Three Reasons to buy Virtual Villagers 4: The Tree of Life

1. Relatively Low Cost
2. Long play time
3. Fun characters

Three Reasons to avoid buying Virtual Villagers 4: The Tree of Life

1. Slow Pace
2. Simple Graphics
3. Gets Boring Fast

“Virtual Villagers 4: The Tree of Life” is fourth in the series of “Virtual Villagers” Games. In this one the chief of Isola sends out a band of five selected villagers to discover why life seems to be fading in and around the island. This tiny band of explorers soon find a huge dying tree, decide it is the “tree of life” and settle near it to build a village and try and heal the dying tree.

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As in the other three installments “The Tree of Life” is a role playing game. The player literally manages all aspects of the tiny villager’s lives, from what they learn to what food they gather and even who they have babies with. Set a villager to a task and they will continue it until it is done, you set them to a new task, or they decide they can’t get it done. Neat thing about this game it is the characters continue to grow and function even when the player is not interacting with them. It is a true “real-time” game. There are three paces to the game: slow, normal or fast.

To win the game the villagers must heal the tree. They also must survive. So they learn skills as they go along like how to weave fishing nets, make soap and so on. Of course they must gather or grow food, build huts and so on as well.

You must solve 16 puzzles in the game to allow the villagers to cure the tree. It is these puzzles that make up the main sequence of game play.

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The graphics are good without being exciting and to establish a good background and context for the game play. The sound is typical with lots of faux tiki music and special effect sounds as well. While the sound doesn’t detract from the game play, it doesn’t add much to it either.

If you are expecting a “Civilization IV” type of game for $19.95 American you are going to be disappointed. This game is more like the poor cousin of “The Sims” but not as good. If you enjoyed the other installments of the series you are likely to like this one as well, but to others, the game play is long and boring and ultimately unfulfilling.

You can try the game at this link:

http://www.nielsbauergames.com/TVManager.html

Game Review Summary

If you’ve always wanted to own your own zoo, you’ll love this game. A letter arrives from your grandfather telling you he has provided you with a zoo to maintain. He wants it be the number one zoo. Your job is to care for the animals and upgrade the zoo.

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Three Reasons to buy Simplz Zoo

- You are looking for a family game that provides hours of fun.
- You enjoy entrepreneurial games in this case managing a zoo.
- You enjoy matching puzzle games.

Three Reasons to avoid buying Simplz Zoo

- You prefer games with a short time span rather than lengthy games.
- You are a serious gamer who wants a challenging game.
- You prefer target shooting games rather than empire building games.

Full Game Review

Game Play

The game begins with a letter from your Grandfather who wants you to carry on with his dream of making Seagull Park Zoo, a number one zoo. All you have is a lion to start with who would like to be surrounded by more animals. Your job is to attract visitors by purchasing more animals for the zoo.

The game works on two levels. The first level is buying animals and putting your attractions where you want them. The second level is making sure the animals and the zoo has enough food and resources. This involves playing a matching puzzle where you have a grid and you have to match the same 3 objects together such as coins and food but there is a catch; you must make sure you have the amount it asks you. This leads you onto different rounds until you can afford to go upgrade your position until you are the best ranked zoo. It is highly addictive.

Graphics

The 2D animations are simplistic but striking on screen and easy to see. The colorful animation style graphics will appeal to children.

Sound

The background music is gentle and there are options to alter the level of noise. There are entertaining sound effects when you win each round.

Creativity and Innovation

Simplz zoo is very creative because it takes a simple idea of owning a zoo and gives it an extra edge with the extra puzzles within the game. The fact you have to earn food and resources on the quick fire matching puzzle games make the game innovative and more interesting. The variety stops the player becoming easily bored. The fact you can take the timer off the matching games means it is accessible for the whole family.

The game is good value for money because it is a game which will provide hours of fun for the whole family. This is a game I would consider buying because I love business games and this one also has matching puzzles making it even more entertaining.

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“Join Scarlett, the feisty star of Farm Frenzy 3, as she puts robots to work on her land. Can you keep up with the latest advancements in technology as you grow crops, feed animals, collect produce and manufacture goods? Of course you can! Just don’t let the zany new animations distract you from the task at hand. Featuring 90 levels packed with never-before-seen characters, buildings and challenges, Farm Frenzy 3: American Pie promises a bumper crop of fun! ”

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What do you get when you cross SimCity with Tetris? Mother Gaia Studio provides an intriguing answer in City Rain. With a disappointingly limited demo, it’s difficult to tell exactly what to expect out of the full version. What you can expect, however, is an unusual mix of city planning and split-second decision-making that makes the demo at least worth a look.

