Tablet Gaming Update - 6/8

So updates to tablet gaming off the android store...

GameLoft/Learning Center's Oregon Trail American Settler
Good news! The game now only occasionally suffers crash issues when loading.
Too bad bad news outweighed the good.

- Now you need to build multiple vet centers in order to grind ingredients to heal sick animals. Good thing this build, like the medical tent and workshop, is cheap and affordable.

- The sudden appearance of Premium buildings, which require an infusion of Premium currency in order to operate. Constant infusions. More and more this game is demanding Premium currency, which can be bought with real money, in order to avert disaster... what a bunch of crock.

The game has come down with a massive case of Premium currency addiction.
So far and I don't like it, not one bit.

GameLoft's Fantasy Town
For awhile the game was suffering slowdown slash brief freezing issues, and while it still suffers that a bit it's not as problematic anymore. The game however suffers from slow progression, requiring long hours to grind levels in this game, progression of your village a slow going chore.

Glu's Tavern Quest
As I reach upwards towards Level 30 unless New content appears it looks like the game is going to be all but done with only 24 hour recipes to grind in order to finish the game with as close to 100% completion as possible. Sad, but true.

More updates coming soon, stay tuned.

Broken Review? GameLoft's Men in Black 3

Is it me or is broken GameLoft games slowly becoming reviewing norm around here? First the glitchy failure to loads of My Little Pony, then the game update that turned Oregon Trail American Settler into a glitch ridden mess that now can't even load properly without crashing, and now this. This game couldn't even download properly! It suffered cataclysmic fail the instant I tapped its icon for the first time! How broken is that!

I would like to say that maybe it's just me, but given the broken nature of GameLoft Live and its useless friend system... if you can call whatever they have a system... to past failures reviewed on 3DS Life and PSP DLC Life episodes past? This is all par for the course as far as I am concerned but this... whatever.

For being dead on arrival Men in Black 3 gets a Jigglypuff aka a Zero. Stupid game.

WIPR : Gameloft's Oregon Trail American Settlers Review

I thought it was a pretty rare treat getting my hands on this game, a rare Gameloft release that, yes, while cloning a popular series (the Ville series from Zynga) it turned out to be a pretty good and addictive game all in all.

Leave it to GameLoft though to shoot themselves with their new game update, ruining what was a pretty good game in the process. Mind you it is not yet completely ruined, and can be fixed... but right now it makes me want the previous version of the game back.

Besides small cosmetic changes here and there several bigger changes have been made, starting with an annoying game synching which seems to crash the game half the Times you try to play it. What a tripe, especially since this was the rare game that played offline well, unlike My Little Pony that suffers constant crashes loading if it's not online.

Disasters are changed. While you have less devastating disasters you also can't use food, wood or money to minimize the damage... you also lose the three choice option for a short pay premium currency or suffer this effect. The worst is building damage has your buildings now burst into flames and you have to craft... get this... paper and fire to fix it. Paper and fire! Also it used to be you could use wood to repair buildings. Can't do that now.

I only just started grinding into this new version, but the rampant crash issue really burned my butter... reminds me of my stupid router... anyway more notes to come as a full review is coming soon. Stay tuned.

The Village Idiot : Gameloft`s Ice Age Village

When it comes to tablet gaming a lot of the reviews in these early days will be casual games. Yeah, I got The Bard`s Tale to review sure, but for the most part a big chunk of reviews is in the category of casual. Specifically Cafe World clones, Farmville clones, and the on the go quick gaming experience here and there... and the occasional T for Teen content Adults Only game. Seriously have we become so sensitive that games that used to easily get a T rating is considered too Adult even if said game has ZERO adult content? Boggles the mind.

But this is The Village Idiot, and as you guessed the name of the game is village building Sims and what better way to start then to take a trip to the marketing tool of DreamWorks Animation and Ice Age Village... actually there are far better trips we could be taking, I wad bring sarcastic.

Released by Gameloft and set in the world of Ice Age, but not tied to any particular movie or plot, you build a village... and that is that. There is no attempt to even create a story here, but then again even the best of these Sims lack a real narrative so cest la vie. Your progress is not hampered by limited energy that measures out how much progress you make each day, but you really don't discovery satisfied with progress you make either. You go through the motions, you build a village, and that is that.

The highlight of the game, if I dare call it that, is an unlockable theater that runs promotional trailers and clips of Ice Age Continential Drift, aka Ice Age 4. It's nice and all, even if a bit dated given how long ago that movie came out, but that gimmick is just not enough to recommend this... almost. If I am to recommend this one it would be to young children or for the casual gamer looking for a lite bite of village SIM without the grinding needed to play a good village SIM. It is a taste, but not a burden to grind through so it gives you the experience without the constant working at the game to progress. Some people thrive in games like that yes, but for those who don't you have Ice Age Village, a 3 out of 5.

Next time...

The first of two going native island Castaway Sims that had promise, but fell short somewhere along the way. First off we look at Pixonic`s Robinson, a slow grind of a game where true progress is hard to achieve, and the most difficult thing to unlock is human companionship on both the virtual and real sense.

Next time. Stay tuned.

WIPN : Jurassic Park Builder

WIPN, or "Work In Progress Notes", covers notes on games I am presently reviewing,both good and bad.

I was going to call this "Reviews In Progress Notes", but that would have been RIPN for short and it sounded like I was dissing the game already... which I am about to do by the way.

In this case the game seems to have a sometime failure to auto save when you leave. Usually as these are casual games you can pop in for a few minutes and pop out, the game auto saving as you leave. However the last two times I popped in I had to repeat two actions over that I finished off with last play. Thankfully your money reappears if your last act was doing a purchase or clearing land or doing research, and that is good as making money in this game takes FOREVER!

Just a few of my numerous complaints I will have in the full review coming soon.