Megaplex Madness for 99 Cents

Big Fish Games has Megaplex Madness: Now Playing for 99 cents good through May 31, 2009. Use the following coupon code: MEGA99.

About Megaplex Madness: Now Playing:

Restore the historic Bowmont Theater as the first act of your mad dash to bring cinematic excitement back to Movieville! Purchase ailing theaters all over town and return them to their former glory. Keep customers happy with quick service and delicious concessions! Become a Megaplex Expert to gain access to fun arcade mini-games, and master levels to unlock theater repairs and upgrades. Get caught up in the Megaplex Madness today!

PC Game Review: Virtual Families

Virtual Villagers have captured the hearts of many players as each one takes on a personality of his or her own. Players also venture around the village to learn new skills and make discoveries. No wonder many have high expectations for Virtual Families thinking it’d be a home-based version of virtual villagers. For the most part, it is, but not quite as addicting as the island counterparts.

The game opens with adopting a new family member. Though you can choose which person to adopt, you can only view one possibility at a time. Either reject or adopt. There’s no going back. This limiting feature could use improvement by allowing players to flip through a few people before deciding.

After adopting, the person checks out his new home. You can have several games going at once, but the home is the same in every single one. The land never changes in Virtual Villagers, but the space is much smaller in Virtual Families. It doesn’t take long to feel like you’ve seen it all.

Ding ding. You’ve got mail. Be ready to see a potential mate through a computer dating service. Either reject or marry the person. The more often you reject a mate, the longer it will take before another one comes through. It pressures the player to pick a mate either on the first or second try or else the little person will become lonely and depressed. Email comes in from time to time. Sometimes it’s spam, a note from the people to you, a letter from a relative or good news such as extra cash. The email notes could be better — they’re cheesy.

The heads of household have careers ranging from domain buyers (nice name for domain squatter) and writers to vitamin maker and fashion designer. They begin at level one in their careers. The more they work, the higher their position and earnings potential. Jobs provide the bulk of the cash used to buy groceries, add ons, clothing, accessories, repair kits and room makeovers.

The families can also earn money by auctioning off collectibles found in their yard — a clever way to incorporate collections. Virtual Villager fans know too well how hard it is to complete collections. The collection part (coins, nuts and twigs, bugs and picture) works better in Virtual Families because it doesn’t take as long, but it’s not a blow off either.

The game works in real time like Virtual Villagers and again it means playing the game in spurts. Virtual Families doesn’t require as much maintenance as Virtual Villagers. In fact, all you need is five or ten minutes once or twice a day. This helps those who have busy schedules with no time to play games. At first, it’s hard because you want to know what can happen. With fewer places to discover and puzzles to solve, it gets easier.

The game, however, turns frustrating when you have to spend the five minutes waiting for the people to throw away trash, pick up a weed or dump loose socks into the laundry room. If you try picking them up to speed the pace, they’ll drop whatever they’re carrying. If one says he’s about to send an email to the player, forget picking him up and dropping him in front of the computer.

The limiting number of puzzles to solve is disappointing. For example, there’s a locked shed. You’ll have to figure out how to unlock it and what to do with the stuff inside. It doesn’t take much time or days to complete the majority of the tasks or puzzles.

Humor abounds in Virtual Families. Maybe not quite as much as Virtual Villagers. The baby making ritual accompanied with kissing will make you smile every time. The people’s illogical movements may annoy, but they’re also funny. For example, you put a person in the bedroom near the door. She’ll walk toward the bed and turn around to exit the room to do something else. Why doesn’t she just walk straight out the door instead of deeper into the bedroom? When you catch a kid digging a hole, check out the caption.

At first, it’s upsetting that people don’t live pass 60 to 65 (C’mon! That’s young!), it actually helps. By that age, the kids are gone and they’re moving so slow. So have them pick up a weed and then take a break while they do it. If you exit the game and come back in, the weed remains. After they die, you can adopt one of their children to take over. If they don’t have kids, you’re out of luck.

Plenty, maybe too many, trophies are available for the earning. The list is so long that it gets old to keep checking it. The game should post the completed items at the end of the list so players can quickly see what they have yet to earn.

Virtual Families offers a decent experience that won’t take up much of your time. But it won’t live up to the expectations of those who have played Virtual Villagers. The game rates about an average — not the best, but not the worst. The free one-hour trial gives you enough time to decide if it’s yay or nay.

Download the game from your favorite site

• Big Fish Games



• Playfirst



• Reflexive’s Gamecenter Solution