Ruling the Game Podcast up!

Hey everyone, just a heads up that Lisa and I did a new podcast episode and its up on itunes right now! Follow the link bottom right to get to it quick like. In the cast we ramble about iOS 8, the Air 2, the mini 3, the i6 and i6+ phones too. Then we went off to discuss the following games :

Plunder Pirates
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/plunder-pirates/id845129661?mt=8
Free, universal, 97mb download, gamecenter enabled.

A enjoyable Clash-of-Clans alike with a much much larger pve mechanic, more friendly ranking system, more in depth training system, buildings are linked to each other for upgrading purposes, there are buildings with no purpose aside from cosmetic that have to be present to upgrade other buildings, there are guild focused buildings offering perks and bonuses based on guild participation towards the building. And that doesn't even cover all the things to do on the pve map. Worth a try!

My suggestion to the developers, make the water 'road' that sticks from the ship unusable for enemy player landings. All having it usable by attackers does is cause all the progressive minded players surround their ship with land since attackers can't deploy directly on land. It really ruins what is otherwise an emersive interactive and fun to watch town.

Royal Revolt 2
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/royal-revolt-2-defend-your/id705211891?mt=8
Free, universal, 93mb download, game center enabled.

My original comment summary for this game was 'clash of clan clone' and that was my greatest disservice to it. This game is in only the lightest lightest sense of the word a clone. You can attack other players. That's it, nothing else. Base building is fixed position, no worrying about whether your building it right. Instead you have the road. The road is what other players have to run through to reach your castle gave and victory. You can layout the road anyway you see fit, load it with traps, configure waves of your defenses that flow out and attack, get as detailed or not as you may want. On top of that the game is very very generous with the what-they-get-for-winning vs what-you-lose-when-they-win. All buildings are upgradable and fully change appearance as you go. The dungeon under the castle is massive and littered with in game currency rewards, iap rewards, equipment rewards (you upgrade all equipment on your king who you control in battle much like you would in any rpg) and even new units for your kingdom to use in defense as well as offense. Combat is limited to your wheat count but you can indefinitely watch 30 second videos to resupply the wheat needed for combat. One video gets you another fight, you can go for hours and hours and hours just chasing leader boards, chasing the event ranks and amassing a fortune that you use upgrading everything in your kingdom, your road and all your kings equipment.

I have to say I haven't enjoyed a game as much as this one in a very very long time and will be playing it for a long time to come. My only suggestion to the developers : Implement some sort of guild system, a social aspect to this game would blow everything else out of the water.

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We also discuss Space Engineers but I won't ramble on it here, I'll make a separate blog entry for it. Want to know more about it? This blog has plenty of entries that ramble on length about why its my favorite pc game of all time and has even caused me to retire Kerbal Space Program recently. Like minecraft? Want better controls, graphics, combat, the works? Check it out.

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And there you have it, enjoy the podcast, we 'promise' to make more and keep up with it this time.

-whistles, hopes, no guarantees though heehee-

o7

Wednesday Night Release

Ok, here we go another wednesday night... and a whole lot more games to muck around in. I downloaded eleven titles, half were premium and other half free-to-play. Not all the summaries that follow are good ones though, some of these games annoyed me for one reason or another. Here's the touch arcade link to the full twenty odd game list that released :

http://toucharcade.com/2014/02/26/out-now-disco-zoo-and-lots-more/

And now, off to my choices.

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Primal Flame
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/primal-flame/id600052237
2.99usd, universal, 43mb download.

A very nice game to look at, great graphics! Your finger is a flame thats keeping away the dark, you swipe around collecting seeds that extend the fuel of your flame. Catching leaves reduces he flame, additionally there are 'venus fly traps' that go after the seeds... and you if you sit still. You can draw through these plants stems to cut them off. Additionally you can cut the stem of a fly trap with a seed in its mouth to release the seed before it eats it. If a fly trap catches you, advice : do not swipe around frantically, it dosen't do much, drawl through the fly trap to break free. The music is enjoyable, the game gets quite frantic. Achievements award currency, there is no iap currency in this game. You spend your currency upgrading your flame in various way and also purchasing spells.

