Europa Universalis III: Napoleon's Ambition Review

Europa Universalis III: Napoleon's Ambition, developed and published by Paradox Interactive on Gamer’s Gate.

The Good: Automated merchants, more rules options, longer timeline with additional events and national ideas, several interface improvements, Austria is finally colored white

The Not So Good: Can't join multiplayer games in progress, no short scenarios

What say you? A sufficient expansion for fans of the original game: 6/8



MY POORLY WRITTEN INTRODUCTION

The expansion pack has inundated the PC gaming market. Adding a few additional features for a reduced price, expansion packs have run the gamut from comprehensive and worthwhile to oversaturated and meaningless. One of my favorite games is Europa Universalis III, and a digital-only expansion has been released called Napoleon's Ambition. Not surprisingly, the game centers on an expanded timeline to cover the exploits of one Napoleon Bonaparte and his attempts to try to take over the world, among some smaller user-requested features.



GRAPHICS AND SOUND

While the graphics remain the same as the original game, there have been some interface improvements made to make navigating through the game easier. There is a right-click province menu for one-stop military shopping, a colonization view with all of the pertinent information in one place, an improved ledger view of provincial improvements to make building easier, and others that I will talk about a bit later. All of these additions are nice, but things that could (and some have) been included in a free patch. Still, anything that makes navigating through the game easier is fine with me, and the interface improvements are worthwhile things that you will actually use. The game performance has also been improved, as loading the game and playing at the highest speed both happen noticeably faster, so that’s nice.



ET AL.

The most obvious improvement made in Napoleon's Ambition is the expanded timeline to December 1820. You can now start the game any day between 1453 and 1820 and the world’s provinces are historically accurate. With the date expansion comes more events, additional national ideas for high technology levels, the ability to dismantle the Holy Roman Empire (by occupying all of the capitals of the member nations), and enhanced revolutions. Now, nations that are revolting gain bonuses against monarchies, and vice versa. I think it’s just a matter of time before the game expands even further into the present; the game engine could probably handle all the way up to the present day using the current rules, and it’s just a matter of investing the time and energy in doing so. The potential for the game engine is exciting, and I hope the developers make additional expansions to Europa Universalis III instead of making separate games with slightly different rules like they have done in the past (the rules and level of complexity in Europa Universalis III is the best out of all of the Paradox titles).



To satisfy those patrons of Europa Universalis II who enjoy less randomness and more historical accuracy in their gameplay, Napoleon's Ambition includes additional game options that influence the appearance of historical leaders. Before, leaders, advisors, and rulers had a window in which they could appear, but now you can set “historical” rules and they will appear on their actual birthday and die on the appropriate day as well. This has some really interesting impacts on gameplay, especially if you have historical military leaders on. Basically, you are getting leaders for free (great for cash-strapped countries) with really good ratings without using tradition. You can also eliminate the costs associated with merchants, colonists, missionaries, and spies, adding another layer of intriguing ramifications on gameplay. The spread of land discoveries and colonist size can also be tweaked to alter the composition of the New World. More options are always better, so it’s nice that Napoleon's Ambition adds more user-defined settings to tailor your gameplay experience further.



An area that received improvements was trade, and most notable is the addition of automated merchants. Finally you don’t have to keep clicking every couple of months to constantly send merchants. It was so tedious and by far the least enjoyable part of the game. Now, you can assign each center of trade a priority (high, medium, low, or zero) and the game will automatically send merchants to the best center of trade if you have enough money. The game won’t send merchants if it will bring your balance below zero before year’s end, and it will take value and competition into consideration when choosing where to go next. Now, instead of trade being an annoying part of the game, it can be left alone and your focus put on more important areas. The trade map has been enhanced with icons representing the good it produced; while it is helpful for colonization and manufactories, you have to know which goods are “good” and which are not. Napoleon's Ambition adds the ability to create (and destroy) new centers of trade if the current center of trade in the region is pulling in a lot of cash. The AI seems to do a good job with managing new centers of trade, and it’s a nice addition to allow for nations to develop another source of income.



Provinces can now have a recruitment queue for military units, taking some of the repetitive nature out of creating an army. While this is a useful feature, it’s faster to build one unit in five provinces than five units in one province, unless you have some sort of bonus from a manufactory. Smaller nations have been given a boost through discipline, which is tied to the quality vs. quantity slider. Now, high quality nations will get double benefits, through increased morale and discipline, to make the use of that slider more practical. This evens the playing field a bit more, although the largest nations will always have an advantage in war. You can consolidate regiments in Napoleon's Ambition: instead of having two half-strength infantry units, you can combine them. I don’t really see the usefulness of this feature, since it’s the same number of troops and you are preventing reinforcement during and after the war. Spies have been given a couple of new tricks: counterfeiting currency to increase inflation, reducing stability, fabricate core province claims, inciting natives, and bribing defenders. I’m not a big spy player, but, again, more things to do is always welcome.



The last area of improvement deals with war. First, if you click on the war alert flag at the top of the screen, the diplomatic panel for the country you are at war with will open. This is very useful in those weird wars where you are battling some far-off ally of an adjacent country (for me, Funj allied with Austria). Napoleon's Ambition comes with more end-of-battle information, with the total troops engaged, casualty information, and the values of each leader, replacing a simple “you lost” message. There is also a war screen that displays the data the AI uses to calculate how a war is going. The armies and navies, stability, and economy are converted into a war capacity value that shows how much more a country can invest into a prolonged battle. This takes some of the guesswork out of an AI refusing a peace proposal even though you hold several of their provinces (they may still be able to raise more troops). I think the war capacity was always in the game and it’s just now being shown to the player; some users think that the AI has been altered somewhat but it seems to behave the same as before for me.



