Portent

I gave up playing this yesterday. I’d achieved 79 islands and 15th place in the game (out of about 6,000) as the player YieldToPortent but the game (Game 1) was getting a little bit stagnant for me. All of the unowned islands had been taken and new ones only became free when someone dropped out. Then there would be a mad feeding frenzy as everyone made a mad dash with disputes and hassle.

It’s been fun. But what started out as perhaps 5 minutes a day was taking an hour, maybe two at weekends; way too much time. Bits I remember- the anxiety after capturing an island, waiting until you could ship enough resources in to raise the main house to level 2 (I lost 5 islands due to someone capturing them just a few minutes before the house reached level 2- that prevents anyone colonising an island) and then having to pile up defences against people who were unwise enough to attack. I even had one island that someone claimed was his- he had attacked twice and been repulsed but caused me a massive amount of damage. I eventually stocked it up with 11,000 stone throwers and 96 catapults and of course he never attacked again. Most people rarely have more than 2,000 soldiers on an island- that was a large amount.

Combat in Inselkampf was ferociously pyrrhic. I lost several fleets with over 200 Warships in and hundreds of soldiers. Anyway it was fun and no regrets… Compare this map with my earlier ones! The darker coloured islands are mine.

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Well I’m still playing this free online strategy game – you can see all reports on Inselkampf here. I’ve just captured my 17th island and am ranked 174th out of 3000+. It has got a bit more interesting- micromanaging the expansion of all the islands- shipping resources between islands, making sure there are no delays due to resource shortage.

Its made more challenging by the fact I can only do orders at work before I start work or at lunch. So I do the shorter builds when I’m at home and at weekends and always schedule long builds overnight. At work I try to arrange the builds to be 4-5 hours.

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Back in November I started playing this free online game. You can see all posts here . As you can see, I’ve three islands now and have just built a colonisation ship for my 4th. As soon as I click the Transport button, the invasion starts.

I must admit though that while it has been fun, I’m starting to get a bit bored of it. To build a colonisation ship takes nearly 5 days of accumulating resources on one island and then 20 hours building. This is definitely a game for the patient. But I’ll carry on a bit longer.

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A month ago I started playing the free online strategy game Inselkampf (It means Island War in German). See all reports here. It is not the fastest game but I’ve increased my island from Level 1 Gold, Stone Mines and Lumber production to Levels 10, 15, 16 and 15, researched many weapons and even laumched a failed attack on an unmanned island nearby.

I can’t believe a month has gone by! Its not the fastest game- you do a few orders then check 3 or 4 hours later to see what happens. I’m in an alliance and a more advanced player has been shipping me resources to help me accelerate my development. However his ships take two real days (48 hours) to reach me. I think the game is paced just a little too slow. When I reach a certain level (not too far to go) of research, I’ll be able to successfully attack. Anyway, another update in a month!

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For those whose German is none existent- Inselkampf means Island War. If your Deutsch is “sehr gut” then you can visit the German language version at Inselkampf.de.

I’ve always been fond of games- 20 years ago I was working in my own business writing them. A big appeal of this is it didn’t take a lot of time to play. Some games would consume your entire existence- not this. INSELKAMPF is a browser-based online game. Become the ruler of your own island, build ships and buildings, do weapons research, train an army and send it to war. It’s free or you can pay $20 a year for the XXL version which lets you do more.

It’s a bit of an economic game- dig gold, chop lumber and quarry stone to expand your empire with new buildings, technology, armies and fleets and attack your neighbouring islands. I’ll keep you updated as to how well (or more likely) badly I’m faring…

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I finally finished playing it in July 2007! You can see the final report here.