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A Gaming Diary
Ravensword: The Fallen King (iPhone)
Nov 18th
After killing Nazi zombies I thought I’d wind down with a bit of fantasy adventuring. The controls, which felt fine yesterday, felt a bit awkward after Call of Duty, but I adjusted quickly enough as I walked through town. As soon as I was out of town, though, I got killed by a wolf. Bother.
To make myself feel better I bought a nice hat with wings. Wings!
Lovely, ain’t it?
Anyway, I’m a bit stuck right now. I’ve only got one quest, which involves rescuing someone trapped in a dungeon. Unfortunately there are a couple of high level skeletons in my way and they keep killing me, so I think I’ll have to go hunting for a while to level up. Mind you, there’s a mace for sale at the blacksmith’s shop. I wonder if that would be better against zombies than a sword? There’s no stats for weapons to let me know whether it would be any better or worse than the sword I’m using, which is a bit of an issue.
Call of Duty: World At War: Zombies (iPhone)
Nov 18th
Yes, it’s a two-colon game, but let’s not hold that against it. What we’ve got here is the Zombies game mode from Call of Duty: World At War, where you’re stuck in a bunker with hordes of Nazi undead trying to break in and munch on your brains. You start off in a small room with just a knife, pistol and few grenades, but as you earn money by killing zombies and repairing your barricades you can purchase new guns and unlock new areas of the bunker.
I’m not really sure it should work. After all, it’s a game designed for big consoles and big TVs and big controllers. However, against expectations, it’s blindingly good. It looks wonderful, with the zombie animation especially good, and it’s great fun to play. I’ve only tried the dual stick controls so far, but apart from sometimes shooting when I don’t mean to, I’ve not had a problem with them. (HINT: Swiping across the screen turns you 90 degrees, great when you want to look around quickly.)
I was playing it with headphones at lunchtime and it sounds great, with great zombie groans and useful sound cues. Excellently, though, the developers have realised that people will want to play with the sound off, so have included visual cues for when zombies get close to you. It’s just a sign of the love and care that’s gone into this game.
It may have a premium price – and it looks like you’ll have to pay more to get more maps when they’re released (only one comes with the game) – but it’s a game that’s actually worth the cost.
Oh, and that’s before taking into account the online multiplayer, which I’ve not had a chance to try yet. Top marks and a new App Store classic.
Incidentally, in my first go I got to wave three. On my second go I got to wave nine with a combination of the shotgun and then the flamethrower – and maybe could have gone longer if I had switched back to my rifle by mistake. Not a good thing to do when you’re surrounded.
Oh, and then I had another game but died on round four. Let’s forget that one.
Words With Friends (iPhone)
Nov 18th
Didn’t have time to play anything other than Words With Friends last night because I went to the cinema to see 2012. Takes nearly an hour to get there, then the movie was about eight hours long, so I didn’t get back until way after bedtime. No time for gaming. Anyway, the film had some brilliant set pieces and Oliver Platt, Woody Harrelson and Zlatko Buric were great, but it really felt like a great ninety minute film unnecessarily bloated with speechifying and too many subplots. Still, I’m very glad I went to see it at the cinema, because the good bits were tremendous. (Even if one of the best bits had been completely spoiled by being shown in a Sony commercial before the film. D’oh.)
Anyway, Words With Friends, eh? Lovely game.
Ravensword: The Fallen King (iPhone)
Nov 17th
It’s Oblivion on the iPhone, basically. A lot smaller, yes, and the lack of character customisation means it’s more of an action adventure than an RPG, but it’s set in an open fantasy world and lets you get on with things. There are quests to take, different areas to explore, treasure to find, monsters to kill, all that good stuff.
I’ve spent an hour with it, which has seen me killing rats for a restaurant to serve up for dinner, getting on a horse and herding some sheep, killing thieving goblin scum and venturing into a dungeon to rescue someone’s daughter.
And I’ve had a great time doing all of it. I changed the sensitivity of the controls to maximum before I even left the first room, then I was away. There’s a decent interface – though the map could maybe use a bit more work, even if only to show the direction you’re facing – and lots to do. It may not be as long or as deep as a real Elder Scrolls adventure, but it’ll do me fine, I think.
Oh, but I’ve been “dying” a lot and if Beatrice gives me her patronising speech one more time I may have to kill her… except I can’t, because you can’t attack NPCs. Probably for the best, eh?
GHOSTS’N GOBLINS GOLD KNIGHTS (iPhone)
Nov 17th
I was awake between 4am and 5:30am this morning, due to a combination of a dodgy stomach and a hungry cat. Mainly the stomach – the cat went back to sleep after getting some food.
I was using my iPhone in bed, after spending half an hour on the loo, and noticed that Ghosts’n Goblins, sorry, GHOSTS’N GOBLINS, had an update, which has added in a whole new game mode. That’s a bit of surprise so soon after release. And, even more of a surprise, it was free.
