Posted by Rosethorn on May 19, 2011 at 5:25 pm
Recently, we took a look at the first six games in the Dream Day series, hidden object titles that have evolved nicely. With Dream Day True Love, the series takes a step back in gameplay but a step forward in story telling. It's hard to knock this game with an amazing story of 70 years of marriage (based on a true relationship). However, despite the emotion, the lack of hidden object scenes makes it hard to recommend it on its merits. There are missed opportunities in this title and we're not sure why that happened.
The couple, Bill and Helen, met in 1939 while Bill was on leave, being in the military. The story of their meeting was adorable - they went to a dance with different dates and left with each other. The game proceeds to give us glimpses into their lives together, told in ten year increments with each milestone wedding anniversary. The player is still the wedding planner, but in this case, we've been hired to throw a 70th wedding anniversary party to be held at an old family home. It's a beautiful story and hard to imagine living long enough to spend 70 years with someone. The fact that the story and the photos are all real creates a wonderful narrative for the game.
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Posted by Rosethorn on May 18, 2011 at 10:19 pm
Matching games are a popular sub-genre of the PC casual game and have even made their way onto consoles and phones. Vesuvia is a matching game with a minor twist, an OK story and absolutely no variety to the gameplay, which turns it from a semi-interesting and fun game to a dull game that goes on way too long. We often complain about a game being too short and leaving us wanting more, but Vesuvia is the opposite, and the fact that it ends with a possible hint at a sequel doesn't leave us excited, but instead dismayed.
The story goes: Jake wrecks his ship and gets stranded on an island (that appears to be sentient, Lost anyone?) and runs into two other people who have also been stuck on the island for a long time. He wants to get off and he follows a path with clues to figure out how to get off. That's the story in a nutshell, and it's told through a variety of mechanisms, from voice-overs and cutscenes to a diary with clues found along the way. All of this is very well done, although there was one part where a grammatical mistake really bothered me (improperly using 'and I').
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Posted by Rosethorn on May 16, 2011 at 6:39 am
Letters from Nowhere 2 is the continuation and conclusion of the game and story started in Letters from Nowhere, which left us with a cliffhanger. It's a hidden object title, with a smattering of relatively easy puzzles thrown in throughout the game. The story is fair and the hidden object aspects are ok, but what saves this game from being simply mediocre are the trophy system and the unlimited mode. That's not to say those additions make it a great game, but it's not terrible either. And for the overachiever, there's a lot here.
In Letters from Nowhere, we discover that a husband has gone missing and the wife goes on the investigative hunt to track him down. She receives letters from a mysterious source, which turns out to be a ghost. In this second game, instead of letters, we're looking for diary entries from a man who disappeared while he was investigating the strange disappearances in a small town decades earlier. A black cat is following us around from scene to scene, and is the special hidden object which must be found in order to unlock sections of the game, along with the three stamps per scene as in the first game.
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Posted by Rosethorn on May 13, 2011 at 5:58 pm
Snark Busters 2: All Revved Up is a follow-up release to Snark Busters: Welcome to the Club - a welcome one at that. The first title was extremely fun and the second follows in its footsteps. A different character awaits this time, but the story is just as whimsical and enjoyable as the first one. The gameplay at its core is hidden object, but it plays more like a classic 90s adventure title than a traditional hidden object game, and this is a great thing.
In Snark Busters 2: All Revved Up, players are introduced to Jack Blair, race car driver extraordinaire. He's a thrill seeker who ends up following in his grandfather's footsteps - disappearing without a trace. The reporter makes a return this title, adding in the little news segments, and we even get to visit her studio and save her from something nasty. Just as in the first one, we're left with a cliff hanger, wondering what's going to happen next. We wonder if they've written out a storyline for these games and, if so, how many are slated for release.
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Posted by Rosethorn on May 12, 2011 at 1:20 am
Dream Day Wedding launched a series that now includes seven games, all hidden object games. The newer titles have more mini-games and puzzle elements than the first couple, but they've all retained the artistic style and hidden object design created in that first game. The first few games may have had less extra elements outside of the hidden object aspect, and it was a straightforward hidden object list, but it did have a Choose a Story, which has been abandoned in the last three games.
The first game, Dream Day Wedding, came out in 2007. It was straightforward, following the story of a couple getting married, with the player as the wedding planner, dealing with setting up and averting crises. The first game had very little extra gameplay, but the Choose a Story gave it replayability, since it's fun to see what the other paths the characters took to the aisle could be, similar to the Choose Your Own Adventure novels. The only other gameplay outside of hidden object was a card matching game that revealed wedding presents. There was a bonus scene, a honeymoon room, which shows up in the next title as well.