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As mayor, your goal is to create a thriving city. The usual city-building conventions apply: Supply power, meet your citizens’ needs, manage your budget. What’s different is that all the buildings fall from the sky. Your citizens don’t mind this for some reason, as long as you don’t destroy existing buildings with the new ones. This is generally an easy task until curveballs get thrown your way. Trash is the most common adversary, often appearing just when your last landfill (the only place you can drop trash without penalty) is full. The unexpected appearance of city blocks (shaped like Tetris blocks) also complicates things, as well as the occasional tornado.

Unfortunately, after twenty minutes of play, City Rain completely runs out of steam.

With three difficulty settings that only adjust the speed at which everything falls, there’s very little to keep you playing City Rain once you’ve figured out how to make a city that doesn’t implode upon itself. The videos on Mother Gaia Studio’s website for the game promise petitions and a larger playing field. But since the demo is available only in Flash and not as a standalone file (as the full version would be), there’s no way to tell what’s included or even how it runs other than by its list of features. City Rain’s demo is so limited that it doesn’t offer a clear picture of what the full version is like.

What can be determined from the demo is that there are some nice visuals. The buildings tend to look a bit too similar to each other, but other than that, there’s not much to fault in the art department. The sound is a little too bland, however. The one musical track is generic easy listening, while the audio is little more than two or three sound effects and the advisors’ messages in accented English. The Brazilian developers don’t quite have a proper grasp of the English language – which is worst of all in the endings, which include such mangled messages as, “The people disapproves your administration.” None of these make the game any more tempting to buy.

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With a selling price of only $9.95, City Rain might be worth buying. It’s a good concept with an acceptable presentation. The big problem is that the demo only demonstrates a concept, with only the vaguest example of how it’ll be presented in the full version. Without any sort of baseline to judge exactly how the final version plays, buying this game is totally a gamble. For that reason, City Rain gets a 2 out of 5.

Romopolis by Lonely Troops is a tedious real estate management game which only distinguishes itself from games like Build-a-Lot and even the designer’s own Townopolis with its setting in ancient Rome. If you’ve played Roman town-building games like the Caesar series or CivCity: Rome, you’ll find none of their charm or difficulty here. The buildings look okay and the game does present a challenge as it progresses, but its presentation is so lackluster that even the novelty of Roman architecture can’t save it.

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Your goal in each level of campaign mode is to meet whatever needs the unseen Emperor has in mind, from X number of buildings to Y amount of civic advancement to Z amount of denarii, or a combination of the above. There are also medals and trophies for accomplishing special goals, and some levels impose time limits. You receive a steady income from residential buildings such as houses and apartments, and generally they will need things like shrines and gardens to generate happiness and yield more revenue. With a limited number of plots per level, a lot of careful building and sometimes even rebuilding is necessary to win. It’s not a bad concept, but it’s been done before – and far better.

The most striking detail about Romopolis is its sheer lack of action. In the secluded suburban setting of the superior Build-a-Lot this is forgivable. But in a Roman town supposedly full of people, it’s jarring to see such a static landscape animated only with ugly clock and damage icons. Worse, there’s simply not much to do at the beginning of each level. All you can really do is build small houses until your resources grow. And the ostensibly helpful tutorial messages actually hamstring you if you haven’t built exactly as the designers intended. All of this combined with soporific Roman-style musak makes for an excruciatingly dull experience.

Romopolis doesn’t help its cause with its horrendously lazy presentation. Sure, the game’s Roman, but was it really necessary to use a white Times New Roman font for everything in the game? Or wash out the already drab colors with a brown marble border? Or offer medals and trophies which apparently serve no purpose other than to keep gamers busy? Or list campaign levels as nothing more than numbered circles around a static shot of a Roman city? There are so many things that could’ve made Romopolis easier to play and look at, and none of them were included.

