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Tag: Town building »

Puzzle Craft 2 Review

+ Universal App - Designed for iPhone and iPad
By Jennifer Allen on September 17th, 2015
Our rating: starstarstarstarblankstar :: HEARTY FARE
Bigger and better is the key behind Puzzle Craft 2.
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Jurassic World: The Game Review

+ Universal App - Designed for iPhone and iPad
By Rob Rich on April 30th, 2015
Our rating: starstarstarstarblankstar :: THE PARK IS OPEN
Jurassic World: The Game is a worthwhile follow-up to the popular Park Builder.
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Garfield: Survival of the Fattest Review

+ Universal App - Designed for iPhone and iPad
By Jennifer Allen on April 16th, 2015
Our rating: starstarstarblankstarblankstar :: SAMEY GAME
Garfield: Survival of the Fattest is a freemium town building kind of game, and one you've seen before.
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DomiNations - Tips, Tricks, and Strategies for Being the Finest Leader

Posted by Jennifer Allen on April 8th, 2015

[Can't decide if DomiNations is the kind of thing you'll want to sink hours into? Check out our review.]

Have you just downloaded DomiNations and you're trying to figure out the best way to progress? Here are some helpful tips and tricks to give you the edge in battle.




General Tips

  • Explore! Explore so very much - Clear surrounding forests whenever you can. It gives you more room to develop your civilization but it also uncovers more animals for you to hunt, gold chests to loot, mines to excavate, and even ancient ruins. Those ruins are particularly great as they unlock crowns - the premium currency in this game.
  • Build new houses whenever you can - They get expensive but they mean you have 2 more citizens at your disposal each time. These then give you the means in which to complete more tasks at once, which inevitably leads to more profit for you!
  • Hunt everything as often as possible- It might seem like a waste of time pursuing bunnies and deer, but what you gain from them really adds up fast. It’s good to be busy.
  • Food and money are everything - Follow that ethos by maxing out your farms, mills, merchants, and markets at all times. They passively give you more of both resources, and do add up fast.
  • Keep your base neat - It’s easy to move stuff around and you’d be wise to keep everything connected via the road network, thereby giving you more gold. Walls are great for slowing down enemy attacks too.
  • Use crowns sparingly and intelligently - Only use them for long winded things rather than because you’re impatient. Having said that, if you know you’re going to be away from the game for an extended time, sometimes it’s handy to burn some crowns so you can accomplish a couple of things before you go.
  • Keep an eye on upgrade timers - Once any upgrade has less than five minutes to complete, you can boost its progress for free, finishing it off quickly. Use that often.
  • Raid smart - Raiding other players is the fastest way of earning resources but don’t rush into it. Wait till you’ve got sufficient powers of your own to fight back when they take revenge.

Pocket Ages Review

+ Universal App - Designed for iPhone and iPad
By Jennifer Allen on April 7th, 2015
Our rating: starstarhalfstarblankstarblankstar :: PRETTY BUT SHALLOW
Pocket Ages is a fairly formulaic freemium town builder, and not a very exciting one at that.
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Compass Point: West Review

+ Universal App - Designed for iPhone and iPad
By Rob Rich on March 26th, 2015
Our rating: starstarstarstarblankstar :: IT’S A WEST WORLD
Compass Point: West is a neat, western take on town building and defense.
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It Came From Canada: Compass Point: West

Posted by Jordan Minor on March 18th, 2015

If developers insist on making even more Clash of Clans clones, they’d better gin up a better excuse than “we just want a lot of money.” Fortunately for Compass Point: West, the Wild West setting actually proves to be pretty thematically appropriate for the genre. But is that a good enough reason to continue the gold rush? Find out in this edition of It Came From Canada!

Like I said, Compass Point: West's biggest coup is that the Clash of Clans template of building a town from scratch, populating it, defending it from invaders, and exploring uncharted parts of the map is basically the western cowboy pioneer spirit in a nutshell. So while the gameplay remains virtually unchanged, unlike other clones, it rarely feels like a nonsensical chore. Plus, the lush 3D graphics really sell players on the organic world. The texture of the ground, the swaying of the trees, and the flashes of the guns give the game that crucial, if cartoonish, frontier feel. True grit.

But Compass Point: West does offer slightly more than just a cowboy cover of Clash of Clans, even if all of its new ideas don’t exactly work. When enemies invade, players place hero units like the sheriff on top of buildings, which mixes up the standard tower defense and alters the nature of town design. To find new missions, players manually send out the Pony Express to reveal new parts of the map via charming animations. Finally, instead of recruiting offensive troops, players earn all their units - from cowboys to bankers - through a randomized playing card system. After completing missions, or by paying, players draw several cards and reap the rewards. On one hand this adds a neat element of chance, and units eventually revive after death so the stakes aren’t punishingly high. But taking away player choice also makes them more likely to depend on freemium currency, which is always dubious. At least players can choose to fuse units into stronger allies, so their strategic options aren’t entirely beyond their control.

At this point Clash of Clans clones are as ubiquitous as cowboy movies were in the 1950s. So if the idea of the two of them finally coming together sounds good to you, check out Compass Point: West when it launches everywhere soon.

Cars: Fast as Lightning - Tips, Tricks, Strategies, and Cheats For an Easy Ride

Posted by Nadia Oxford on October 23rd, 2014

Hey there, Stickers:
Want to know all about how impressed we were with Radiator Springs? Check out our Cars: Fast as Lightning review!

