Guild Wars Week of May 4, 2020 - Blue Day

Day 2: Blue Day

Yesterday's Defense - 0 for 0, wasn't attacked.

My blue day defense team is basically my pvp team - Divine Ishbaala, Qilin, Rope Dart, and Moon Rabbit. This team easily clears PVP through the highest ranks. That said, it does require a lot of user thought, so we will see. This team uses Frostmage, mostly to try to block other teams.

For attack, its Moonsinger, King Gobtruffle, Maraji Queen, and the Bronzelock Pistol. Moonsinger is the empowered converter to feed Gobtruffle and we all know the rest of the deal. This team is terrible and lazy but also incredibly safe and effective. As a side note, Bronzelock Pistol is one of my person sleeper weapons - I think its about as powerful as the Skeleton Key/Egg Thief combo if those colors are blocked.

Fight 1 - a Titan team rated at 9,936 with a +9 Mang, Queen Ysabelle, Zephyros, and High king Irongut. Any fight with HKI can go sideways at a moment's notice. Fight went well - fortunately a 10k rating is pretty short of mine and the strength difference was notable. 3,238 points.

Fight 2 - a Warlord team with a rating of 10,483. A +9 Summer's Fury, Abhorath, Gargantaur, and Gemhammer. This fight actually went terribly - a Gobtruffle failed to loop repeatedly and a couple of desperate Maraji triggers results in skulls cascades for the other team. 1,386 points.

Fight 3 - a priest team rated 5,803. Scored 1,536 points

Fight 4 - an assassin team rated at 8,959 with Dimetraxia, Emperor Khorvash, Dragotaur, and Shadow Dragon, They did almost get me with the spawning a new guy thing where I used Maraji without a loop, but still wasn't much of a battle. 1,626 points.

Fight 5 - An archer team rated at 11,274 points. Glaycion, Captain Skullbeard, Venbarak, and King Bloodhammer. Glaycion and Bloodhammer are both solid pvp choices, and while Venbarak isn't really a meta pick, his ability is strong if you can fire it twice in quick succession. Captain Skullbeard was a new name for me, and I'm honestly not sure why he is in this list. This was a close fight - I got lucky that some of my team was submerging through the Frostmage ability and it caused Venbarak's move to miss them. Moonsinger actually died pretty quickly and Gobtruffle's damage output wasn't high enough to quickly move through my opponent. I relied on Pistol mostly, as Marajji alignment was difficult to come by, and when it did happen, didn't do as much as I would have hoped. Picked up 1,635 points though.

Assemble Review - Apple Arcarde

Assemble is one of the initial offerings through Apple Arcade. Made by the same team that has put together the immensely popular Monument Valley games, it exists as almost a short, side story. Its good - but it isn't great - and its short playtime makes it a perfect showpiece for the most obvious Apple Arcade use case.

Every single article about the Apple Arcade initial offerings, whether a PR friendly piece or otherwise, seems to mention Assemble and its lineage with Monument Valley. And, to a large extent, that is useful - the game has many of the same mechanically satisfying puzzles as Monument Valley. It isn't just a Monument Valley clone, though, as Assemble uses the guise of repairing 80's ear electronics as its primary puzzle design rather than architectural dreamscapes, and Assemble generally shies away from perspective based puzzles.

So the gameplay - if you have familiarity with the Room series, you have a great frame of reference. An object is placed in front of you, and using intuitively mapped gestures, you examine the object, take it apart, and then put it back together. Assemble smartly doesn't put much in between you and the puzzle - the only tool is a screwdriver - and there is no interface or HUD during puzzle solving. In fact, at one point I was miffed when I couldn't find a restart button, only to discover the omnipresent cup of coffee acts as a menu during the puzzle sequences.

And that brings me to the next point - is there a need for a restart button? Honestly, probably not. The gameplay doesn't rely on the player making any insightful connections or discoveries, and instead opts for asking how well you can pick up the context clues the game offers to complete the challenges. You don't need an understanding of the objects themselves as most pieces in the game only have one interaction making it mostly "Select a piece, see what highlights, connect piece to highlighted area." There are a couple of wiring things that could be done incorrectly, but the puzzle offers helpful 1,2,3 markers to show you the way. There is a really, really good moment in the opening tutorial that hits on the internet meme of understanding the winding of a cassette tape, and I suppose if you have never seen a record player before you might be momentarily confused by the idea of RPMs, but again, the game offers enough hand holding that I doubt anyone will stumble.

