Category Archives: 4 stars
Tri It! Triangle Puzzle
The game play for Tri It is simple and pretty ingenious. The game board is a shape divided into a bunch of triangles of the same shape. Equilateral perhaps? The game piece is 1 or 2 triangles positioned somewhere on that board. The easier puzzles start with one triangle – Your objective is to move the triangle to another place on the board by “flipping” it along one of its sides. You keep doing this until the triangle ends up at the goal. This is interesting because the movement isn’t intuitive…you can’t just follow a straight line. Additional challenge is introduced by having barriers between certain places on the board, more than one triangle (all of which are affected by each swipe), having “transporter” places, different colored triangles, or having “enemy” triangles that you have to move out of the way (in the same manner). If you like this type of game, I think it’s pretty innovative and worth a look.
Survival Score: A couple dozen levels before it was too difficult for me
Tri It! Triangle Puzzle
The game play for Tri It is simple and pretty ingenious. The game board is a shape divided into a bunch of triangles of the same shape. Equilateral perhaps? The game piece is 1 or 2 triangles positioned somewhere on that board. The easier puzzles start with one triangle – Your objective is to move the triangle to another place on the board by “flipping” it along one of its sides. You keep doing this until the triangle ends up at the goal. This is interesting because the movement isn’t intuitive…you can’t just follow a straight line. Additional challenge is introduced by having barriers between certain places on the board, more than one triangle (all of which are affected by each swipe), having “transporter” places, different colored triangles, or having “enemy” triangles that you have to move out of the way (in the same manner). If you like this type of game, I think it’s pretty innovative and worth a look.
Survival Score: A couple dozen levels before it was too difficult for me
Tractor Beam
The look and feel of this game is very nostalgic — it’s all classic asteroid. But instead of shooting the asteroids that come at you, you send out a grappling hook (see my last posting on Gravity Hook), and pull yourself forward, trying not to hit any of the oncoming asteroids (game over). No gravity in the game (thank goodness) but there is inertia. So, when you grab an asteroid, you exert force on it and pull it towards you. The effect of this varies depending on the size of the asteroid. The goal is just to go as far as you can without smashing up into little matchsticks. A nice thing is that when this happens, you don’t have to go all the way back to the beginning.
Survival Score: several games, now and then
Tractor Beam
The look and feel of this game is very nostalgic — it’s all classic asteroid. But instead of shooting the asteroids that come at you, you send out a grappling hook (see my last posting on Gravity Hook), and pull yourself forward, trying not to hit any of the oncoming asteroids (game over). No gravity in the game (thank goodness) but there is inertia. So, when you grab an asteroid, you exert force on it and pull it towards you. The effect of this varies depending on the size of the asteroid. The goal is just to go as far as you can without smashing up into little matchsticks. A nice thing is that when this happens, you don’t have to go all the way back to the beginning.
Survival Score: several games, now and then
Cursed Treasure HD
Cursed Treasure is a pretty standard tower defense game with enough interesting elements that I actually played all of the levels (about 25 of them) and thought seriously about going back and getting “gold” ratings on all of them. Some people find tower defense games tremendously boring. But I think of it sort of like dynamic chess. I set up my board, invite in the waves of marauders, and modify my defenses in real time to both anticipate their strengths and (hopefully) demolish them. The theme is a gridded open countryside. Each square is either grass, snow, or rock. Or a “special” square. There are three towers corresponding to the three different types of squares, and the square and the tower must match. Any tower can be built on the special squares. The bad guys are pretty ordinary tower defense stuff — some are stronger, some can disappear, some are faster, etc. What is cool about Cursed Treasure is that there are dozens of different upgrades. You “purchase” them with skill points, which you earn by playing (not necessarily by winning). And each of the upgrades has anywhere from 2-5 levels, so the upgrading goes on and on and on… For me, it provides a little thrill of power to see my towers go into frenzy shooting 20% faster than before! and so forth.
Survival Score: Hours. Had to stop myself from attempting a perfect score.