There are some other odds and ends included with Napoleon's Ambition as well. You must hold the capital of a nation in order to make it as vassal. An annexed nation loses all cores on colonial provinces. And you can move your capital to a new province. I’m not sure what the reason for this is and the AI seems to be a little too happy in doing this (Spain’s capital in modern Peru? Whatever). I suppose if you are losing your home provinces you could “relocate” to your colonies, but wouldn’t that really be considered a new country? But I guess one weird feature in a sea of good features is OK.



IN CLOSING

I like what Napoleon's Ambition has added to Europa Universalis III. I wouldn’t call it a must-have to owners of the original game, but it offers enough substance to warrant its purchase. The expanded timeline is nice and it gives you more time to develop your country, but it is thankfully not the only additional feature. The automated merchants is my favorite feature (something I mentioned in my review of the original game), and the additional rules options allow users to customize their game even more. Most of the smaller improvements I like (the movement of capitals and unit consolidation are questionable), and overall they make playing the game that much easier. Oh, and Austria is now it’s appropriate while color instead of that blasphemous red. Some (most?) of this stuff could have been included in a free patch, but since the basic game was so cheap (and yet so good), I don’t mind paying $20 to support the efforts of the developers. At $50 total for the original game and the expansion, it’s a very typical price and still less than all of those useless console games. The game still doesn’t allow for joining multiplayer games in progress (something I wish they will add in the future) and small scenarios are still missing to ease people into the game. Still, if you play Europa Universalis III enough, it’s worth $20 to get Napoleon's Ambition as it enhances the game and adds meaningful features to an already impressive game.

Galactic Assault: Prisoner of Power Review

Galactic Assault: Prisoner of Power, developed by Wargaming.net and published by Paradox Interactive.

The Good: Enjoyable strategy gameplay, challenging campaign, neat morale model, streamlined base management, emphasis on resupply rather than massing units, one unit per hex stresses realistic front lines, time of day drastically affects strategy

The Not So Good: No level editor, some missions are exceedingly difficult

What say you? This turn-based strategy game has a lot of good ideas, but casual users will dislike the tedious pace and high difficulty: 6/8



MY POORLY WRITTEN INTRODUCTION

The Massive Assault series has been around since 2003, providing strategy fans with a decent series of games: the original Massive Assault, Massive Assault Network 2, Domination, Massive Assault: The Next Generation, and Massive Assault: Deep Space Nine. The Assault has now expanded from Massive to Galactic levels in Galactic Assault: Prisoner of Power. This new title uses the same conventions as the Massive Assault series but a more conventional RTS approach (though the game is still played in turn-based modes) with base-building, unit recruitment, and faster-paced straight-up action. It was time for a change, since the basic game has been around since 2003 and each iteration really felt more like an expansion pack than a full-fledged game. Will Galactic Assault: Prisoner of Power open to doors to a wide audience and provide a distinct gameplay experience?



GRAPHICS AND SOUND

The graphics of Galactic Assault: Prisoner of Power are largely the same as in Massive Assault Network 2, albeit with more varied locations and new units. The game is rendered in 3-D and a lot of the same effects and attention to detail present in previous games carries over. The units move in a realistic method, utilizing roads and automatically moving to a column formation while moving. The unit animations are also well done, from the infantry lining up and taking their shots to the more powerful weapons in the game. The game uses a movie-style camera that zooms in on the action during large explosions: it is dumb, not necessary, but easily skipped. Overall, Galactic Assault looks good for a wargame, but lags behind the higher production values present in mega-budget real time strategy games. And that’s just fine with me, as the minimal interface has come to a very streamlined place and navigating through the game is very useful. Galactic Assault displays both morale (as a circular indicator) and health (as a bar) above each unit at all times, making assessing the battlefield situation easy. Galactic Assault is easy to get in to thanks to its mostly intuitive interface. The quality of the sound presentation is similar to what it was before: sporadic and not up to the graphics. The uninspired voice acting heard when passages from the book the game is based on are being read while loading a new campaign level doesn’t get you excited for the next mission. The sound effects, while decent, are sporadic (typical for a turn-based game) and don’t bring the full force of war to your gaming experience. The background music is good and doesn’t repeat itself much. Overall, Galactic Assault maintains the higher-than-average quality graphics for a wargame.



ET AL.

Like Massive Assault, Galactic Assault is a turn-based strategy game where you move units around to conquer enemy bases. The game comes with four campaigns (one for each of the races) totaling seventeen missions in all. The first set act as a sort of tutorial to the game, although if you haven’t played Massive Assault you will be almost completely lost: the in-game tutorials do not explain the user interface (and neither does the manual) and other nuances of the game very well if at all (though tool-tips are some help). A single mission can take up to an hour to complete (thanks to the slow turn-based nature of the gameplay), so Galactic Assault has a lot of content. The campaign missions are generally well done (though difficult) and strike a good balance between offensive and defensive operations with some stealth mixed in for good measure. There are also eleven objective-based scenarios and twelve deathmatch maps with identical goals for each side (capture the other base). You can also engage in hot multiplayer action over a LAN or using the in-game matchmaking. You can only play deathmatch, as the territory-based mode from Massive Assault is mysteriously absent. This is a good amount of content and it should keep you busy for a while, even without a map editor to incorporate third-party content.