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Romopolis is nothing more than an incompetent clone designed to piggyback on the success of superior real estate management games. The hour-long demo is 60 minutes of your life you’ll never get back, and the idea of anyone actually buying the full version is less likely than Caesar rising from the dead and singing showtunes. For foisting this game on innocent gamers, Lonely Troops should be sacked by barbarian hordes. Romopolis gets a 1 out of 5.

Summer Session is a social interaction game. Spend the summer attending classes, interacting with others, and looking forward to the weekend. Make the right choices to increase the chance of getting a date.

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Spend a summer at school attending classes and interacting with local students. Meet and greet the new roommate. Run into new classmates on the way to class. Meet the new teacher of biology. Talk to a few more students. Finally, set the schedule for the rest of the week, in anticipation of the weekend.

Summer Session focuses on a story about a guy stuck in summer school. He is searching to increase his popularity and obtaining a girlfriend. Passing biology is a minimal goal even though classes seem to take up the majority of the time.

The Summer Session characters are drawn from standard stock on a two-dimensional background. The displayed backgrounds are minimal. Only used to distinguish where the character actually is. Nothing stands out. There is no action other than the occasional classmate popping up out of nowhere. The action is described in text at the bottom of the screen rather than in the game.

Summer Session choices are limited to a very few. The most these decisions do is change the feeling of the classmate. A right decision increases the character’s popularity. A wrong decision decreases the character’s popularity. The more popularity, the more likely the character is to get a date and survive summer school.

Conversations are carried out between characters in a text box on the bottom of the screen. This leaves the character’s voices to the imagination. Interest is quickly lost in the vast amount of reading done by a very simple conversation.

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Most of the sound is regulated to a very simplistic strip of musical chords. This occurs only when the main character interacts with another student. The only good thing about this is there is no annoying background music to distract the player or alleviate the excruciating boredom that occurs from Summer Session’s reading text.
Setting the weekly schedule ahead of time speeds Summer Session up drastically. However, there is only one option available for each day. The planning stops on the weekend and sticks with its limited choices. Again the lack of movement in this realm limits this game, severely. While some of the options such as playing video games or partying sound like fun, they, in fact, are regulated to a few words and a background change.

Summer Session is an extremely shallow game. The demo is extremely short and only allows for a seven day play. It’s choices are extremely limited and only affect the character’s social standings. Classes are a useless waste of time. Only allowing one choice for each weekday scheduling is very poor. Even the story line is simple and shallow.
I will not be buying this game.

Yummy Drink Factory is one of the best multi-tasking games that has been put out in quite some time. Your character starts out by taking a wrong turn and stumbles upon a creepy coffee shop. You stop to get directions and decide to order a warming drink-a “double-chocolate mocha, dry, extra-hot, fat-free milk and no whipped cream”. Your character is a not-so nice young lady with a bad attitude.

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Because of your character’s ill behavior and bad manners, the old lady says “you will pay for your evil ways” and the spell is cast. Your character finds herself on Fairytale Island and she must travel the land and serve drinks to the villagers. If she doesn’t learn humility, she will have to stay on the island forever.

There are three levels of playing. The easy level will provide you with 20 different recipes, medium has 28 recipes and the difficult level has 38 recipes that you will need to learn and prepare for customers. But not to worry, if you don’t remember all of the ingredients, a recipe book is at hand with step-by-step directions on the preparations. Gems are also collected to purchase upgrades at the general store.
Each day at your shop, customers who are child-like characters that resemble anything from fairies to miniature witches, will place their orders. Sometimes the order has only one drink but many times they have multiple requests. The drinks range from simple coffee-flavored hot chocolate to slime-flavored topped with green warts. Stars along the bottom of the ticket will count down while you prepare the drinks.
The start of the game has several options that you can play. The story mode includes the storyline that lasts 50 days. Other game modes include the freedom modes that you can either play using the game recipes or recipes you have created. The create and share mode allows you to create custom recipes and share them with your friends.

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The graphics are cartoonish without much animation. When the order is complete, the customer simply disappears. The sound has “fairytale” type music playing in the background. Other than the customers greeting you with “hello”, this music is basically the only sounds of the game. During play, the music isn’t noticeable and sound isn’t required to play the game so it can be turned down so as not to be distracting.
The creativity and innovation are typical for this type of game. However, the game has gone a few steps above by creating some very interesting recipes and allowing you to create your own specialties. The extra modes make the game more interesting and worth the purchase. There are a lot of options and game play for the price of the full version. I rate this game a 4 out of 5.

