Just saw a Tweet that said that the Trouble With Robots IAP content is free today. Haven’t verified myself.
Also, on the Sentinels unlock front, the most detail I’ve been able to glean was from the Greater Than Games forum. But no one has reported any successful unlocks. Apparently they’re hard to accomplish, but something that you could have happen in the course of a normal game. Sounds like they’ve really buried these guys, though.
I finished the demo for Trouble with Robots, and it asked if I wanted to buy levels 2 and 3 for $0. So yes, at least that much is free. I have no idea if there’s more.
Reemul
2943
The dev said on touch arcade that it will be free though till end Monday.
Played a few more levels and still awesome. Wish it had some type of multiplayer just for kicks.
biosc1
2945
Yah, one play through made me not want to go back through that again.
nKoan
2946
Monsters ate my Birthday cake has a nice update with some new levels for those that enjoyed the original game.
I’ve been playing a lot of Lords of Waterdeep, and it’s developed a really annoying bug recently, presumably in the last update. It turns the screen upside down. It’s tied to the iPad’s inertial sensors, so if I rotate the screen so it’s right-side-up, it helpfully rotates so it is upside down again. Forcing the game closed and then re-starting sometimes fixes it, but it shows up again later.
TimJames
2948
I played Lords of Waterdeep this week while visiting relatives. I thought it was a solid little worker placement game. I appreciated the strategy once I understood how the three types of quests create three distinct phases: plot quests first, then the engine quests to provide moderate VP and resource output, then the high VP quests.
What keeps it from being a better game is the lack of variety in the strategy. The random player card at the beginning mostly determines what to do.
Also: I actually liked the cubes.
Anyway, I just picked up Tigris & Euphrates on sale for $1 and the next-to-last expansion for Ascension. Now I just need to plan a vacation so I can play them during the downtime!
Lock the screen. Annoying to have to do, but would hopefully make it playable.
It’s actually more complex than that, though I can see how you might view it that way if you only have a couple of games under your belt. What quests are available and the building mix strongly affect the shape of the game. Some quests that are relatively hard to do because they require a lot of Wizards or Clerics (that’s purple and white cubes to you) become a lot more viable if there are buildings that produce them. Some quests are rough just because of the sheer number of adventurers required, such as Bolster the City Guard which requires 9 Fighters, but become easy with quests that produce mass fighters or rogues. So weighing which quests to pursue sometimes depends on the availability of other quests.
The expansions open the game up, of course. Undermountain adds more ways to acquire and play Intrigue cards, and adds some buildings and cards which have you placing bonus items on the board, which can be a complex decision, since you can shape how others play if they pursue those extra items. Skullport adds the Corruption tokens, which adds another risk vs. reward mechanic. Some of quests and buildings make taking corruption a much more effective tactic, since they provide ways of easily getting rid of it or poisoning other player’s buildings, and some intrigue cards let you punish players who have taken corruption tokens.
Even though consensus around here seems to be “only play with both expansions,” I think even the base game is pretty good.
geewhiz
2951
I got a great chuckle of of that comment. I think the cubes are fine but would not mind getting the little figure pieces if I played it more. I do like pimping my games - it does seem to add to the fun for some reason. :)
@Gus
I agree that the base game is good to. I mainly play it this way as I use this game as a gateway. When playing as an introduction to non-gamers I find it is better to keep it simpler. I can understand a gaming group stating to play with the expansions since it ads a lot more to the game in a good way.
I have not enjoyed it as much on iOS; I do not seem to pay attention to what everyone is taking as their quests in the digital version or maybe it just goes by to fast?
Yeah, I’d say that the expansions add enough complexity that it’s best to leave them out until your gaming group understands the basic mechanics and is playing reasonably well. The “where do I put these extra fighters” and “is this worth taking another corruption?” decisions are a bit much if you’re still learning the game.
I’ve got 73 completed games with the iOS version, but I’ve never played the physical copy I own. None the less, I bought the plastic meeples from The Broken Token in case I ever do get to play it, just to add to the atmosphere.
TimJames
2953
Sure, I see that. Buildings like the Smuggler’s Dock make certain quests more viable. But when it comes to iOS boardgames against the AI, I prefer Euro style games that give me 4-5 different paths to success depending on what other players are doing. I like to explore each style and then move on to the next game. That loop was shorter in Waterdeep though I liked my time with it.
On a related note, my wife’s cousins suddenly broke out Puerto Rico one night. Everything looks so different on a real board! I had to take a few minutes to jog my memory using the iOS edition. It was enough to pull out a tie for the win. :)
I wouldn’t say most Euro games give multiple paths to success. Sure, there are several different strategies in Puerto Rico, but most of the top-ranked games could be described as being about “scoring points in the most efficient manner,” with about as much variety in what “most efficient” means as Lords of Waterdeep. My point being that there’s actually quite a lot of leeway in what “most efficient” means in most of these games, enough so that each game feels quite different from the last.
However, if you’re only playing against the AI, of course Lords of Waterdeep is going to outstay its welcome pretty quickly. I reached the point where I was always winning every game against the hardest AI opponents in a couple of days, no matter what Lord I was playing, how many opponents I faced. Against human opponents is another matter. About the only games which feel somewhat similar in that case are the ones where I draw the lord that gains 6 points for each building she owns at game end.
There’s a Lords of Waterdeep group in the leaguelet thread in case anyone wants to join it.
There’s no actual Lords of Waterdeep activity in that thread, though. At least not in the last 50 pages.
I think it’s because we’ve got some very slow players. I’m in a couple of games right now with board members, and they’re both 60+ days old and in round 5 or 6. I honestly think Annie is going to default in one of those despite a 45 day per player timer.
I was wondering if maybe some fresh blood would spark something. :) Cuz you’re absolutely right!
Also, if anyone loves the game, you might find some new folks to play there.
While I’m almost always a pure single-player guy with computer games, I find that boardgame adaptations usually demand multiplayer. The problem being that game AI is rarely challenging, and with a boardgame they don’t have the option of assisting it with extra resources to compensate for that. About the only exception that crosses my mind is Keldon’s implementation of Race for the Galaxy, where the AI is very strong.
I’ve got hundreds of hours into Ascension, for example, but only because I was willing to dip my toe into multiplayer. I’d have shelved it right away and never purchased any of the expansions if I quit when I mastered the relatively weak single player game.
Further, I’d say that to succeed, the game has to be work well with asynchronous play, and async play has to be well implemented. That’s why Eclipse died. It’s a very well done adaptation of a highly-talked about boardgame, but it was not only ill-suited to async, the multiplayer implementation of async was terrible. The devs seemed to have no clue that players needed to see other player’s moves, and if they were waiting around, they needed to be able to look at things when someone else was playing, rather than being completely locked out.
Just grabbed it, and only level 2 is free atm. Unless I’d have to finish the demo to get 3 for free.