Gameplay in Galactic Assault takes place over two phases: the combat phase where you can order troops and the reinforcement phase where you can purchase new troops and upgrade your bases. The game features a good number of real-world features that impact the gameplay, such as time of day (which drastically affects fog of war) and cover provided by terrain. Galactic Assault puts a lot of emphasis on good movement planning, forcing you to evaluate the terrain’s features well and note which kinds of troops can traverse the varied landscapes in the game. Units can be instructed to use camouflage (which makes them invisible to units beyond the adjacent hex) or entrench for improved defense. Engineers can also build pontoon bridges on shallow water and construct forward air bases. Unlike a lot of RTS games, new bases are not built; rather, they can be moved when resources run out (there is a finite level of resources at each location). This cuts down a lot on base management, as you’ll only have one or two places to worry about instead of many outposts scattered about the map. Bases can be captured by simply moving a unit into the center, so troops must be kept back on defense. Depots can be built surrounding a base to construct units, much like in Rise of Legends. Again, this makes finding unit-producing buildings very easy since you know they must be adjacent to your base. Each depot type can construct one type of unit, from barracks for infantry to ports for ships. Depots can be upgraded to unlock more powerful units. Each depot is limited to producing one unit per turn, since only one unit can occupy a single hex at a time (and each depot sits on one hex). Galactic Assault features conventional units: infantry, vehicles, tanks, transports, air, and naval. Each of these has their strengths and weaknesses, from attack ratings to speed to weapon range. Damaged units can be repaired for a much lower cost than making a new unit at their depot, if you want to take the time moving them back to home base. I like how Galactic Assault incorporates RTS conventions into its formula, and the result is an easy-to-handle game because of the streamlined base construction.



During the combat phase, units can move and shoot in the same turn. Since there is no stacking in Galactic Assault (each hex can only contain one unit), there is a lot of planning involved when you start to move troops around. The game displays the attack range of each of your units when you select them, helping out the process. Most of the units for each of the races are the same (although they look different), so you can plan your movement and orders accordingly. . Luckily, you can queue your commands up in succession, so you don’t have to wait for the last unit to finish moving before issuing orders to the next unit: this speeds up the gameplay somewhat. You will need to maintain a front line of units to prevent fast units from moving past your units and engaging fragile artillery or capturing your base. Units can return fire on defense and support artillery can protect nearby units automatically by engaging three enemy units during the opposing turn. Galactic Assault comes with end-turn prompts that remind of you unmoved units or those that haven’t fired yet, helpful for making sure all of your firepower has been used. Galactic Assault has a good morale system: units that suffer incoming fire and the death associated with said fire will experience lower morale. Lower morale will result in decreased firepower, and units with the lowest morale won’t fire at all. The morale model is well done because you don't have to annihilate every unit on the map to make them ineffective. Of course, they can still act as road blocks, so some enemy units will need to be completely destroyed in order to advance across the map. Specialized units like hypno-transmitters can increase morale, but the best way of keeping morale up is not to die. Units can earn combat experience, which increases damage and morale values. The one unit per hex restriction makes Galactic Assault easier to handle than a lot of wargames, and the morale system is very straightforward. So, with all of these good things said about the game mechanics, why doesn’t Galactic Assault completely succeed?



Galactic Assault is too hard. The AI is good enough to engage a human opponent head-on (although it isn’t quite as aggressive as a human in deathmatches), but the developers seem to be hard-set on making each campaign and standalone scenario unbalanced with too many enemy units. This was a problem in Massive Assault and the trend continues in Galactic Assault. Easy is challenging enough, and anything higher than that is very hard and meant for strong veteran players. I’m no slouch at strategy games (I review plenty of them), but I had a terribly time winning even the introductory scenarios on medium settings. It took a while for me to “get over the hump” and start enjoying Galactic Assault. The game does require you to be almost perfect in order to win with any regularity above “easy” difficulty (and even that level is no walk in the park). You will need to carefully scout ahead to eliminate enemy surprises (of which there are many in the imbalanced campaign), carefully maneuver your troops to prevent enemy units from breaking through your lines, are carefully direct your fire to take advantage of counters (like anti-tank units), positioning, and morale. Galactic Assault requires you to be perfect, and that’s a very hard thing to do in a game with multiple variables. The deathmatches and multiplayer modes are more evenly matched, but the campaigns and stand-alone scenarios border on frustrating difficulty. While Galactic Assault has a faster pace than Massive Assault, the tedious gameplay will annoy some users. Units (especially infantry and artillery) move very slowly when not on transport units, making reinforcements a long time coming. It also usually takes a turn or two to destroy a single unit, so the combat pace is also slow. This deliberate pace allows for some thinking and more involved gameplay, but the does get annoying after a while at how long a single match takes and how little each unit can do in a single turn. The pace is in line with other turn-based strategy games, but Galactic Assault seems to drag along more for some reason. This game is certainly more approachable than Massive Assault, as the units are more conventional and the base building elements add familiarity. I do like how this aspect of the game works, providing funds over a limited time and requiring users to expand to new territories. I think the developers tried to expand the audience with a more conventional structure and they were successful on some levels, but the deliberate pace and requirement of perfection will dissuade some players.



