The Great Tournament

The great tournament is a choice of game set in a low fantasy-medieval setting.

The writing, which is the most essential part of the game can be considered somewhat solid. The story has no real twist or any other kind of element that would stand out. The choices given to the player are medium in quantity and mostly do not posses the quality to make the decision a moral challenge for the player. I only relay had to think about what to do in 2 or 3 situations. The problem is that the players gets the feeling that no matter what choice he makes the story does generally continue on the same path. Many times it is also possible to play down all choices and see what happen which further increases the feeling that the choices are only partly influencal. Best example for this is the training before the tournament when you can train on all 4 fields instead of choosing only one or two.

The Greatest Showman

My main problem with the film is the main character of Barnum and it is not bad acting but bad writing what I am talking about. From the first moment on I could not put a tag on the motives of this character and as the film developed this only got worse.
It starts of pretty usual as a poor kid witnessing how he and his father are treated like dust, not happy with his status in the society but also not really sure why this social status is such a big deal. So Barnum ends up fantasizing, wanting to be more and looking forward to taking matters into his own hands.

Lords of the Realm 3: the game that should have been the addon to Lords of the realm 2

Lords of the realm 3 is mainly regarded as a unworthy successor of the 2 installment in the series. But I think a lot of this believe feeds from the situation that LOR 3 did not fulfill the high expectations set in it after the good work of the 2 title. Which does not mean that LOR3 is a bad game. This situation of unfulfilled expectations making it difficult to judge the game by its real value. A problem not present for this evaluation as I played LOR 3 before the 2 part.

Decision 2, Decision 3 and Decision medieval. Why sometimes "less is more" also applies to computer games

Mies van der Rohe a prominent figure in the modern architecture movement -a movement formed by the architects who desire to renounce the use of useless ornament and incorporate new emerged materials in their design- once claimed "less is more". From this origin the "less is more" statement found its way also in the daily used language of contemporary times (or at least in the German language) and in other forms of life-style like minimalistic living.

This statement also stands true for the decision online game and its sequels.

Decision plays in a small town overrun by zombies. The player takes on the role of a survivor who decides to become a one man army and wipe the city clean of the zombie hordes. To achieve this goal the character reinstalls towers which increase the safety of the area, recaptures factories which give resources and manually kills zombies in the dozens by handpicking some of the offered weapons and skills presented by the game.

The Founder

I can not remember being so angry at a film in my whole life. And I am sure I am not alone with may thoughts about this films.

If someone has to sum up the film in on scentence it would be something like "The founder is the real story of how the today in the whole world known fast food chain started out". Especially the first scenes where the brothers who founded the first McDonald's are introduced and where it is shown how they perfected their ideas and never gave up even after some failures are really good. But that scenes include pretty much all the positive felling the film gives the audience.

War Cube

Its not easy being a cube and being a war cube is even worse, but you know what is the worst of all, that you are sent back to an old kingdom, Your Old Kingdom! By mister I am so funny narrator and everybody knows you and that you were the king. But given the fact that in this kingdom everyone is a cube and the fighting makes great fun and the fact that you are kind of a king, even if your mighty kingdom is run down by barbaric red cubes, it is not that bad.

That is kind of how the game of war cube starts, a small little combat game full of humor and all kind of medieval stuff. As already stated the game has good humor but I see the danger of this element becoming too powerful. In this state of the game the humor is hold back to an agreeable amount but if the game is going to define itself just through its humor, I may have to give it a bad review in the future.

Prison Architect

I am an architecture student so when i found out this game existed I immediately bought it because İ said architect and I wanted to become an architect. And I was astonished the core game mechanic combines perfectly with some thoughts and processes of an architects design work. For example the designing of the user’s movements how and when they move where and way and which corridors are more often used and which corridors are dead corridors. Or the main usage design and zoning which leads to deciding which areas are going to be prisoner free and which are going to be for visitors and then of course this zones need to be more secured and easier accessible, but also richer furnished and so on. All together it can be played as the simplified and fun added version of how an architect really works and achieving this alone is a huge success in my opinion.

