Gameloft is a company that is known for its high-quality games. Their titles normally look good, sometimes being at the top of the charts for graphics. Unfortunately they’re also known as a company that tends to rip off or copy other titles. Even if that’s the case, nothing seems to stop this game giant.
It’s hard to describe exactly what Elder Sign: Omens is about. It’s basically a board game in which you and a group of adventurers — either NPC or ones controlled by friends — attempt to solve mysteries before you go mad. Really, if you are familiar with Lovecraft and all of that mumbo jumbo about crazy gods and the end of the world (which I am not) then you will know what I’m talking about.
Playing Pitfall, the 30th anniversary remake of the early Atari favorite (I can still hear that music that plays when you successfully jump over a pit of crocodiles) made me actually smile. So many of the games I have recently reviewed for this site have forgotten to be simple and fun.
Dark Summoner, by Ateam inc, is a very odd game. I’ve played similar games before and have even enjoyed them, but this particular one seems so eager to convince you that hitting a few buttons for a few minutes at a time is somehow fun, immersive or challenging. OK, I should say that pushing only a few buttons occasionally can be fun thanks to social, casual and turn-based gaming, but Dark Summoner is so packed with flashy images and confusing UI elements that I felt like I was stuck in Vegas on a repeating loop.
I’m not a huge fan of Anime-inspired games, unless they are of a very particular strain. Basically I’ll know a good Anime when I see one, but I can’t really explain the type I’d like. Zenonia 5 is uber cute, filled with massive explosions and weapons, packed with cute but deadly monsters and pretty much what you might expect from a freemium Anime shoot-em-up for Android. I found it semi-delightful until the game would punish me for seemingly no reason.
Naught, a nifty looking side-scroller by Blue Shadow Games will have you twisting your way through many different levels in the hopes of grabbing diamonds and seeds. The controls are relatively fun. You can choose to use the accelerometer or buttons on the screen to tilt the landscape, forcing your little black and white dude to move one way or the other. At first the controls feel clunky or poorly tuned. It took me a while to try out all three control styles — my favorite eventually becoming the on-screen pair of buttons — before I felt comfortable. It’s a neat mechanic but it’s essentially the same game we’ve seen before.You’ll recognize the gimmick pretty quickly, but not until after you’ve had some fun working through some different levels.
You know, I’m not normally a fan of rehashed clone games. The fact is that any gamer who has spent more than a dozen hours online knows that feeling when he or she sees yet another game that uses mechanics or designs that we’ve all seen a hundred times before. So, when I stumbled across Survivalcraft, an obvious clone of Minecraft: Pocket Edition, I was hesitant. I’ve also learned that a game can look like another yet be its very own creation, so I bought it and started the download. In the notes about the game, the developer literally gives credit to Minecraft and asks players to purchase it, so that gave me more confidence. After all, I’ve read a lot of player-written stories that are based in official lore or viewed wonderful fan art, all of it based on somebody else’s creation.
Let’s be honest, OK? If you’ve played one of these casual, hidden-item, Big Fish-style games you’ve really played them all. Well, sort of. While I’ve become very good at pointing out how many titles repeat the same designs over and over, and how this repetition has begun to wear even my battle-hardened gamer senses down, I still keep in mind that some genres will always be what they are… that’s what makes them genres. Sci-fi will probably always have spaceships and robots, Westerns will have cowboys on horseback and fantasy will keep it up with swords, dragons or orcs. It’s just how it is a lot of the time.
Dragon Slayer, a new Infinity Blade-esque game brought to us by Glu is yet another take on the “swipe, swipe, swipe, push a button, swipe, spend money” genre of gaming that seems to be the only thing I happen to have the misfortune of coming across on the Google Play market. Bear in mind that I come from a background of covering — and loving — independent titles, so covering games that are essentially re-skins of a game that came out years ago is a bit depressing.
I’m supposed to explain to you what I thought about My Little Pony, a new adorable city-builder by Gameloft. I could make it really easy and say that it is a pretty charming, well-made city-builder and mini-game collection that is really nothing new. Sure, it has a nice pink coating of Pony magic all over it, but the mechanics have been seen a million times. This is par for the Gameloft course; they specialize in re-creation.
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