IN CLOSING

Veteran wargamers will have a grand time with Galactic Assault, but beginning players who aren't accustomed to the gameplay mechanics of Massive Assault will feel lost and overwhelmed by the high difficulty and level of planning required in order to be successful. There are a lot of things in Galactic Assault that I like: the units, the base building, the amount of content, the morale model, the non-stackable units, and the general gameplay are all fine and dandy. But the game is really difficult and slow, two things that won’t appeal to a large audience. I much prefer Galactic Assault to Massive Assault and it does a lot of things well and more often than not I am having fun playing the game, but then I encounter an unfair or overly difficult scenario that causes me to quite playing. There is nothing wrong with a challenging game, but it should be challenging on “hard” settings, not on all settings. Ultimately, Galactic Assault is a high-quality wargame that will appeal to wargamers, but not many other people.

Concentration Review

Concentration, developed by Freeze Tag and published by Mumbo Jumbo.

The Good: A reasonable assortment of puzzles, accurate gameplay, challenging puzzles, reasonable AI

The Not So Good: No online play, repetitive sound, no custom puzzles

What say you? A faithful recreation of the classic game show: 6/8



MY POORLY WRITTEN INTRODUCTION

One of the many game shows I followed in my youth was Concentration. While it wasn’t my favorite (that high honor goes to Press Your Luck), it was still good entertainment that required some skill in order to win, unlike a lot of the contemporary game shows. Most, if not all, game shows translate well to the computer gaming realm, so it’s not surprising to see a new version of Concentration coming around the corner. The classic game show required you to remember where prizes were hidden on a game board and then figure out a puzzle using pictures and letters to convey a common phrase. Will Concentration feature all of the heart-pounding excitement of Concentration?



GRAPHICS AND SOUND

While Concentration is not rendered in 3-D, the game does get the style of the game board and puzzles correct. You won’t see the host or avatars representing your player, but Concentration does use the old color scheme (along with some new ones) for the game board and the puzzles are just as flamboyant as during the TV show. The various prizes have good icons for each of them, so overall the game board holds true and looks good. Concentration does feature the classic sound effects for matches and choosing squares on the board, but it seems like they couldn’t afford licensing the theme song and had to resort to some hokey selections. The host also becomes terribly repetitive, even during the first round of the first game you will play. It doesn’t seem like much attention was paid to the sound outside of the accurate effects, but the audio doesn’t ruin the overall experience. The graphics and sound for Concentration are exactly what you would expect for a $20 game: straight and to the point, accurate but not making any improvements.



ET AL.

The game of Concentration exactly mirrors the game of Concentration (or is it vice versa?). Concentration (the game, not the game) can be played by one player against the computer or two human players on the same computer. There is no online play, something that would have been greatly welcomed (and caused a higher overall score). If you are unfamiliar with the conventions of the game show (if so, what is wrong with you?), here is how play progresses. A puzzle is covered up by twenty-five squares, each containing a prize. If the player matches two squares with the same prize, he or she earns that prize and the two squares are removed from the board, revealing a portion of the puzzle. The puzzles combine pictures, numbers, and letters to form a well-known phrase, although there is some abstraction involved to make the puzzles more difficult (for example, a picture of a dove represents the word “of”). Whoever correctly solves two puzzles first wins and moves on to the bonus round. The bonus round is similar, although there are pictures of cars hidden behind fifteen squares and you must match all of them within a thirty-second time limit.



Concentration stays true to the original game show. The puzzles have the same design as the originals and there are enough of them so that it takes a while to find repeats. There is no puzzle editor, though, which would have been a neat addition. The prizes are more contemporary in nature and the colorful backgrounds aid in identification. You will occasionally find wild cars that will automatically find the match of the other card you chose, and take cards will allow you to take (surprise) a prize from your opponent. The game tracks high scores and cumulative stats for a single player name, and even assigns a champion title to the current undefeated player. This is a game where the AI could really cheat a lot, but it seems like the AI has been programmed fairly: it plausibly finds matches, makes some mistakes, and waits until near the end to solve the puzzle. Overall, the AI is a fair competitor that makes playing the game enjoyable. While I would have liked to have online play in the game, Concentration does offer everything you would expect a game based on the show to have, so fans of the game show will find an enjoyable replica here.



IN CLOSING

Concentration translates very well to a computer game, and Concentration is an entertaining computer game. While the game lacks online play and the host is repetitive, the remainder of the game is a very accurate replica of the game, delivering all of the hot memorization action of the game show. The AI provides a good competitor, but playing against another human placed within smacking range (for when they steal a prize you just found) is good fun. The puzzles are numerous enough and challenging enough to round out this quality title. While it’s a little odd to see a computer game version of a show this old, Concentration is still an enjoyable game and a good fit into the library of any fan of the show or computer games in general.

It’s The Big Game, Charlie Brown! Review

It’s The Big Game, Charlie Brown!, developed by THE WEB PRODUCTION and published by Viva Media.