Cursed Treasure HD
Cursed Treasure is a pretty standard tower defense game with enough interesting elements that I actually played all of the levels (about 25 of them) and thought seriously about going back and getting “gold” ratings on all of them. Some people find tower defense games tremendously boring. But I think of it sort of like dynamic chess. I set up my board, invite in the waves of marauders, and modify my defenses in real time to both anticipate their strengths and (hopefully) demolish them. The theme is a gridded open countryside. Each square is either grass, snow, or rock. Or a “special” square. There are three towers corresponding to the three different types of squares, and the square and the tower must match. Any tower can be built on the special squares. The bad guys are pretty ordinary tower defense stuff — some are stronger, some can disappear, some are faster, etc. What is cool about Cursed Treasure is that there are dozens of different upgrades. You “purchase” them with skill points, which you earn by playing (not necessarily by winning). And each of the upgrades has anywhere from 2-5 levels, so the upgrading goes on and on and on… For me, it provides a little thrill of power to see my towers go into frenzy shooting 20% faster than before! and so forth.
Survival Score: Hours. Had to stop myself from attempting a perfect score.
Durion
s you know, I am a word game fanatic. In order to keep my attention, a new game must offer something unusual or distinctive. And it has to have a good dictionary. Durion’s dictionary is mostly OK. But the gameplay seemed to me, initially, to be pretty typical– a dropping letters game. You get a row of letters, make a word and zap it in for points, with bonuses for word length, speed, and how many times you’ve gone without a false entry. And so, it was headed for the recycle bin. But then I uncovered a couple of things — things I couldn’t pick up in the incredibly confusing instructions. First, I could make the letters drop faster. The default speed was mind numbingly slow. Second, I could move the letters around in the tray, a la Scrabble style. So instead of identifying words in the dropping letters, it became more of a strategy and probability game. I could choose some letters thinking that I had a high probability of using them in a word (different letters have different point value, so is a bit of a gamble — play it safe and run out of time, or go for the big points but possibly go bust!?) and then change my mind about what word to make as the letters continue to drop. As a result of this serendipitous discovery, Durion kept me occupied for a good hour straight.
Survival score: 30-60 minute sessions.
Durion
s you know, I am a word game fanatic. In order to keep my attention, a new game must offer something unusual or distinctive. And it has to have a good dictionary. Durion’s dictionary is mostly OK. But the gameplay seemed to me, initially, to be pretty typical– a dropping letters game. You get a row of letters, make a word and zap it in for points, with bonuses for word length, speed, and how many times you’ve gone without a false entry. And so, it was headed for the recycle bin. But then I uncovered a couple of things — things I couldn’t pick up in the incredibly confusing instructions. First, I could make the letters drop faster. The default speed was mind numbingly slow. Second, I could move the letters around in the tray, a la Scrabble style. So instead of identifying words in the dropping letters, it became more of a strategy and probability game. I could choose some letters thinking that I had a high probability of using them in a word (different letters have different point value, so is a bit of a gamble — play it safe and run out of time, or go for the big points but possibly go bust!?) and then change my mind about what word to make as the letters continue to drop. As a result of this serendipitous discovery, Durion kept me occupied for a good hour straight.
Survival score: 30-60 minute sessions.
Train Defense
his game is sort of like a tower defense game except you don’t have towers, you have a train engine with one car, and you use your finger to lay down tracks to travel along. If you run out of track, you just sit still until you make more tracks. So, the game board has passengers to pick up on the left of the screen, and you drop them off on the right. Plus, a big ol’ water tower in the middle you need to go around. Simple enough. Yes, but then bad, bad vehicles start moving in, to steal your water or to shoot you. Did I mention that your train car has a turret on top? Luckily, you don’t have to aim, you just have to get close enough and it shoots on its own. You have a certain amount of life points. Once those are gone, the game is over. When you deliver passengers, you get “money,” which you can use to upgrade your weapons and add train cars, and so forth. Unfortunately, I haven’t figured out how to get them attached. I think that’s just because I haven’t played enough. I get a little stressed out, so I only play a bit at a time.
Survival Score: Fun, in short bursts
Train Defense
his game is sort of like a tower defense game except you don’t have towers, you have a train engine with one car, and you use your finger to lay down tracks to travel along. If you run out of track, you just sit still until you make more tracks. So, the game board has passengers to pick up on the left of the screen, and you drop them off on the right. Plus, a big ol’ water tower in the middle you need to go around. Simple enough. Yes, but then bad, bad vehicles start moving in, to steal your water or to shoot you. Did I mention that your train car has a turret on top? Luckily, you don’t have to aim, you just have to get close enough and it shoots on its own. You have a certain amount of life points. Once those are gone, the game is over. When you deliver passengers, you get “money,” which you can use to upgrade your weapons and add train cars, and so forth. Unfortunately, I haven’t figured out how to get them attached. I think that’s just because I haven’t played enough. I get a little stressed out, so I only play a bit at a time.