It’s Boxers mode, where you spend the entire game in your underwear, without armour, so one hit kills you. I also think the enemies might be faster and there might be more traps. It was hard to tell, it being five in the morning in the morning and all. However, even in the early hours, I was able to tell that the new mode’s an awful lot of brutal fun and should breathe new life into the game for me.
There’s also a new leader board for Time Attack. I don’t know if that’s for Boxers mode – unlike the standard mode, you get continues in this version so time-based leader board might make sense – or whether it’s for completing the main game in a single run, or what.
Jet Car Stunts (iPhone)
Nov 17th
This is really, really hard. I played this exclusively yesterday evening – though I wasn’t playing all that much – and I only got through a few more levels. (That’s a cunning way of saying that I can’t really judge how long I played for and can’t remember how many levels I completed.)
It’s excellent, though – even when I’m falling to my doom.
Ground Effect (iPhone)
Nov 16th
Finally finished the seventh race simply by not taking the tempting shortcut and being a lot more sensible when using boost. (For example, I’ve now trained myself to stop using it when I’m going uphill, as doing so sends me straight into the ground.)
The eighth race was pretty easy and featured an excellent jump. The next track looks pretty nasty, though. I may even have to try using some brakes.
The Settlers (iPhone)
Nov 16th
I wasn’t go to buy this for £3.99, after it unexpectedly went up in price from £2.99. But I had the credit in my account and it felt like such a Sunday game that yesterday I gave in and downloaded it.
Good decision, bad decision?
I won’t keep you in suspense. It was a good decision. Definitely.
The first three tutorial levels didn’t seem to be teaching me much. After completing them I still felt slightly baffled and started the fourth mission – the first that doesn’t tell you what to do step by step – with some trepidation. However, after a bit of messing around with icons and menus I started to feel more comfortable and soon had a thriving economy going… which, after a couple of hours, ground to a halt. My gold mines seemed to be the first to stop producing, following by coal mines and soon I was unable to produce any soldiers. I had a look around and the problem seemed to be a lack of fish. I had a fishing hut, but it wasn’t producing anything. So I built another one, which didn’t produce anything, either.
I scratched my head for a while, before having a eureka moment. It turned out that, in messing about with the icons at some point, I’d set my fisherman to try and catch fish on land, so obviously he wasn’t doing anything. The second fishing hut I’d managed to build too far away from the water, so this fisherman was also doing nothing. I told both fisherman that, yes, they should look in the sea for fish and my economy started working again. Soon I had gold and swords and was able to finish off the Vikings on the west side of the map. Hooray! A delayed victory, but a victory nonetheless – and one that taught me a lot about the game.
Fantastic stuff – and gorgeous, too. Wonderfully animated, with tons of incidental detail that brings the world alive. A great, great game so far and I’m so glad I bought it.
Jet Car Stunts (iPhone)
Nov 16th
It’s pretty much Trackmania, just on the iPhone. And with a lovely, stylised chunky polygon look to it. It’s got a great controls, it runs like a dream and it’s very hard without crossing the line and being off-putting.
The menus aren’t great, but they’re functional enough and the game’s got it where it really counts. If had some sort of award I gave out to games that seem like they’re really good based on the first hour or two of play, this game would get one.
Ground Effect (iPhone)
Nov 16th
Though technically pretty astonishing, this ekranoplan racing game didn’t grab me at all at first. I was flying around, skimming over the sea and ground, feeling like it was all a bit lifeless. The first race is just an oval, the second only slightly more interesting. A reasonable way to introduce people to the game, but not very interesting. The third race is more fun, but it still wasn’t grabbing me at all. The tilt to turn mechanics work fine, there’s a boost to use on straights, but it all felt a bit lacking, like a tech demo with a dull game bolted on.
Then I tried the fourth race. This puts you down at the edge of a small archipelago with a checkpoint on the other side. You can take the safe route round the islands, but that’s not going to help you get in the top three. (You unlock the next track by coming in third or better in the races.) Instead, you have to work out a good route between the checkpoints, then actually manage to fly around for three “laps” without crashing.
I found it incredibly difficult. It took me a long time to work out a route, then trying to do it without crashing was causing me all sorts of problems, due to some nasty turns. I spent a long time trying and failing to perfect it, then went back to basics and worked out a much safer route, which finally let me complete the race. It took me many, many goes, but it really made me appreciate the game.
Then level five comes along, which is much easier and offers a breather, then level six is harder again. I’m currently on level seven, which is another hard one. It’s a simple route, with checkpoints limiting the opportunities to take short cuts, but there’s one very tempting place where you can just about get over a rocky outcropping without crashing – but only if you get it just right. I can’t resist it, but crash in that spot and you’re pretty much done for. It’s a fine balancing act.
Highly recommended, though be prepared to let it grow on you. It’s not as immediate as some other games on the App Store, but it’s worth properly digging into.