The Good: Appropriate for a variety of ages due to numerous difficulty settings, diverse mini-games, can skip recruiting process, simple mouse-driven controls, recognizable 2-D graphics

The Not So Good: Fielding is very hard, slow pace, some arbitrary story advancement requirements

What say you? Part adventure game and part sports simulation, it is enjoyable for a large age range: 6/8



MY POORLY WRITTEN INTRODUCTION

One of the most esteemed comic strips is Peanuts. Charlie Brown and his gang of cohorts have been doing their antics for quite a long time, and have appeared in numerous television specials like A Charlie Brown Christmas (????) and It’s Columbus Day, Charlie Brown! Sports have been infused with the comic strip, from Lucy’s Tony Romo-like football holding skills to baseball. Using this connection is It’s The Big Game, Charlie Brown!, and adventure-sports game where you must recruit members to your team and then play your way to victory in a point-and-click baseball game. It seems like a good concept that doesn’t just use the license to sell games (since baseball was a predominant part of the comic). Will It’s The Big Game, Charlie Brown! be good, or grief?



GRAPHICS AND SOUND

It’s The Big Game, Charlie Brown! uses 2-D graphics that mirrors those found in the comic strip. I’m glad the game uses this method to look more like the cartoon instead of an inferior 3-D game with giant bulbous children. While the level of quality isn’t up to the cartoons, the game still looks good and it’s unmistakably Peanuts. The game looks like a color version of the comic strip, and that’s all you really need in a Peanuts-based game. The game doesn’t lose anything by eliminating that third dimension (although the baseball games are more challenging, which you could argue is actually a good thing), so residing in a well-represented 2-D world is fine with me. It appears that all of the current voice actors are in the game, or at least people strongly reminiscent of those voices. It’s reassuring when Charlie Brown sounds like Charlie Brown. Completing the package is entertaining background music that fits the atmosphere of the game well. Honestly, the graphics and the sound could not have been better for a Peanuts-licensed game, and keeping true to the original comic is what fans would prefer.



ET AL.

It’s The Big Game, Charlie Brown! is a single-player only game where you must recruit players onto your team and then taste sweet, sweet victory in The Big Game. The recruiting phase is a lot like an adventure game, where you go talk to characters and “unlock” them by completing mini-games. You can skip the story mode and go straight to a game if you would like, though the story mode is good enough to play through once. In the story mode, you must activate each of five Peanuts characters and then beat their mini-game. Typically, activating a character involves bringing along another character to interrupt their current activity and start the mini-game (distracting Lucy away from Schroeder, making Sally annoy Linus, et cetera). Most of these interactions make sense from a character standpoint if you follow the cartoon, though if I didn’t have the walkthrough, it would have taken me a while to figure out how to unlock each of the mini-games. The characters also have side dialogue that doesn’t repeat as much as you would think; if you backtrack past the same area, the resulting conversation might even reference previous passes by. After each successfully completed mini-game, you are taught one aspect of the baseball game to prepare you for The Big Game (like hitting, pitching, or fielding). Each mini-game has three difficulty settings to choose from and they are very different, making It’s The Big Game, Charlie Brown! appropriate for all ages. The hard difficulty level is actually very hard, even for a seasoned gaming veteran such as myself (I almost felt bad playing most of the mini-games on medium…almost). The mini-games also have a good variety and most of them relate to the specific character: Schroder has a Simon-like music game, Lucy gives a Peanuts-related trivia game (in the form of a psychological test), and Linus makes you catch objects with his blanket, to name a few. It’s nice that the developers actually put some thought into the mini-games: instead of just throwing them in, they do relate pretty well to each character. There isn’t any replay value in the story mode and it only takes about two hours to complete, but it is something to try out once and it is well-designed and appropriate for the Peanuts world.



The baseball game is a mouse-driven affair, as everything is done with clicking on the field. This makes the game much easier to control than any of those console baseball games, since this game is geared towards a younger audience. You can choose a six or nine inning contest and the difficulty level (which, again, makes it very easy or quite challenging). When pitching, you will pick the pitch type (fastball, slider, curve, or change-up), location, and speed. It’s pretty difficult to strike out opposing batters if you don’t mix up your pitches, which adds an air of strategy and realism to the game. Fielding is probably the most difficult portion of the entire game: you have to click on the ground where you expect the ball to land, and the closest player will automatically go there. Since It’s The Big Game, Charlie Brown! is in 2-D and the fielding mode is played from an overhead perspective, it can be difficult to judge where the ball is going to land based off the ball size and shadow. It definitely takes some practice, and the first losses you will experience are a direct result of poor fielding on your part. To bat, you simply move the batter in the box and click at the correct time. Once you figure out when to swing (right before the ball crosses from the grass to the dirt), battling becomes trivially easy. The opposition tends to throw a lot of strikes (especially at the lower difficulty levels) so it’s just a matter of getting timing down. The game could have made you guess where in the strike zone the ball was going to go, but maybe that level of complexity is beyond the scope of It’s The Big Game, Charlie Brown!. Running is done from the same overhead perspective as fielding, and you just need to click on the base to move. Runners will automatically advance to first base, but other runners will automatically hold up, requiring some micromanagement. It does get frustrating when players are out because they didn’t (or did) automatically run when they should (or shouldn’t) have, but in the end that’s poor playing on your part. Overall, the baseball aspect of It’s The Big Game, Charlie Brown! is well-designed and very appropriate for a wide range of ages. While the constant cut-scenes interrupt the flow of the game (though they can be skipped once you see them once), the simple mouse controls means anyone can learn the conventions of the game quickly, and you almost have the same level of control as in more “sophisticated” simulations. I actually had fun playing the baseball part of the game, at least until I figured out how to hit the ball with disturbing regularity. Still, I imagine kids will have a ball (get it? ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha! ha!) with the game, as the adventure mode and baseball mode come together to produce a completely entertaining package.



