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A Gaming Diary
Bejeweled 2 (iPhone)
Nov 23rd
Last time I mentioned this game I mentioned a statistics screen but didn’t show it. So this weekend I took a screen shot for you. I hope you’re grateful.
Not especially interesting, but possibly more useful than yet another shot of a grid full of gems.
Words With Friends (iPhone)
Nov 23rd
Good grief, but I’m tired today. Didn’t do much gaming over the weekend because my wife and I were doing an epic sort out of our house. Boxes were gone through, bins were filled and the cat got very, very confused. It’s nice to be in work now for a bit of a break, though I suspect I may have to break down some boxes and throw some more stuff out this evening.
Anyway, I still managed to keep up with my games of Words With Friends, though I seem to be losing more than I’m winning at the moment. I’m blaming brain fatigue. And my letters. I always blame my letters.
Ravensword: The Fallen King (iPhone)
Nov 20th
So, I had to go kill an ogre. I walked through town. I trekked through the forest, killing boars and goblins aplenty. I made my way through the dark, dank dungeon where I’d killed the orc. I got to the new area where the ogre lived. I fought off an attack from a terrible lizard. I found the ogre. I unloaded explosive arrows into him, but he managed to get close to me and…
I didn’t try again. How I long for some fast travel options.
Call of Duty: World At War: Zombies (iPhone)
Nov 20th
Killed a lot more zombies last night. I’m happy to report that it’s not getting old. I also tried out the other control schemes available and they all work fine. So well, in fact, that I’m now wondering which to stick with. I think maybe the default controls, which are very similar to the dual sticks set up, but the right stick is invisible and centres on where you put your thumb. Believe me, it makes sense. The tilt controls are great for aiming, but make running around a bit more tiring.
Hmm, might be nice to have touch controls for moving and looking, but then let you tilt when you’re looking down your gun sights. I wonder if that would work?
Bejeweled 2 (iPhone)
Nov 20th
I found a stats screen last night. It shows your maximum score over the last five weeks (optionally compared to a friend) as well as a “level” under different points categories. I’m level four when it comes to the 25,000 points category, having got that score over fifty times, but only level two in the 50,000 points category. I don’t know if that does anything other than let you know a rough score distribution. I doubt you unlock anything for leveling up.
I also played a bit of Classic mode last night while Bones was on. I wanted to watch Bones, but I was too fidgety to just sit down and watch it, so having a no-pressure game of Bejeweled on the go was perfect.
Touch Cricket Lite (iPhone)
Nov 20th
So, I was playing Little Master online and rather enjoying it. I noticed there was an iPhone version, but it cost 59p, and Touch Cricket – that I had been told was very similar – had a free Lite version.
And it is fairly similar, but more complicated. Your left thumb moves the batter and your right thumb moves the bat. Balls come in from the right and you have to hit them.
Easy enough conceptually, but incredibly difficult in practice. I tried and tried, but didn’t do very well at all. I think I managed over twenty runs in one amazing session, but most of the time I was getting caught or bowled without hitting a single ball. (And, yes, I read the help. This wasn’t a problem with the controls, just my own inability to judge where to put the bat and batter.)
Eventually the frustration got too much and I deleted it. Cricket’s rubbish, anyway. Harumph.
Ravensword: The Fallen King (iPhone)
Nov 19th
Guess what? Would you like it if you were in a dungeon trying to find an orc after killing loads of wolves to level up enough to survive the dungeon but you couldn’t find the orc and then it turned out you had to jump through burning hot lava to get to the orc?
Anyway, things are back on track now. I’ve rescued the girl from the orc, finally, and I’ve got a new quest to do.
Also, it turns out that zombies are surprisingly wealthy.
Call of Duty: World At War: Zombies (iPhone)
Nov 19th
You know how I blogged about this yesterday, praising it to the heavens and calling it a new App Store classic? Remember that? Well, I tried it at home last night and… and… I think I was right. It’s absolutely superb. I’m already itching for new maps, though.
I also tried an online game last night. It took me ages to find one – normally the Quick Game option would spend ages looking and then leave me in a lobby on my own where nobody joined me. Eventually, though, I got into a four player game. As soon as it started everyone started jerking around and then I found myself on my own. It was, quite frankly, awful.
I’m not going to blame the game, though, because I decided to run some speed tests. Looking at the results, it seems I need to try and play online either very late or very early. The evening, which is when I want to play, has terrible net connection speeds.
It may be that my ISP is doing some overly zealous traffic shaping, but I guess it’s just that everyone in my little cluster of houses out in the middle of nowhere is having to share a connection that just can’t handle us all.
Bejeweled 2 (iPhone)
Nov 19th
Ah, so it turns out the high scores are reset every week. This is probably only news to me. This week, though, I have two people to compete against. It was only one last week. Special.
I wish it would record my best score of all time somewhere, though. I’ll have to investigate menus just to see if I’ve missed it.
Anyway, yes, brilliant game. Great for quick bursts. I’m talking about the Blitz mode in this post, by the way. Should probably have mentioned that sooner.
You know, I often think of doing a monthly post of the top ten or twenty iPhone games, but then I realise that it would be far too difficult. Might be useful, though. People often ask me for recommendations.