After playing Virtual Farm by Alawar Entertainment, I have found it to be quite unrealistic and a game that quickly becomes boring. Personally, I did not like it; I enjoy games that are a challenge, and this game was far too simple. To give it a rating, I would say it is no better than a 2/5 for children, a 1/5 for everyone else.

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The game is far too stereotypical and idyllic with very little creativity or innovation. Seeing as I live on a farm, I think the game designers know very little about farming and have instead developed a game more along the lines of home gardening; farmers do not grow grass, they grow hay as any 3-year-old living on or near a farm can tell you. Naturally the main character is the stereotypical large pot-bellied farmer in plaid overalls and straw hat that waddles around with gardening tools and equipment. There are hardly any setbacks as you play the game, and unless you forget to do something or you make a mistake everything will turn out perfectly. This game has been built from a basic template that has been used by many, many other games, and has no innovation or creativity other than being set in a large garden. I was surprised I did not have to chase any troublesome garden gnomes away; it would have probably been more interesting and engaging.

The game does keep the player involved, through pure micromanagement that soon becomes tedious. The game play is quite weak and the market set-up is quite confusing to understand how to work properly. When one has become tired of the managing the “farm” and has learned what all the commands are, the game loses all appeal.
The graphics are very fluid but are quite simple, and after the initial impression wears off they do nothing to help the weak game play keep the game interesting. The game has very simple and generic sound effects, that like the graphics do nothing to keep your attention on the game.

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Overall, the game was too stereotypical, too simple, too unrealistic, too generic and becomes boring quickly.

However, despite all my criticisms, Virtual Farm would be a very good game for children, as it requires some skill with organizing, planning, and managing; things children often enjoy in simple games and can learn from games like this. I know that if I had just been beginning to play games, this would be a fun game that I could learn some basic skills from and apply to other games and situations. For someone looking for a new game that can capture a child’s attention for a little while and teach the child some basics in the process, I would recommend that you consider this game. Anyone over the age of 10 or 11, should consider this to be a 1/5 and move on.

Positech Games has made some interesting simulation games in only two years of operation. It’s therefore somewhat puzzling that they would make Oval Office and then license it to Zero G Games. Unlike its predecessor, the critically-acclaimed political simulator Democracy 2, Oval Office only allows you to run the United States while offering only minor cosmetic changes. Its developer has even admitted on his own forums that “If you are here, and reading this, and you liked the OO [Oval Office] demo, you might as well buy Democracy 2.” Is it still a good game? Yes. Is it worth buying at a three dollar discount? Not really.

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The game puts you in charge of the Republican party by default, but you can change it or the opposition party to anything from the Democratic party to the People’s Liberation party. After the game finishes loading (and showing you one of its many interesting political quotations), you’re presented with a fairly realistic projection of America after the 2008 elections: There’s a large debt, heavy pollution, hospital overcrowding, and most voters hate your party. Your job is to change all that, or at least get re-elected. You’re also inundated with more buttons than an airplane cockpit. The display is divided into two sections: The inner grid containing voter demographics, and a pie chart with tons of issues and policies. Everything in the display is connected somehow, and each policy must be fine-tuned so that all of them annoy the public as little as possible. If you don’t have enough support by the elections, you’re forced out of office.

While the intricate connections of all the issues and policies result in an incredibly detailed simulation of how policies affect voters and issues, the presentation is very sparse and heavily lacks in polish. The primary screen looks okay, but all the icons look randomly thrown onto their respective areas, resulting in a sloppy look. The policy screens require going to the upper-right corner and clicking the X button to get out of, when an “Enact” or “Cancel” button might have been less awkward. Some well-rendered representations of voters appear in the Focus Group, but that’s the height of Oval Office’s special effects. The audio is a bit better, with suitably presidential-sounding music and sound effects that don’t grate on the ears.

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Despite the questionable marketing tactics, Oval Office is as playable as its full-featured counterpart. While it has a steep learning curve and a dry presentation, it’s also quite compelling to see how your policies affect the country. But be warned: It neither has the flexibility nor the patch support of Democracy 2. Because of this, while I give Oval Office a 3 out of 5 for gameplay that will glue you to your monitor if you can stomach the bland visuals, I don’t recommend buying it. As the developer suggests, try the demo, but buy Democracy 2 instead.

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