IN CLOSING

It’s The Big Game, Charlie Brown! doesn’t simply use the Peanuts name to sell games: it is thought out and executed very well and appropriate for a large age range. The adventure mode is fun the first time through, recreating a believable Peanuts universe thanks to the spot-on graphics and sound. The mini-games are also plausible activities that link to the characters in the game. The baseball game uses simple controls but still manages to be a bit challenging, at least until you start connecting on hit after hit. It’s The Big Game, Charlie Brown! shows how a license is supposed to be used: to create a compelling and plausible game within the universe of that particular license. Those interested in a Peanuts-related game, or even just an adventure or baseball title, will find a lot to like in It’s The Big Game, Charlie Brown!.

The Bojo Game – Home Edition Review

The Bojo Game – Home Edition, developed by Black Knight Productions and BBM Multimedia and published by G3S.

The Good: Simple game mechanics, large simulated online environment

The Not So Good: AI bettors need work, no real online play

What say you? A good foundation for a betting game, but the dumb AI makes it feel much less realistic: 5/8



Note: Version 1.5 of the game fixes the AI issues I discuss in this review. This patch was released after I posted this review but before retail release, so potential buyers won't experience the issues with the AI I mention below. While I didn't feel like re-writing an entire review (cutting out the rant about the AI would have made it extremely short), you can go ahead and bump up the overall score to a 6/8.



MY POORLY WRITTEN INTRODUCTION

Gambling has become so popular that it’s almost bordering on “sport” status; the World Series of Poker gets many showings on ESPN, complete with the action-packed excitement of watching cards turn over. Obviously, most gambling-type games would translate well to the computer games. I’ve been known to enjoy some poker, and a new card-based gambling game has come in the form of The Bojo Game – Home Edition (Ty Pennington not included). This is a combination of poker and craps (you know, what you get after eating too much Taco Bell), incorporating side bets for each card drawn and a main bet for the result in a simulated online environment. Will The Bojo Game – Home Edition prove to be an engrossing gambling game worthy of your virtual dollars?



GRAPHICS AND SOUND

The Bojo Game – Home Edition features some utilitarian 2-D graphics, similar to the consoles you’d find in an Applebee’s. The background is supposed to look like a casino, with flaming flames that don’t seem to ignite the playing cards for some reason. There aren’t many special effects in the game, other than the countdown timer and the flames in the background. The cards appear on the game table and you use the mouse to select your bets each turn, and that’s pretty much it. The game does have a bunch of stats that are accessible from the main screen and you’ll never have to navigate away from it, so that’s nice. This is about the best the game could have looked without making the leap to 3-D (which, honestly, is unnecessary) and the interface promotes speedy and unhindered gameplay. The sound in the game is underwhelming, though: a lot more could have been done to promote the casino atmosphere. Overall, The Bojo Game – Home Edition has a fairly standard presentation that lacks the loud noises and shiny things that accompany most gambling ventures, but it still looks decent for a straightforward gambling game.



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The Bojo Game – Home Edition is a betting game surrounding five card stud poker (and I, for one, should know about stud poker…because I’m a STUD). You bet on each individual card’s color, suit, and rank, as well as the overall hand (one pair, straight, flush, et cetera). Being a Home Edition, you don’t actually play online, rather against simulated AI players numbering between 200 and 100,000. While the lack of online features should be noted, the game would progress exactly the same if you were competing against real people, so it’s not really missed. You can change some of the settings in the game, from the number of AI players to the amount each bet costs (you always start with $200). You can also adjust the amount the casino charges for betting for a more realistic monetary experience. You are playing against the other players and not the house, so the strategy is to bet in the categories that others are not to maximize your profits. The game displays how many competitors have bet in each category, but I would like to see a bar graph for easier identification of underutilized bets: staring at numbers is a bit strenuous.



The basic premise of The Bojo Game – Home Edition is well executed, for the most part. There is the potential for a very entertaining game: while the side bets are mostly luck, you can adjust your betting to take advantage of the least used categories. There is also some intrigue associated with the poker bets: will the next card produce a straight or a pair? You must play a poker bet before the first card is thrown and you can only increase your poker bet (meaning you can change your bet from one pair to two pairs but not back again). The thing that ruins The Bojo Game – Home Edition is the elementary AI. The first sign of trouble is that each of the poker bets gets an evenly distributed amount of bettors at the start of each round. You mean to tell me the AI thinks getting a royal flush is just as likely as one pair? This goes for the numerical bets as well: every card gets essentially an equal number of bets, no matter which cards have been played. This results in inflated winnings if you guess correctly on the side bets. The AI is even worse with the poker bets: no matter which cards have been played, the “royal flush” category always gets the most bets at the end of each round. This is caused by the even distribution and the fact that you can only increase your bets: evenly distributed increases cause a massive amount of “royal flush” bets. This could be partially solved by allowing movement up and down the poker tree and awarding more money for staying on a single poker bet longer. As it stands, you get the same amount of money if you chose two pair on the last turn than if you kept it all along, which doesn’t seem fair. What really needs to be done to solve the The Bojo Game – Home Edition puzzle is to improve the AI. The computer players need to avoid poker bets that are impossible according to the current cards played. If an eight is the first card, there should be nobody betting royal flush (other than those who played it from the beginning, which actually shouldn’t be anyone since you can move up to royal flush from one pair anyway). If you have a king of clubs and a three of diamonds, why are the AI bettors throwing their money on a straight or flush? It doesn’t make any sense and it’s quite sad since good AI would make this game much more enjoyable. The AI should also be programmed to look at the played cards when doing single-card bets. Although single bets work well enough since they are more suited to evenly distributed bets, more variety would result in more exciting gameplay. Although the basic game is fun enough, the lack of thoughtful competition will turn a lot of people away from The Bojo Game – Home Edition.