Survival Score: Fun, in short bursts
Control Craft and Control Craft 2
My son tells me games like Control Craft are called “real time strategy’ games. I’m not quite sure what that means, but strategy is definitely at the core of what I like Control Craft. It’s basically you against 1 or 2 computer opponents. You each have 1 or 2 outposts. These outposts create — “spawn” — soldiers and hold onto them until your dispatch them to another outpost (either all of once or half of them) to capture it. Then those captured outposts make even more soldiers. Eventually, you have to battle the enemy over an outpost, taking it over with the sheer number of soldiers you throw at it. You win the round when you have captured all of the outposts (or, you lose the level when you have no outposts left). The pacing is a little slow, plodding even…must be all the equipment the soldier have to carry. There is nice variety — soldiers can fly from some outposts, and some create double sized super-soldiers. There are defensive towers that zap you until you capture them, and some outposts create soldiers faster than others do. Gameplay is the same in both the original and the sequel. HOWEVER, the first I rate 5 starts and the second only 4, because there are levels in the second that I found impossible to even come close to winning…the strategy there, I think, is that the game developers want to capture your money…you need to put down real cash to purchase special weapons. A buck for 1 measly bomb? Well, forget that. I just won’t play those last 3 levels!
Survival score: Played all the way through, several hours.
Control Craft and Control Craft 2
My son tells me games like Control Craft are called “real time strategy’ games. I’m not quite sure what that means, but strategy is definitely at the core of what I like Control Craft. It’s basically you against 1 or 2 computer opponents. You each have 1 or 2 outposts. These outposts create — “spawn” — soldiers and hold onto them until your dispatch them to another outpost (either all of once or half of them) to capture it. Then those captured outposts make even more soldiers. Eventually, you have to battle the enemy over an outpost, taking it over with the sheer number of soldiers you throw at it. You win the round when you have captured all of the outposts (or, you lose the level when you have no outposts left). The pacing is a little slow, plodding even…must be all the equipment the soldier have to carry. There is nice variety — soldiers can fly from some outposts, and some create double sized super-soldiers. There are defensive towers that zap you until you capture them, and some outposts create soldiers faster than others do. Gameplay is the same in both the original and the sequel. HOWEVER, the first I rate 5 starts and the second only 4, because there are levels in the second that I found impossible to even come close to winning…the strategy there, I think, is that the game developers want to capture your money…you need to put down real cash to purchase special weapons. A buck for 1 measly bomb? Well, forget that. I just won’t play those last 3 levels!
Survival score: Played all the way through, several hours.
Roads of Rome HD
What, you say, you were intrigued by my last post and want to try another one? Roads of Rome is pretty standard. Much closer to the standard approach of the genre — to build a road, while overcoming obstacles, gathering a gem or two, making sure your workers are fed, and finishing before dark. And the standard interface…the only distinguishing feature here is that the tiny workers are wearing togas and sandals. The side story, such as it is, is that the emperor is keeping the General in the field fixing roads in order to keep him away from his daughter. I won’t give away the ending, suffice it to say they are depending on you.
Survival score: Straight through, 10-20 hours.
Roads of Rome HD
What, you say, you were intrigued by my last post and want to try another one? Roads of Rome is pretty standard. Much closer to the standard approach of the genre — to build a road, while overcoming obstacles, gathering a gem or two, making sure your workers are fed, and finishing before dark. And the standard interface…the only distinguishing feature here is that the tiny workers are wearing togas and sandals. The side story, such as it is, is that the emperor is keeping the General in the field fixing roads in order to keep him away from his daughter. I won’t give away the ending, suffice it to say they are depending on you.
Survival score: Straight through, 10-20 hours.
Island Tribe HD
I am a sucker for time management games, and there are a bunch that use the same basic theme — you have a worker, and then have to gather resources, construct buildings, wars off baddies, etc. Island Tribe has a couple of interesting twists on the genre — the most obvious one is that (starting after a few beginning levels) most of the playing field is obstructed at the start of the round by “fog”. The fog clears as you explore the level. Another interesting twist is that some resources can only be made if you have enough of another resource… Like, to make wool, you need to give the rancher bags of grain. But to get grain, you need to give the farmer buckets of water. About 30 levels overall, lasted me on a long flight, and several long lines at Walt Disney World.
Survival score: Played straight through, 12-15 hours.