This all begs the question - what is the gameplay supporting? Much like last year's Donut County, where the gameplay was mostly in support of telling a quirky, fun story, the same is true here. Except where Donut County used absurdism to explore its characters with surprising depth, Assemble tosses any sense of subtlety in favor of stuffing its emotional messaging down your throat. The entire game is short (my "Screentime" is showing 1 hour and 41 minutes, and that includes sitting it down while I rocked a baby back to sleep) and while there is more story telling than gameplay, it is still abbreviated. That can be great - efficiency in story telling has its merits - but here, it cheapens the experience. Characters meet the protagonist and within 6 words declare "I work all the time because I never felt like my father approved of me" or "I'm lonely because my mother died and my father works to avoid dealing with his grief." You then fix a treasured item, the character gives it to someone who is not currently meeting their emotional needs, and within another two sentences the conflict is resolved and people are happily emoting.

So now that I've ripped into most of the games features, one must ask why Apple would promote this so heavily. Of course there are the practical concerns of the excellent developer track record (or the fact that a journalist can spend less than 2 hours and get the full experience), but there must be something compelling. And there is - its the production. The production values here rival anything being released for $60 on a major platform. The voice acting is crazy good, and the story vignettes have sound effects layered over the narration. The music is mild and unobtrusive and used to further the story telling, and again, its all done perfectly. I even have some thoughts about the use of JRPG-style character portraits and postage stamp designs for the different settings that I might go into deeper elsewhere, but suffice to say that if you needed to tell 30 minutes of story interspersed with gameplay, this is how you would do it. Did I mention the voice acting yet? Its that good (although... anyone who has spent any amount of time in Britain will cringe when the daughter somehow doesn't have the same accent as her father, or how the sisters sound like they were each raised on the other side of the country).

Other production high points - the interfaces are clean and fit with the overall theme, and incredibly intuitive. The designs of the items that you take apart and assemble are phenomenal. The puzzles are all logical, even if they are numbingly easy. And even if the characters are all a bit flat and one-note, they are memorable.

Now, the question with most app store games comes down to "Is it worth it?" and this is where the real value of Apple Arcade comes in. As stated above, even with some idle time, I've clocked under 2 hours start to finish, and I don't see any reason to return to Assemble unless I decide I want to grab screenshots to fit into this article. If I didn't listen to all of the beautiful narration and instead played with the sound off, I doubt I would have gone over an hour. Last year's Donut County retailed for (I believe) $3.99 and I took about 3 hours in my first playthrough, and have since played through it twice more and gone back to mess with a couple interesting levels after that.

And this, to me, seems to be the joy behind Apple Arcade. Would I recommend Assemble at even a $3.99 price point? Probably not (except to say that a cup of coffee is the same price and lasts even less than the hour and a half that Assemble does). I don't even know if I'd plunk down $0.99 for something like this. And, similarly, does this game, with its full voice acting and sound design, get made if they can only charge a dollar per pop? Probably not. But - if I'm already paying $5 per month for access, and if Apple is going to throw money at a developer to produce something, this works, and quite perfectly. I have my active Arcade license, I downloaded Assemble, have played it, and looked at it a second time, and now I'll move onto the next experience.

And that is a part of the beauty - the developers didn't need to bloat the experience to justify a $5 per game price point. They don't have to lock additional levels behind additional fees. They don't have to show ads that break up the experience (I actually took me a little while to realize how bizarre it is that the game never once asked me for money or displayed an ad). They don't have to invent daily quests to keep me coming back for more. They don't have to hack in some sort of PvP to give me a leaderboard to climb and thus power creep to spend money on. There is no advantage to forcing additional grinding. And to top it all off, if this was the ONLY game I wanted to play right now, I could just pay the $5 for a one month period, play it, and cancel.

I think, therefore, the only potential downside is, what happens if I want to pick this back up in 6 months, or a year, or 5, or 10? Will it be available to me?

In conclusion, Assembly wants to be a game but offers only the barest of gameplay, wants to be a story but tells it all within a thousand words, and wants to be a product but is instead an advertisement for the Apple Arcade. However, anyone with an Arcade subscription and an hour should pick this up, put in headphones, and experience the ride - its low impact but also low involvement, and recommended for those reasons.

Crush the Castle Review

Crush the Castle
Armor Games
iPhone
$0.99

Crush the Castle (CtC) is another physics based destruction game, very similar to the recently reviewed Angry Birds.  Crush the Castle was originally a flash game on the ArmorGames site, and if you want a nice preview of the App, I suggest you go check it out.  The original game has spawned both a sequel and a pack of user designed levels, as well as this iPhone game.