Fully recommend this one.

God of Light
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/god-of-light/id735128536
1.99usd, universal, 64mb download.

Another visual charmer, in this game you control a spark of light in a dark world. Your job is to light the pillar on each stage. Bonus points for hitting all three crystals that fell out of the pilar along the way. How you do this is you angle the spark so that the beam of light coming from it hits various plants (mirrors) that reflect the beam around the stage. The iap in this game comes in the form of fireflies that you can use to temporarily light up the stage, doing so shows the route you need to take for the beam to hit all three crystals along the way to the pillar.

Great visual effects, solid music and responsive controls. Fully recommend this one.

Duck Destroyer
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/id704235012
Free, universal, 440mb download.

I picked this one up on impulse because the screenshots reminded me faintly of duck hunt for the nes way back when. And largely, thats what this is. You move your finger around on the screen, doing so moves the targeting reticle. Tapping the weapon button shoots. You do this around various stages until the timer runs out at which you are rewarded cash based on how many goals you achieved. Each goal is worth a star and stars are used to buy new guns. Cash is used to by devices like dynamite sticks and also used for upgrading everything. As with all chillingo games there is a good bit of iap present. These range from ad removers which I don't mind to currency packs which I find highly annoying. Still, I don't see a pay wall here so far, just patience required to farm up the coins and abit of skill to get those stars.

Royal Revolt 2
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/royal-revolt-ii/id705211891
Free, universal, 94mb download.

-facepalm- Take royal revolt 1's gameplay and slap it on clash of clans. I probably don't need to say more but I will anyways, sigh. This game is part time kingdom manager, part time player versus player. You spend your time and currency upgrading various buildings around your kingdom that do everything from generate income to unlocking new units for combat. Combat is two fold. First half is defense, you have a large swath of forest infront of your castle that you can drawl out with your finger as twisty and puzzly a road as you have road tiles for (unlock more road tiles by upgrading main castle). You toss defense towers and traps all over it. Lastly you lay out the waves your soldiers will come out when another player attacks you. If they win, they get some of your coin and trophy points. The second half of combat is of course, attacking other players and this portion of the game is literally royal revolt 1. Run down the road designed by the other player, smash all their soldiers and defenses, crush their castle door. If you do this within the 2 minute time limit you get much reward and trophy points.

The iap is horrible and everywhere and very much expensive. Developers, there is a reason why clash of clans was so unbelievably successful and why every clone has only been so to small extents. They did it first. Thats it, thats all. Copying their business model and throwing it on what was a great game, just lessens yours.

Play it if you like, but there is plenty elsewhere to better occupy your time in my opinion.

Running Quest
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/running-quest/id711746352
1.99usd, universal, 61mb download.

Temple Run clone with a combat mechanic and prettier graphics. Controls are iffy, often not responding immediately, plenty of iap in two forms. Exp/Coin gain doublers that I don't mind and currency packs which annoy me greatly.

Moving on...

Beyond Space
https://itunes.apple.com/us/app/beyond-space/id770806299
2.99usd, universal, 660mb download.

Woo, space shooter! Great graphics, responsive controls cheesy voice acting. Stage based, proceeding through the game unlocks new ships and equipment that you can mix and match inbetween each stage. Third person perspective meaning you can always see the back side of your ship, assisted targeting meaning so long as you are 'close' to correct with your aiming, you will hit your targets. All the important control options are hear though I would rather have a emergency brake button rather than a slider. Conversation at work as I loaded this one up :

Me : Woo, space shooter!
Co-worker : Hey look its star wars.

There is ALOT of influence here from star wars space combat, in particular the opening battle of episode 3. There is iap present but it simply unlocks vehicles early. Everything can easily be unlocked by playing the game. Recommended!

Thats it for this post, I have five more games to play and will put them in a part 2 later.

o/