Cars: Fast as Lightning is a cute and fun app that combines racing and town-building with the charisma and marketability of Disney Pixar's Cars franchise. It's a friendly game, but that doesn't mean you can't use a few tips to help you make Radiator Springs shine again.


Starting Out


  • Complete quests to earn rewards - Quests queue up on the left side of the screen when you're not racing. Quests offer rewards like experience and coins, and they're a good way to get back on track if you've been meandering from task to task.
  • Pay attention to the difficulty meter before you race - Each car you engage in a race has a difficulty measuring from one to four. Make sure to race within your rank if you don't want to waste gas on a loss.
  • Place attractions on the track to earn more experience with races - Don't neglect putting attractions on race tracks. They earn you a bit of extra experience with every race, plus they make the joint look classy.

Master of Craft Review

+ Universal App - Designed for iPhone and iPad
By Nadia Oxford on June 30th, 2014
Our rating: starstarstarstarblankstar :: GOOD TIMES WITH WEAPONS
Master of Craft's blend of town-building and adventuring should keep aspiring weapon-shop owners happy for hours.
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TownCraft Review

+ Universal App - Designed for iPhone and iPad
By Nadia Oxford on April 29th, 2014
Our rating: starstarstarstarblankstar :: GO TO TOWN
TownCraft is now a universal app, and assembling a personal little town is as engaging as ever.
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Clash of Clans Receives Big Update, Adds Clan Wars and More

Posted by Tre Lawrence on April 10th, 2014
+ Universal App - Designed for iPhone and iPad
Our rating: starstarstarhalfstarblankstar :: LET SLIP THE CLANS :: Read Review »

Supercell has updated its wildly popular combat strategy game Clash of Clans with some new features.

Described as the "biggest update in Clash history" by its developer, the update adds no-risk clan wars with bonus loot, and clan castle renovation.

We had an opportunity to review the game a while back. Clash of Clans is available for free (with optional in-app purchases) on the App Store.

Greedy Grub Review

+ Universal App - Designed for iPhone and iPad
By Rob Rich on May 23rd, 2013
Our rating: starstarstarstarblankstar :: A CUTE CRAWL
Greedy Grub is certainly adorable, but it's not particularly ground-breaking.
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Fantasy Quest Review

Posted by Rob Rich on March 28th, 2013
+ Universal App - Designed for iPhone and iPad

Developer: GAMEVIL
Price: FREE
Version: 1.10
App Reviewed on: iPhone 5
Graphics / Sound Rating: starstarstarstarblankstar
Gameplay Rating: starstarstarhalfstarblankstar
Playtime Rating: starstarstarstarblankstar
Replay Value Rating: starstarstarstarblankstar

[rating:overall]

I’m just going to say it: Fantasy Quest has a slow burn to it. Not that it’s bad once things pick up, but until it reaches that point it can be a fairly significant grind. And not the fun sort of grind, either. Thankfully once players get past that initial roadblock they’ll find a free-to-play kingdom building RPG that isn’t all that easy to put down.

Fantasy Quest is essentially two kinds of free-to-play games in one. There’s the town building with all the expectant tax collection and land expansion, and the energy-reliant RPG-ing with a number of different characters and quests. Both feed into each other, of course, with buildings created in town effecting what characters can be hired for a team and goods earned from slaying goblins and such necessary for expanding the town. It’s all fairly simple in practice but there’s also has a sort of refined elegance to the way each aspect plays off of the other, as well as how they’re both very accessible without being mindless.

The kingdom building aspects are mostly typical of a lot of free-to-play games these days with the exception of being able to raid other players’ settlements. Not that this is a new idea, but the way it’s implemented is pretty clever: stamina is needed to attack specific buildings and each hit (damage determined by the questing team, surrounding buildings, etc) coughs up various resources, including Valor that acts as a kind of special currency. What I find refreshing about it is the fact that being raided doesn’t incite rage. Sure I might lose a few coins, but I hardly lose enough to get mad over and raiding other players can more than make up for lost income.

The actual RPG-like quests can be entertaining as well, although they don’t really pick up until after a third party member is acquired. It can be incredibly slow going at first but once that threshold is passed players will find themselves with a competent group of adventurers, each with their own sets of equipment to manage and special skills to learn. It’s a little unfortunate that there isn’t a larger selection of basic units (only one of each type can be bought with non-premium currency) but it isn’t exactly a game breaking detail. A more significant (and literally game breaking) problem is the occasional crash or server hang-up while in the middle of a fight. Again, not so bad when all that’s really lost is a little time and some energy that replenishes at a fairly generous rate, but it can still be irritating.

Fantasy Quest feels a bit like a slow “me too” kind of fantasy freemium game at first, but it really does come into its own once players progress past the intro phase. It’s definitely a good time so long as one has the patience.

The Croods Review

+ Universal App - Designed for iPhone and iPad
By Jennifer Allen on March 19th, 2013
Our rating: starstarhalfstarblankstarblankstar :: VERY SHALLOW
It's tough not to be cynical when confronted by such an uninspired freemium town building sim such as this. It hardly uses the movie license well.
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Playmobil Pirates Revew

+ Universal App - Designed for iPhone and iPad
By Rob Rich on December 21st, 2012
Our rating: starstarstarstarblankstar :: CUTE CORSAIRS
Looks like LEGO isn't the only kids toy that can make the transition to video game form.
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