I originally fell absolutely in love with this game, and it was in fact my first paid app on my phone.  The action is interesting and polished.  There are several different types of ammo, as well as several different materials at which you must fire.  Each reacts in a different, but believable, way.  This, however, is par for the course for these types of games.

What makes CtC stand out is the firing mechanism.  This game uses a trebuchet style launcher, which is incredibly difficult at first.  Generally, your first 15-20 shots will either by spiked straight into the ground in front of you, or land behind you.  This is a drastic departure from games like Angry Birds where launching and aiming is straightforward.  This added challenge is overall a nice addition.  Once you get familiar with it, you will learn how to fling bombs incredibly far, or lob them directly into weak points.  The control is actually very fine.  This comes at a price, however, as some levels will require a series of very specific shots, each of which will require incredibly difficult timing.  Some levels become a chore, rather than a challenge.

This specificity carries over into the physics model as well.  There is very little randomness in how the game reacts to each attack.  While this does mean it is very easy to determine what works and what doesn't, it also means that those edge of your seat moments completely disappear.  After some play, you will know whether the shot will work as soon as you release it and see its trajectory.  This turns the game into a technical puzzle that requires twitch timing, rather than an exciting demolition job.

As for the levels and difficulty, there are plenty of levels to keep you busy.  Also, playing through the game rewards you with new ammo types as you go, which then carry over back to previously cleared levels, allowing you to go for high scores.  Clearing levels is easy, as you have unlimited shots.  This means you can simply fling ammo at the base until finally something gives way.  There is a Gold/Silver/Bronze medal system, and getting golds generally requires clearing the level in 1 or 2 shots.  This can become quite a challenge, requiring advanced ammo types and near perfect accuracy.  Some of these can be a little frustrating, but I was able to get all Golds eventually.  You then unlock "fantasy" ammo that completely breaks the game, but is an absolute blast to use.

Technically, the graphics are competent, as is the sound.  The game goes for somewhat realistic visuals, and has a sort of tongue in cheek humor to it.  There is also a level editor, but I found it way to much of a chore to be worthwhile.  Also, you can't download other player's creations.  The game doesn't update, but it is technically in perfect shape, as I have encountered no bugs whatsoever.  It has that short burst gameplay that suits iPhone games, and the controls are a joy to use.

Overall, Crush the Castle is a great physics based destruction game.  There is plenty of replay value, and the design is top-notch.  Additionally, the high score challenges and unlocks make for real incentive to practice.  Unfortunately, this game falls short when compared to Angry Birds, unless you prefer a very exact and technical style of gameplay.  Nonetheless, this game gets a very high recommendation, and is a great value for the price.

Review: Angry Birds

Angry Birds
iPhone
$0.99


Angry Birds is a physics destruction game that had you launching objects at various buildings, with the attempt to knock them over.  Similar games including Armor Games' Crush the Castle and Donut Games' Castle Smasher.  I'm not sure which came first, but Angry Birds, from Rovio Mobile, is clearly the best.  At $0.99, this game is a must buy for anyone with a supported device.

In the game, you launch birds from a slingshot into buildings constructed of wood, glass, stone, and various other sundry materials.  You attempt to not only destroy the buildings, but more importantly, kill all the pigs in the level.  The fun comes from the awesome physics model, which has players watching with glee as parts of the building lean, then tumble, and then crumble as they fall and are destroyed.

These types of games live and die on small factors.  For example, the graphics in Angry Birds are bright and cartoony, which is fun, but the also convey plenty of detail about the types of materials and the needed level objectives.  Mechanically, the game auto-zooms for detail, but can be easily zoomed out for taking in the big picture.  Each level is also well balanced.  They are appropriately difficult to complete, which for the most part, can be done in 3 or so tries.  Your performance is scored and given a rating of 1, 2, or 3 stars.  Going back for 3 stars is incredibly challenging, but also very rewarding.  While simply firing off all the birds will almost always allow you to complete the level, getting 3 stars requires planning and expert use of the birds various abilities.

Another problem these games can run into is by requiring incredibly difficult aiming.  Shots in Angry Birds often need to be arced over obstacles, but there were very few times when I felt a level required three perfectly placed shots to clear.  For the most part, once you have a moderate familiarity with the game, you can predict where shots will land well enough to clear the levels.  The challenge is just right in this area.  Also, it should be noted that you can easily restart levels quickly anytime you mess up on the first or second shot.