IN CLOSING

The Bojo Game – Home Edition is a good card betting game destroyed by incapable AI. I like the premise and it opens the window for some interesting betting, as you try to out-maneuver your AI opponents. While there is only one mode of play using the default rules and betting structure, the combination of short-term and long-term bets makes for an entertaining gambling game. However, the shoddy AI makes winning in the game all too easy. When 23 people bet on one pair (usually the winning hand) while 7,000 bet on royal flush, there is a problem. The AI completely ignores the cards that have been played, so straights, flushes, full houses, and three of a kinds will continue to be bet on even if they are impossible to get. Hopefully the AI can be easily improved and The Bojo Game – Home Edition will be a better game in the future. I do like the overall design, and The Bojo Game – Home Edition is an AI fix away from being a notable gambling title. But as it stands now, the AI is too unintelligent to enjoy as a competitor.

Sam & Max: Season One Review

Sam & Max: Season One, developed by Telltale Games and published by The Adventure Company.

The Good: Simplified interface, good sense of humor, nice graphical style, great music and sound design, mostly intuitive answers, can’t fail, slight changes in gameplay for successive attempts

The Not So Good: Limited controls means reduced complexity, the occasional oddball solution, poor handling in driving sequences, no “current objective” list

What say you? A simple, funny, and entertaining adventure game: 7/8



MY POORLY WRITTEN INTRODUCTION

As I have stated previously (I can’t seem to remember when, but I did), downloadable titles are the future of PC gaming. It’s cheaper and you don’t have to be a big publisher with deep pockets to get your game distributed around the world. One of those downloadable games is Sam & Max, released in six episodes over half of a year. This resurrection of an adventure game is now available in CD format and at a reduced price for the entire collection. Those of us who were hesitant on purchasing small, three hour snippets of a game (albeit at a low price) can now pay a reasonable sum for the whole set. Will Sam & Max: Season One make all of us believers in the adventure genre once more?



GRAPHICS AND SOUND

For what is essentially an independently produced title, Sam & Max: Season One has some high production values, especially for the adventure genre. The game plays out like a classic 2-D point-and-click adventure game, but the game is rendered in 3-D and each of the small environments look good. The level of detail is well done and there is a nice cartoon theme to the entire game, from the appearance of the buildings, characters, and objects in the foreground to the dynamic background images. Sam & Max: Season One feels like you are playing a cartoon, and since the source material is a cartoon, this is a good thing. The dialogue sections and cut scenes in the game don’t become annoying or overly drawn out and are rendered using the game engine, instead of popping in a movie file that takes away from the flow of the game. The game also features some high-quality background music and good voice acting to make the world of Sam & Max feel authentic, at least in a cartoon sense. Both the graphics and the sound of Sam & Max: Season One are impressive for an adventure game; if only all titles in this genre could have the same attention to detail.



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Sam & Max: Season One comes with all six episodes that were released online. Each episode takes about three hours to complete and you can play them in any order, although doing them in the proper order is recommended because events in later episodes reference earlier ones. This CD version also includes some bonus material such as trailers, the soundtrack, behind the scenes extras, and other things. It’s not enough to make people who already own the single episodes to buy the collection, but for those of us who missed out on the original run will enjoy these additions. Although each episode is short (for a total of about 20 hours in all), there are changes in some of the missions for subsequent plays. Most of the multi-task missions (where you have to complete three different objectives) have five or six possible tasks assigned randomly each time you play. This is pretty neat and it adds some replay value that is completely absent in most adventure games.



The controls are very simple: it’s just the mouse. Sam & Max: Season One is purely a point-and-click adventure game, and everything is done by clicking on objects, selecting items in your inventory (displayed across the bottom when you select the box), or moving the mouse in the case of driving the car. While this method works well for the most part, making Sam & Max: Season One accessible to a wide audience, the driving could be more precise. You will command Sam (the dog) during the game; text appears when your mouse hovers above functional objects (eliminating a lot of hunting). You will also click to move, which is tedious on default levels when moving large distances. The camera angle is done from the side like a classic adventure game, though the levels are rendered in 3-D and the camera rotates automatically when appropriate. While I do like the third person camera angle better than a first person view, it makes accessing objects off the side of the main screen more trouble than it should be. These simple controls means anyone can play this game in a matter of minutes, but the tradeoff is that the puzzles aren’t as complex as in some other games where a more complete suite of commands are used.