Age of war 2

Age of war 2 works the same as the first part of the game as Age of war 2 fully transports the good working age change system from age of wars. With fully new 7 stages the game has definitely evolved. Factions like the Egypt, Spartans and fantasy elements in the medieval stage are added. Which all together give the game a good, improved, new look.

Sadly the good balancing of the first part did not make it into the second part. All different difficulties can be won in about 4-5 ages. And it is not the point of balancing to give the computer players more resources and XP points. Better would have been to teach the computer players the key mechanics of the game like the upgrading system, the tank/anti-tank situation and the evolving mechanic.

Age of War

Age of war is the oldest browser game I could remember playing and it was awesome. But now a decade later I played it again to review it and I have to admit it is still awesome. But mainly due to the fact that the nostalgia feeling is to xxxx high. Still while playing it i found out that it is one of the best balanced strategy browser games of its kind.

But to start from the bottom Age of war is 2D, base strategy browser game where the aim is to recruit enough soldiers to destroy the enemy base on the other side of the map. To do this the player can chose between melee fighters, range units and tank type units. Throughout the game the ages change and while the player is fighting on dinosaurs and knights in the first part of the game in the later ages tanks and supersonic warrior take control over the battlefield. To give the player at least something to do apart from clicking the solider buttons, also special abilities are present which again change over time from an erupting volcano to an airstrike.

Tropico 3

The first few hours into Tropico 3 were difficult for me as a Tropico 2 veteran. Because in Tropico 2 the for this game tailor made pirate scenario was a great purpose giving and (building up economy) motivating part as ships need to be prepared and raids need to be organized. I felt a bit lost after the start into the new Tropico universe as I did not know what goal to go for and in what direction to develop my island.

A bit into the game I realized that this game has a good branching system according to different development opportunities on different island. Like farming and farm good development on big fertile islands, mining in the resource full islands, fishing and oil industry on island with a long shoreline. Moreover a good interconnection between different game mechanic like military, education and foreign relation is present.

The 3rd part of the series is still faithful to the Tropico charm where all your citizens have different names, backgrounds, needs, views and wishes. That makes the new electing system that more fun and makes it a good diplomatic addition to the game. Moreover the citizen happiness needs are again solved very well but I have to say that I feel the micro balancing was done better in Tropico 2.

Awesome Seaquest

Awesome Seaquest is a real time strategy and upgrade browser game where you have to fight you battels on the sea and upgrade your "Arch" to unlock new units, get money, get research points and dock your unused ships.
Especially the late game phase gets boring because of a balancing problem. That occurs If you have 20 ships up to level 8 and one or two repair bots (which you will have after about half the battels). Then you are nearly invincible and the game gets useless. But prior to that bad ending phase the upgrading, leveling, money and research points gathering system works quit well as it is motivating to see everything come together.

A better battel system would help the game a great deal as the battels either requires no user interaction at all or just the clicking of one button in the right time. Other than that the 90 seconds "battel-pause" system is well thought out and something new as I have not come across other games that use this system. Unfortunately also here no real brainpower is needed (which is but acceptable as it is only the technical money collecting part of the game). But all together that leads to a game with no tactical depth what so ever and the easiest straight forward tactic will win the game for you.

Kokowääh

I have to admit that I am emotionally quiet confused after this film and I started to write this review in the second I finished the film so i do not forget what I want to say. The problem now is that I feel I am not nearly good enough in writing to fully express what I think about this film but I have to try it.

The Internship

The initial idea of the film is that two guys in the prime of their life (between 30 and 40) get an internship at google where they have to put up with "modern" young adults and all kind of "modern" stuff like internet, apps, instagram... And the film succeeds in using most of the subject that comes out of this comical situation to turn it into a quit good film. But the initial story idea which is phenomenal funny in my opinion turns into a worn down, often used story line where the underdogs built a team and the group has to compete in a (ala hunger games, or as it is said in the film "mental hunger games") competition. And in the end they magically win it even though it is often pointed out that they have no chance to succeed or what so ever. But all together the story is still good for a film with heart and a message which is transported to the audience in a comfortable way. Something many films do not succeed in at all.