3101

Did you buy it Grifman? Good reviews in the store, but not many yet. It looks good, but would like to hear more impressions.

3102

Yes, but I’ve only tinkered with it so far but it seems to have potential.

3103

I tried it, but didn’t get far because the camera movement was way too super sensitive for my taste, so I was never able to position the screen during combat the way I wanted. But maybe I was just too used to how it works in Warhammer 40K: Deathwatch, which was perfect in this regard.

3104

http://appshopper.com/games/demons-rise
looks neat.
Kinda surprised at the limitations:

  • Note that this game requires an iPhone 5, iPad 4, iPad Mini 2 or better. It will NOT run on older devices with less than 1GB of RAM.
3105

Did you guys try adjusting the camera sensitivity in the options menu? I found that helped a lot in controlling the viewpoint

3106

http://appshopper.com/games/demons-rise
looks neat.
Kinda surprised at the limitations:

  • Note that this game requires an iPhone 5, iPad 4, iPad Mini 2 or better. It will NOT run on older devices with less than 1GB of RAM.

There have been a lot of weird device restrictions on iOS recently. Fallout Shelter is basically unplayable on an iPod Touch 5G, when it doesn’t come across as the most memory intensive game. And, less surprisingly, Deathwatch:Tyrannid Invasion doesn’t run at all.

3107

Deathwatch uses UE4 which restricts it somewhat, though I guess it’s mostly memory related. The memory, or lack of it, on iDevices is my main complaint about them.

Thanks for the tip, buzznaut, didn’t know you could change the sensitivity, so I’ll try it later.

3108

Ah, I haven’t looked in to many new apps lately. Is there any general feeling as to why? Poorly developed(optimized) code? maybe just that the older ipads and other units are showing their age?

I fear my ipad 3 may be close to it’s end of life :(

3109

I tried Galactic Keep (maybe 4 hours total.) The novelty wears off after a while. I may be missing something.

You fight things. Combat is somewhat repetitive. Particularly tough fights mean your character dies and you send in another one of your characters (who will only have default equipment until you recover your corpse). You wear down enemies and defeat them. After about 20 kills or so you’ll get enough to level up a stat point.

The interface gets a bit cumbersome because when you recover the corpse, you’ll page through your dozens of weapons to find the one you prefer on that character. After each fight, you skip your turn to rest and regenerate hit points (this really should be autoheal on move like most rogue games). To move, you have to click on the d10 each time.

It’s very pretty but I’m not sure it’s entertaining in the long term. This is not a crawl/tome/xcom. Combat choices are boring.

3110

I agree on Galactic Keep - the combat was boring. I didn’t get nearly as far as you though as I stopped just short of leveling my first character. I did die once and had to go recover the corpse. Probably played a couple hours total.

Some gripes:

  • The d10 implementation was just terrible.
  • I have no idea how the initiative rolls work. I dumped points into Luck as it said it was important for this.
  • I have no idea how the resting = healing works other than a vague line I may have read in a review instead of in-game.
  • I hit them, they hit me, repeat, repeat, block, hit again - die or kill them. Boring. Excusable in a game book but this is supposed to be more of an RPG.
  • The d10 implementation is terrible!! Seriously, it doesn’t even roll, just spins. Why go through the trouble of having a d10 if you’re just going to spin it?
  • Why do I have to run up to a worm-thing to shoot it with my long range rifle? Did I miss something? I tried attacking from far off but it doesn’t seem possible.

Very disappointing - I had high hopes for it after reading a good review.

3111

Ha, I thought I was the only one scratching his head at the supposed appeal of Galactic Keep. I’ve been waiting for it to get good, but it sounds like that’s not going to happen. Rats.

-Tom

3112

shrug I’m digging it, but I suppose a lot of that has to do with the nostalgia factor of feeling like I’m wandering around the grid from an old-school TSR map. I wouldn’t say it is ground-breaking or anything like that, but as a trip down memory lane it works for me. Now if I could just figure out where the heck I am supposed to go next.

My biggest gripe with it by far is massive overuse of abilities that force the player to lose turns. For instance I just encountered an enemy whose special ability lasts 6 rounds and you miss a turn on with 20% chance. There is literally nothing you can do to prevent an enemy of using a special for more than a turn or two, generally, if that. So, no amount of planning or forethought could keep you from being obliterated if ring goes against you. There are many enemies that cause you to skip a turn or two. This is an extremely powerful effect and is overused here.

3113

Zach Gage (SpellTower, Unify etc.) released Sage Solitaire yesterday. Delightful little solitaire card game with a decent bit of strategy. There are nine piles of different sizes in a 3 by 3 layout. You make poker hands from at least 2 rows to remove cards. Points are given based on hand type with bonus points for clearing stacks. I encourage folks with any interest in solitaire to check it out. The base game is free, with a paid unlock for a couple of extra game modes and the ability to customize the look.

3114

Lara Croft GO is out for a fiver, and recommended for those who enjoyed Hitman GO (which coincidentally is at sale for a buck).

3115

I’m hooked on Lara Croft GO. There were things that annoyed me right off the bat with the game in comparison to Hitman GO, though. The board-game motif is mostly gone and there seems to be no goal beyond ‘get to the end of the level’.

But, all that said, Lara Croft GO is a pretty good game in its own right and I’m really enjoying it. The game world feels more alive (Lara runs/walks through the levels and she doesn’t live on a game board). In the end, the decisions make sense and dropping the faux board-game motif its probably a plus for a Tomb Raider themed GO game. It definitely fits better with the game world.

3116

How violent is it? My kids love (and are terrible at) Hitman GO, but I don’t let them play much beyond the first half of the first box (i.e. when the guns and knives start coming out).

3117

I’m only about halfway through the second map, so I don’t really know. So far I’ve been killing giant snakes. The reviews seem to indicate that you are only ever killing non-human characters.

3118

Well, I just finished Lara Croft Go. I’m certainly hoping for more levels. A few of the later levels were tricky, but not obtusely so (like some of the Hitman ones were). I really enjoyed it. I hope they add more campaigns eventually like they did with Hitman Go. It feels shorter than the original Hitman Go (even before the expansions) but I still had a lot of fun with the game.

And I would still say it’s pretty kid friendly. There are enemies like giant snakes, spiders, salamanders that you have to dispatch along the way using guns, spears and environmental traps but there are no other humans to be seen in the game.

3119

Puzzle Craft 2 just came out a few days ago. It’s very much like the first one with some extra goodies and extra bullshit. On the goodies front we have a whole new puzzle area and many different crops and animals for the farm minigame. On the BS front we’ve got the freemiumness turned up a couple notches, but not to the point where I feel it’s unfair. Certainly grindy though.

3120

I enjoyed it, but deleted it off my phone because I was playing it a bit too much (and it was feeling pretty grindy).