7 out of 10.

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Popularity: 5% [?]

This games takes the defence scenario but extends it by giving you the ability to build armies (using mana which is obtained by killing the baddies) and then you can go on the offensive. It’s a simple 2d left right scrolling and can be played with keyboard or mouse.

You have artillery in the shape of a bow and as well as earning mana during the battle, you also gain experience that can be used to upgrade your weapons, give you new types of troops. Great graphics, an ok sound track and just fun. Excellent.

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Popularity: 3% [?]

This is quite tough as my lamentably poor score demonstrates. It’s table tennis (aka ping pong) playing against a touch computer opponent.

Just move the bat left or right with the mouse. Bounce angles seem determined by the point at which you hit- hitting the ball off the table is all too easy! But if you’re looking for a simple (albeit frustrating) game then give this a try.

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Popularity: 3% [?]