My wife loves games, which is helpful. These days she mostly plays the social games on Facebook, the likes of the all-conquering Farmville and the, er, some-conquering Fish Isle. The one that’s always looked most interesting to me when I’ve glance over her shoulder is Treasure Madness. It’s a map-based collect-em-up. You click squares on a map and maybe you find some gold, food or treasure. Sometimes you get to play a mini game, maybe a Bejeweled clone or a Puzzle Bobble clone or, well, a clone of something else.

Treasure Madness

Must... click... mouse... must... find... treasure...

Yesterday I decided to have a go. It’s decent fun, actually. It’s free to play, but there’s a catch. Every time you click a square to search it, it uses up some of your HP. Once you’re out, you have to wait for it to regenerate. It takes thirty seconds or so to recover one HP and it costs about ten of them to search a single square. You can add HP with fruit you find, or fill it right above your maximum by using a health kit. Health kits can be bought with Museum Dollars, which you get for completing sets of treasures and other things I can’t remember right now. (Or for spending ACTUAL MONEY or completing MARKETING SURVEYS or for signing up to SPECIAL OFFERS, which is obviously how the publishers make their money. I’m steering clear of all that, thank you.)

So your playing time is very limited, which is annoying, but probably a good thing. I could see myself clicking away glassy-eyed until the early hours of the morning if the game didn’t force me to stop. The drip feed of treasures and leveling up and mini games could be very dangerous indeed.

Anyway, my HP has refilled to maximum, so I’m going to pop on over to Key Island again, see what I find.