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Posted by Rosethorn on May 5, 2011 at 9:18 pm
From developer Sunray Games comes Mystic Diary: Lost Brother, a hidden object adventure that is far too short to be worthwhile. Clocking in at around three hours of gameplay tops, the game has an interesting storyline and a fun hidden object aspect that, if longer, would have made this a recommended game for any hidden object fans.
The story involves two brothers, one who is lost, as the title implies. The brother who is not lost goes looking for his archeologist sibling, Gustav. The not lost brother has magical powers, albeit supposedly limited, and he finds the Mystic Diary, which allows him to teleport around to any location, provided he has a photo of it. The ending is expected, but still feels unfinished. There seemed to be leanings towards a bad guy who tore up a photo in one level, but there's no reference to anyone other than Gustav and his magical brother looking for the book. We won't spoil the ending, but it's a decent attempt at a twist that falls just short of believable.
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Posted by Rosethorn on May 4, 2011 at 7:18 pm
Cave Quest is a matching game with a few hidden object levels. The basic premise is to match at least three tiles to move the characters along a path, but several levels have extra twists, such as locked blocks, growing vines that have to be cleared and ice blocks that take multiple hits to clear. There are several power-ups that help clear the hard levels, so it never gets too complicated. The nice mix of static and moving boards and the hidden object and adventure tasks in between really make this a top notch title.
The story is cute, but it ends rather abruptly. A father, mother, grandfather and brother have all gone missing and it's up to the sister to solve the mystery and rescue them from an evil, immortal king. Along the way, she'll be aided by a Shaman, a shopkeeper and her family as she rescues them. Objects are hidden in the world and gained by either completing hidden object levels or matching boards. Hot spots in each screen are pretty obvious and it's never too hard to figure out what to do with the limited inventory items. Once the final family member is rescued, the game congratulates the player and says the end. It let me wanting a little more drama.
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Posted by Rosethorn on May 3, 2011 at 9:21 am
Developer Sugar Games, who has brought out games like the time management title Wendy's Wellness and hidden object game Matchmaker: Joining Hearts, recently released a new time managemen title into the mix. Wedding Salon puts the player in the shoes of a wedding salon manager, who has to wait on eager brides and grooms and their wedding parties, making sure their clothes and hair is well done, jewelry is purchased and snacks are fed.
It's a solid title with little replayability value - although for those who really like designing the dream wedding scenes, replaying it to check out the designs not picked might be fun. Other than that, there's no real value to playing the game again and there are no advanced modes or alternate methods of gameplay - something unfortunate because an endless mode here would be pretty fun.
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Posted by Rosethorn on April 24, 2011 at 1:27 am
A new casual game from the makers of Diner Dash recently hit the market and this one isn't a time management game. Instead, Avenue Flo is more in the style of casual adventure games with elements of puzzling and hidden objects. And it's great fun too! There were only a couple of things I found frustrating. First, the game is far too short. It left me wanting more. I suppose that's not really a bad thing, but hey, I have to point out something negative! The other thing was in the chicken singing game. The chickens moved off the screen too slowly. Go ahead, accuse me of nitpicking. I don't care. The sad thing is, that's all I can name as wrong with this title.
Everything else is so right. The story is predictable. Flo has to save the day again. This time, it's Ms. Big's wedding day and someone is trying to sabotoge the big (hehe) day. Flo has to fix all the problems the saboteur created and figure out who did it. From what I can tell, Quinn, who is the wedding planner, is just sitting at the boat waiting for Flo to fix her problems. I don't know about you, but if a wedding planner had that many problems on their biggest wedding they are ever holding, they'd be out trying to fix it, but we all know Flo is a superhero, so just suspend your disbelief and go with it/
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Posted by Rosethorn on February 3, 2011 at 10:43 am
Players on virtual world Next Island solved an interesting development bug. New players were coming into areas where aggressive island mobs were taking them down.
The Next Island pioneer community has set up rescue missions to help unlucky newbies. I already knew that we have a helpful, fun crew, but this is amazing. Bemo, Rufwon, Manny, Softhart and other forum regulars have an entire thread devoted to timing and organizing rescue missions to run to dangerous areas to help new players. I also ran into Corey Greyfox, Lee DeLioncourt and others running noob rescues inworld. These are a few names from a long, long list of experienced Entropia players volunteering to spend their playing time and their armor decay to rescue newbies from aggressive mobs.
How awesome is that? I’m so lucky to be part of this community. A gameworld bug is a temporary setback, but a caring, vibrant virtual community is long-term. Thank you, Islanders!
The problem was then solved by adding Sacred Death Tikis to dangerous areas.
Via Killer Monkeys On The Loose! on Next Island News
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