Island Tribe HD
I am a sucker for time management games, and there are a bunch that use the same basic theme — you have a worker, and then have to gather resources, construct buildings, wars off baddies, etc. Island Tribe has a couple of interesting twists on the genre — the most obvious one is that (starting after a few beginning levels) most of the playing field is obstructed at the start of the round by “fog”. The fog clears as you explore the level. Another interesting twist is that some resources can only be made if you have enough of another resource… Like, to make wool, you need to give the rancher bags of grain. But to get grain, you need to give the farmer buckets of water. About 30 levels overall, lasted me on a long flight, and several long lines at Walt Disney World.
Survival score: Played straight through, 12-15 hours.
Antrim Escape HD
Having done a bunch of hidden object games, it took me a little while to realize that Antrim Escape isn’t one of them. Which, actually, added to the enjoyment, because I really did feel trapped and unable to escape. Once I caught on, then things went much better. Most of the puzzles in the room are sensible, only a few that seemed contrived. Took 2-3 hours to solve, which is really all the longer I want an escape game to last. There is a minimal back story that mainly serves to keep a thread to the sequel. A very good hint system, one of the best I’ve seen.
Survival score: Played straight through, 2-3 hours.
Antrim Escape HD
Having done a bunch of hidden object games, it took me a little while to realize that Antrim Escape isn’t one of them. Which, actually, added to the enjoyment, because I really did feel trapped and unable to escape. Once I caught on, then things went much better. Most of the puzzles in the room are sensible, only a few that seemed contrived. Took 2-3 hours to solve, which is really all the longer I want an escape game to last. There is a minimal back story that mainly serves to keep a thread to the sequel. A very good hint system, one of the best I’ve seen.
Survival score: Played straight through, 2-3 hours.
Ancient Block
I love sliding game puzzles — like the old rush hour game where you had little plastic cars on a gameboard that you set up according to the image on the puzzle card. And then you moved the cars around till the red one could slip out of the one exit on the board. I miss the whole tactic thing of setting up the cars, but I still like the puzzle idea. There are lots of them available and many have hundreds of levels. Everyone iPad gamer should have one of these, they are just good for you. Two things about Ancient Block make it a worthy contender — one is the interface is very smooth. The whole “blocks-on-a-lawn” theme is peaceful. And the other is that you can jump in at different levels of difficulty very easily. It also tells you the minimum number of moves to solve the level, which is also a nice additional challenge.
Survival score: A worthy variant of a must-have game. Still have a few hundred levels to go.
Ancient Block
I love sliding game puzzles — like the old rush hour game where you had little plastic cars on a gameboard that you set up according to the image on the puzzle card. And then you moved the cars around till the red one could slip out of the one exit on the board. I miss the whole tactic thing of setting up the cars, but I still like the puzzle idea. There are lots of them available and many have hundreds of levels. Everyone iPad gamer should have one of these, they are just good for you. Two things about Ancient Block make it a worthy contender — one is the interface is very smooth. The whole “blocks-on-a-lawn” theme is peaceful. And the other is that you can jump in at different levels of difficulty very easily. It also tells you the minimum number of moves to solve the level, which is also a nice additional challenge.
Survival score: A worthy variant of a must-have game. Still have a few hundred levels to go.
Anticlon
I didn’t think I was going to like this game. It’s one of those maze games where you have to go through every box once-and-only-once. Well, I was wrong. The game has just the right learning curve, and chunks the levels so that can sit and do a dozen levels or so and then take a break and not worry that I’ll completely lose what skill I’ve gained. The interface is simple, responsive, and very fast. In higher levels, you deal with blocks that have different abilities — like the first one is a block that explodes if a line runs into it. There are 15 chunks. (About a dozen levels in each chunk with a “boss level at the end of each chunk,” which is just 3 puzzles you have to solve in a row with a time limit. I think it’s funny to call it a “boss.”). I’ve played 7. I may or may not play the rest. I like it, but I don’t feel compelled to complete it. That would feel too much like work.
Survival score: Didn’t delete it right away! Over a dozen sessions, 5-15 min per session.