Angry Birds also has an awesome physics engine.  The birds crash satisfyingly into the buildings, and everything breaks and falls with an enjoyable chaos.  There are also some examples of teetering blocks that are nerve racking.  In addition, the engine is predictable enough to be workable, but also random enough to be fun.  Sometimes I won levels with shots that completely failed the previous go-round, but for the most part, I felt well in control, but also on the edge of my seat with each attempt.  The game also is generally good at settling wobbly pieces in a short time, although a few times I have watched the building continue to fall after the game gave me a final score.

People tend to make a lot of noise about the types of materials the buildings are built of, as well as the abilities of the different birds.  I find that all of these physics based castle destruction games have similar features, so I am more concerned about how they work.  And in Angry Birds, I find them to be well done.  They are for the most part balanced, and each works in a unique, but interesting, way.  What I find most interesting is the secondary uses of each bird.  For example, the white bird drops an explosive bomb on a second click.  This is standard in all of these type of games.  But what is interesting is that the bird then flies up and to the right very fast.  Sometimes, it is most effective to use this after bomb boost to do damage instead of the bomb itself.

Finally, on the technical side, the sounds is nice, with menu music and fun sound effects, although I almost always play on silent.  The graphics work, and drain the battery at a normal "game" rate.  Fast, but not debilitatingly so.  The controls are simple, which is always nice for a touch screen game.  Game Center support has been patched in.  The achievements are fairly broken at this point.  For example, upon patching they added ones for playing 5, 10, and 15 hours.  Although I had already put in well over 15 hours, I had none.  I have since got the play 10 hours one, but have yet to get the 5 hours...  The high score tables are amazing, however, easily comparing you to overall leaders as well as friends.  So far, very little hacking seems to be going on.

Angry Birds is far and away an amazing iPhone game.  Honestly, this is the only game that I would say is "Must Buy" since I generally leave paid apps up to each user.  Anyone who likes any sort of game will enjoy this.  At $0.99, its also a steal, and adds new levels once every few months.  This game gets my highest recommendation.

Pixelogic Review

Pixelogic
iPhone
Get it in App Store
$2.99

For the uninitiated, Picross is a number puzzle that crosses the logic of Sudoku with cross referenced clues from Crosswords.  The gamer starts with an empty grid that has a series of numbers next to each column and row.  These numbers indicate how many squares are filled in, as well as how many are touching.  Players are then able to indicate which ones are filled in, and which are certainly empty, and finally discover the solution.  Solutions traditionally are pictures.

Picross generally draws comparisons to Sudoku and Crosswords, which makes it an ideal time-waster game.  Perfect for short bursts during a commute, while waiting for an appointment, a few minutes over your morning coffee.  Therefore, it makes an absolutely ideal iPhone app.  The problem with iPhone and Picross is the board sizes.  Picross doesn't really get challenging until you are on AT LEAST a 15x15 grid, and once you are advanced, 25x25 seems like a fun challenge.

Different Picross games handle this limitation in unique ways.  Pixelogic, for my money, has an elegant solution.  The game auto-zooms to a 5x5 grid, and then must be un-zoomed to look at the entire puzzle.  The game WILL NOT let you mark tiles without being zoomed into the 5x5, the first time you touch the puzzle it zooms you in.  At first, this is very disorienting, but after 5 minutes it feels entirely natural.  I also found that it lowers mistake taps caused by 'pinching' zoom systems on most other Picross apps.

As for the game itself, it features 5x5, 10x10, 15x15, and newly 20x20 puzzles.  Each section has about 20 built in puzzles, which is a fair amount.  They aren't anything new or groundbreaking, but will take a few hours for even highly advanced Picross solvers (Note: I consider myself a very advanced Picross solver).  The games real reply value, however, comes from its Puzzle Editor.

That's right, an iPhone Picross app that lets you make your own puzzles.  Rare indeed, the editor is simple to use.  You simply select a board size, mark squares, and the game sets up the rest.  You can then title your creation, and even upload it to the Pixelogic servers.  You can also go back and play your created puzzles at any time.  I haven't found a way to edit them a second time as of yet, but that is a minor setback.

Uploaded puzzles are then distributed once a day as the "Daily Puzzle." This occurs automatically, and puzzles are sorted naturally into folders by date.  You can, of course, prevent this from happening.  The advantage of this is that you no longer had to sort through thousands of user uploads to find good ones.  The daily puzzle has already been vetted by someone working for Pixelogic.  Also, there is currently backlog of almost 2 years, all of which are available, plus new ones are made everyday.  Therefore, this game has unlimited re-playability.  This is what pushes Pixeloigc to the top of the iPhone Picross pile.