Sam & Max: Season One maintains the great sense of humor of the comic. There are numerous moments of hilarity in the game, and most of them don’t feel forced like in a lot of games that try too hard. The level of humor is appropriate for the “Teen” rating the game received. Most of the puzzles in the game are fairly straightforward and intuitive; all of them “make sense,” though some puzzles are a bit “wacky” in their sensibility. Since you can’t lose or die in the game, it’s just a matter of time before you figure out to steal the cheese or cover up the cow with the lampshade (obviously!). Thankfully, there aren’t any combining puzzles and normally you just use a single object on a target. I would like to have a current objective list, as I tend to forget exactly what I am doing. Since the objectives change each time you play, it’d be nice to see a list of your current missions without having to talk to the person who assigned them. Other than that, though, Sam & Max: Season One is a high-quality adventure game with a good sense of humor, well thought out puzzles, and a streamlined interface that should appeal to many experience levels.



IN CLOSING

Sam & Max: Season One is a high-quality adventure game with a good sense of humor, well thought out puzzles, and a streamlined interface that should appeal to many experience levels (wait…didn’t I just say that?). The game as a whole is engaging: the great graphics and wonderful sound design draw you into the gameplay, while the odd characters and interesting storyline keeps Sam & Max: Season One moving. The slightly demented sense of humor is appreciated, and most of the jokes work well without feeling forced. The controls are simple, although the driving mode is lacking and the basic controls don’t lend themselves to complex puzzles. An objective list would be nice, but the puzzles are uncomplicated enough where you don’t really need one. I’m not the biggest fan of adventure games, but I found Sam & Max: Season One fun and you should too. Since most of the tedium associated with adventure games has been removed, Sam & Max: Season One is a well crafted adventure game that will appeal to a wide audience.

Delicious 2 Deluxe

As the sequel to the popular Delicious Deluxe, the newly-released Delicious 2 Deluxe delivers even more fast-paced restaurant management fun. Featuring two game modes, all-new customers, and hours of family fun, Delicious 2 Deluxe is just the thing to satisfy your craving!

Words Kingdom Review

Words Kingdom, developed and published by MagicIndie Softworks.

The Good: Large board, campaign mode, random layouts increases replay value

The Not So Good: No keyboard input, limited game modes and no multiplayer, basic graphics

What say you? This Boggle game just doesn’t have the extras to compete with more refined titles: 4/8



MY POORLY WRITTEN INTRODUCTION

Words are important: without them, we would have to communicate in a series of grunts and nobody wants that (well, maybe Tim Allen). Not surprisingly, games have cashed in on the word extravaganza, from classic games like Scrabble and Boggle to modern computer software like Bookworm Adventures. The next entrant in this genre is Words Kingdom, where you must connect adjacent letters to form words. How will this game advance the genre to new realms of wordiness?



GRAPHICS AND SOUND

Words Kingdom is one of the more visually boring games I’ve played. While I like the level of quality in the 2-D art of the introductory movie and backgrounds, the rest of the game is very underwhelming. It’s just like someone stuck Scrabble letters up on the screen, as the game lacks any real special effects. The background and soldier positioned to the left of the game board are both static and, as a result, there is no liveliness in the game normally associated with this genre. It is a very utilitarian approach and Words Kingdom just doesn’t take full advantage of the PC platform. The background music is good, but, like the graphics, the rest of the sound effects are very basic. In all, the graphics and sound of Words Kingdom are disappointing and below the level of quality typical for puzzle games.



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Words Kingdom features both a campaign and single play modes with three minute time limits where you try to make as many words as possible. Letters must be adjacent, either horizontally, vertically, or diagonally. Each level in the campaign mode has a minimum score required to advance to the next level and it gives you something to shoot for rather than an arbitrary high score list: a nice feature. Words Kingdom does inject some replay value due to random layouts each time you play (difficulty increases by making you shoot for a higher score in successive levels), but the game doesn’t offer anything beyond the old Boggle board game. There are no special game modes and no multiplayer. Words Kingdom even uses the same time limit as Boggle. You do get higher points for using more difficult letters (like Scrabble) and there is a bonus system that will grant extra points for making a word of a specified length every once on a while, but these additions are minor. Words Kingdom even lacks keyboard input, as you must click on each letter in order to form the words. Most games allow you to start typing and it will figure out the connections automatically, but Words Kingdom resorts to tedious clicking instead of speedy computer assistance. This is basic computer gaming: something that might have worked as a free inclusion with Microsoft Windows 3.1, but not in today’s more advanced environment.



IN CLOSING

As you can tell from the length of this review, there isn’t much to Words Kingdom. It’s Boggle, which is fine, but the game doesn’t really add anything new. The features in the game are quite lacking: while I like the campaign with ever-increasing score requirements and the random boards, Words Kingdom is missing several key features like multiple bonus types, multiplayer, and different game modes. I don’t even mind the outdated graphics (I never put emphasis on the visuals, rather on the gameplay), but the gameplay is old and Words Kingdom doesn’t bring anything new to the table. This looks and feels like a game from ten years ago, and the rest of the word puzzle genre has passed Words Kingdom by. The foundation is solid and the game has the potential to be expanded into a better product, but as it stands now Words Kingdom lacks the features to compete against more developed games.

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The Rise of Atlantis

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Little Shop of Treasures

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Monarch: The Butterfly King

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Virtual Villagers 2: The Lost Children

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