Anticlon
I didn’t think I was going to like this game. It’s one of those maze games where you have to go through every box once-and-only-once. Well, I was wrong. The game has just the right learning curve, and chunks the levels so that can sit and do a dozen levels or so and then take a break and not worry that I’ll completely lose what skill I’ve gained. The interface is simple, responsive, and very fast. In higher levels, you deal with blocks that have different abilities — like the first one is a block that explodes if a line runs into it. There are 15 chunks. (About a dozen levels in each chunk with a “boss level at the end of each chunk,” which is just 3 puzzles you have to solve in a row with a time limit. I think it’s funny to call it a “boss.”). I’ve played 7. I may or may not play the rest. I like it, but I don’t feel compelled to complete it. That would feel too much like work.
Survival score: Didn’t delete it right away! Over a dozen sessions, 5-15 min per session.
Boss Battles
If you don’t have a lot of experience with space shooter games, Boss Battles is a great way to start. You control a space ship that you move anywhere on the screen with your finger. You have to defeat one of a half dozen bosses (you pick which one). You can go back and face the same boss in another round, but it gets a little tougher. You shoot down little baddies first to warm up and collect diamonds they spew as they die. And you gets diamonds as a bounty for defeating the boss. With these you can upgrade you weapons in different ways. The balance between upgrades and challenge is pretty even, slightly in favor of upgrades.
I have played this twice, and both times I keep saying “ok, this is my last round, then I’m turning it off” and an hour later, I’m still playing it. It’s just hard enough to keep you going, and just easy enough that with absolutely no practice, you can get through a lot of rounds. And the rounds are just similar enough that you can know what to expect, and just different enough that you get that little extra thrill from having defeated it.
The ads across the top are annoying of course. And you can’t buy a no-ad version.
Survival score: a good 2 hour chunk of play time every 6 months or so.
Boss Battles
If you don’t have a lot of experience with space shooter games, Boss Battles is a great way to start. You control a space ship that you move anywhere on the screen with your finger. You have to defeat one of a half dozen bosses (you pick which one). You can go back and face the same boss in another round, but it gets a little tougher. You shoot down little baddies first to warm up and collect diamonds they spew as they die. And you gets diamonds as a bounty for defeating the boss. With these you can upgrade you weapons in different ways. The balance between upgrades and challenge is pretty even, slightly in favor of upgrades.
I have played this twice, and both times I keep saying “ok, this is my last round, then I’m turning it off” and an hour later, I’m still playing it. It’s just hard enough to keep you going, and just easy enough that with absolutely no practice, you can get through a lot of rounds. And the rounds are just similar enough that you can know what to expect, and just different enough that you get that little extra thrill from having defeated it.
The ads across the top are annoying of course. And you can’t buy a no-ad version.
Survival score: a good 2 hour chunk of play time every 6 months or so.
Bacis
Before you say anything, let’s up front agree that this is an ugly game. Ok? The theme of colored single cell bacteria with eyes being slid across a surface to go down a sink in its matching color just doesn’t work. And the animation for selecting the bacteria you want to move is clunky. And the board shifts sometimes when you really want it to stay put.
There are lots of games with this theme — Quell being the most elegant in my opinion — so why bother with this one? Simply: The levels. They are the best I have seen so far in being incrementally tricky. I played 18 levels in a sitting. With each successive round, I was literally able to see the new twist or challenge being offered. And there are several dozen levels. I’m sure there is some mathematical reasoning that could explain this in fewer words and more jargon, but I’m not going to go looking for that right now. If you like this type of game, but get frustrated when they ramp up too quickly, try this one.
Survival score: handful of levels now and then, 30-40 minutes a session.
Bacis
Before you say anything, let’s up front agree that this is an ugly game. Ok? The theme of colored single cell bacteria with eyes being slid across a surface to go down a sink in its matching color just doesn’t work. And the animation for selecting the bacteria you want to move is clunky. And the board shifts sometimes when you really want it to stay put.
There are lots of games with this theme — Quell being the most elegant in my opinion — so why bother with this one? Simply: The levels. They are the best I have seen so far in being incrementally tricky. I played 18 levels in a sitting. With each successive round, I was literally able to see the new twist or challenge being offered. And there are several dozen levels. I’m sure there is some mathematical reasoning that could explain this in fewer words and more jargon, but I’m not going to go looking for that right now. If you like this type of game, but get frustrated when they ramp up too quickly, try this one.
Survival score: handful of levels now and then, 30-40 minutes a session.
Elimin8 and Drop7
Elimin8 and Drop7 are both the same game, just wearing different clothes. Start with either a 7×7 or 8×8 board (hence the name). Fill in a few squares with a number from 1 to 7 (or 8). Some with block that have to be busted against twice — once to show the number, again to be activated. If the number on the block matches the number of blocks in the column or the row, the block explodes and disappears (busting against nearby concealed blocks if present). Blocks fall down into any empty slots. Game is over when any column overflows.