Otherwise, the game offers the usual Picross options, including timed high scores and an option to allow unlimited mistakes while solving.  My complaints are few indeed, although it should be noted that the daily puzzles occasionally require some trial and error solving.  Like a Sudoku, a Picross should be solvable from logic alone, but occasionally a user submitted puzzle sneaks through that requires a few guesses.  When you consider that this is less than 5 of several hundred puzzles, it is a minor complaint.  Also, the interface is a little bland and boring, but if nothing else it is functional.

Pixelogic is simply the best iPhone Picross game out there, free or paid.  The $2.99 price tag is well worth the price for an awesome game that constantly updates with new puzzles.  While some may complain about the auto-zoom feature, after 5 minutes of practice, it provides a simple and functional solution to allow full Picross on the iPhone.  This game is a must buy for fans of Picross, and anyone with an interest in Sudoku or logic games should give it serious consideration.

Ms PAC-MAN Review

Ms PAC-MAN
iPhone/iPad
Get it from the App Store
$4.99

Ms PAC-MAN is an arcade classic follow up to Pac-man.  This version is from NAMCO BANDAI, and coming straight to your iPhone.

Honestly, you should need to hear anymore about Pac-man.  If you somehow have no idea what it is, check out the Wikipedia here or the Giantbomb page here.  Safe to say that the original was highly influential and popular.  That the game recieves iPhone treatment actually makes a lot of sense.  The gameplay is generally solid, and requires few buttons.  Its a simple classic, and the gameplay lends itself to short sessions.  In addition to all this, Ms PAC-MAN is the first game to include integration with Apple's Game Center service.  Game Center tracks achievements across games and is poised to be a single clearing house similar to Xbox Live.

With all this going for it, you would think the $4.99 would be well spent.  You would be wrong.  This is an absolutely terrible version of Pac-Man with almost no redeeming features.  First of all, the game is just plain unfinished.  The Game Center achievements show up as "ACHIE_TXT ID 16" of "ACHIE_TXT ID 8" and so on. Sure, they work, and the Game Center descriptions are accurate, but should we really be putting up with games that have placeholder text?  If you change an option on the pre-game menu, the START GAME BUTTON DISAPPEARS!!!  Seriously!!!  You have to select your option, then back out to the title screen, then go straight through and start the game without making any changes.  While this doesn't make the game unplayable, it just smacks of laziness at best, or blatant laughing in the consumer's face at best.  Its like someone at NAMCO BANDAI sat down and said "Well, we are the first with Game Center integration, let's just through some junk out there for $5 and people will buy it just to try out Game Center."  (Fortunately, there are only 3,599 Game Center users with Ms PAC-MAN, while over 350,000 have downloaded Flight Control, showing that there is justice in this world.)

Those issues aside, the game isn't even a good port.  There is some lag with the controls, and the game hitches at odd moments.  On one hand, I thought the game paused when you ate bonus fruit while a sound effect played for dramatic effect, but this game either just hitches, or the sound effect never got put in.  Either way its jarring and a poor implementation.

The controls, while laggy, are the lone bright spot in this game.  There are a few types to choose from.  The first is the virtual arcade stick, which you swipe to use.  The stick is interestingly drawn, and since it is the only on-screen button, it doesn't suffer as badly as games such as FPS games that force on-screen buttons.  The second method is the "swipe" method, where you simply swipe anywhere on the screen.  This is a great idea.  You are making the same motion as with the virtual control, but you can do it anywhere on the screen you feel comfortable.  Most of the time you find yourself using the bottom, except you don't have to worry about missing.  Also, there is still an on-screen stick that represents the last direction swiped.  The third control scheme uses the accelerometer, and is completely unplayable.  A total waste, but fortunately the other schemes are useable.

As mentioned before, this game does have Game Center support.   You can compare high scores with friends and across all users, which is sort of fun.  There are also 25 achievements, ranging from simple to impossible.  For the most part, they strike a nice balance.  Some you will get easily, some are difficult.  Some require you to try new strategies or different game play styles.  Some, however, are impossible.  The reach stage 256 one comes to mind.  Between the controls and the game's increasing difficulty, I doubt many will ever reach it.

Ms PAC-MAN (by the way, that is the engrish official app name) is a terrible, terrible game, and the $5 price point makes it even less worthwhile.  The lone bright spot is the unique control schemes that actually work, as well as the Game Center support.  Nonetheless, unless you are a hardcore Pac-Man fan, or want to take full advantage of Game Center, I cannot recommend this game.