Elimin8 has some powerups to provide a little more strategy. My preference, though is for the more unadulterated version of Drop7. Either way, it’s a one trick pony. Just fine for what it is, but not anything more. Gets stale after a short time but fun enough to pick up once in a while.
Survival score: 30-40 minute session, every few months
Elimin8 and Drop7
Elimin8 and Drop7 are both the same game, just wearing different clothes. Start with either a 7×7 or 8×8 board (hence the name). Fill in a few squares with a number from 1 to 7 (or 8). Some with block that have to be busted against twice — once to show the number, again to be activated. If the number on the block matches the number of blocks in the column or the row, the block explodes and disappears (busting against nearby concealed blocks if present). Blocks fall down into any empty slots. Game is over when any column overflows.
Elimin8 has some powerups to provide a little more strategy. My preference, though is for the more unadulterated version of Drop7. Either way, it’s a one trick pony. Just fine for what it is, but not anything more. Gets stale after a short time but fun enough to pick up once in a while.
Survival score: 30-40 minute session, every few months
Collision Effect
Collision Effect is a game I should delete from my iPad, but I can never bring myself to do it. Simple idea– colored balls appear on the screen. Touch one of them to make the other ones zoom to it, smashing together and disappearing. If different colors collide, though, that’s bad and you lose the game or use up a life or whatever.
There is a puzzle mode, where the balls are prearranged in different configurations. With the umpteen puzzle games I have, I’m just not that interested in this mode. Then there are two arcade modes, the only difference I can tell between them is that in one of them any mistake means game over. In the other, you can make limited mistakes.
These games usually stress me out, and I usually don’t even download them. But this one is SO DAMN PRETTY. The developers include nice touches, like a viscous environment, sparkles on collision, making each circle glow inside. Nice colors, responsive gameplay, simple controls. I just feel guilty thinking about deleting it! And the visual appeal is great enough that it gets me to click on the “replay” option once I crash and burn at a relatively low stage.
Survival score: 30 or so minutes each session, maybe once every couple of months, can’t bring myself to give it the boot.
Collision Effect
Collision Effect is a game I should delete from my iPad, but I can never bring myself to do it. Simple idea– colored balls appear on the screen. Touch one of them to make the other ones zoom to it, smashing together and disappearing. If different colors collide, though, that’s bad and you lose the game or use up a life or whatever.
There is a puzzle mode, where the balls are prearranged in different configurations. With the umpteen puzzle games I have, I’m just not that interested in this mode. Then there are two arcade modes, the only difference I can tell between them is that in one of them any mistake means game over. In the other, you can make limited mistakes.
These games usually stress me out, and I usually don’t even download them. But this one is SO DAMN PRETTY. The developers include nice touches, like a viscous environment, sparkles on collision, making each circle glow inside. Nice colors, responsive gameplay, simple controls. I just feel guilty thinking about deleting it! And the visual appeal is great enough that it gets me to click on the “replay” option once I crash and burn at a relatively low stage.
Survival score: 30 or so minutes each session, maybe once every couple of months, can’t bring myself to give it the boot.
Adventure Chronicles: Search for lost treasure
Big Fish hidden objects games can be a crap shoot. This one has a bit of a dated feel, but offered long play with an attempt at tying the object search to unraveling a mystery. (which, true to form in this genre, isn’t really much of a mystery.) About twenty scenes, with the opportunity to return to find more objects until you find “them all”. Graphics are decent, and scenes can be zoomed in. No mini game interludes. I found myself looking forward to getting back to the game after putting it down for the night. But after getting to the end of the story, going back to look for more clues seemed stale. Survival score: 1 play through with no scene replay, 6-8 hours.
Adventure Chronicles: Search for lost treasure
Big Fish hidden objects games can be a crap shoot. This one has a bit of a dated feel, but offered long play with an attempt at tying the object search to unraveling a mystery. (which, true to form in this genre, isn’t really much of a mystery.) About twenty scenes, with the opportunity to return to find more objects until you find “them all”. Graphics are decent, and scenes can be zoomed in. No mini game interludes. I found myself looking forward to getting back to the game after putting it down for the night. But after getting to the end of the story, going back to look for more clues seemed stale. Survival score: 1 play through with no scene replay, 6-8 hours.
Grey-Haired Gamer 