Railroad Ink Challenge
This is my first review, and I have added this up front as I fear I have rambled.
I have only played under 20 games, I have mixed feelings about this version. I have played expansions on Board Game Arena, and I am still trying to sort out what I think advantages and disadvantages are verses what is just different.
Pros:
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I like the buildings aspect of the expansion and their functions.
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There are a set of goals to meet to provide additional scoring, I have not figured out how to master these.
– Real player with 209.1 hrs in game
Read More: Best City Builder PvP Games.
Addictive, puzzle-like play. This is a good implementation of a good tabletop game (and in fact may be better than the original game, where it was always somewhat problematic to scribe the complex network designs readably).
Yes, there is a BGA version, but this app allows for offline play, supports solo play, and includes the Challenge tokens and special locations on the board, each of which adds a level of beneficial complexity needed for the original game, which was a little too simple.
Hoping they get the supplements out, starting with the original blue/red sets, but it’s already quite good. That’s just improve the replayability.
– Real player with 134.9 hrs in game
As Far As The Eye
This game was incredibly brutal until I discovered the Council building and the Knowledge resource, and then it became an incredibly fair and deep city-building/roguelike/4x game.
The biggest problem with the game is there isn’t a good reference for how all the mechanics work. I think it will be better once an online wiki is available.
My tips for a winning initial game:
Opening:
1. Get 40 wood and build a sawmill. Assign one of your workers to be a gatherer and gather wood. Later, when you don’t need wood, switch this worker to be a food gatherer and build a fruit hut for 80 (you can do this earlier if you get a 4th worker). You should have enough rations for this, and the carpenter/fruit gatherer jobs share the first 3 levels.
– Real player with 26.9 hrs in game
Read More: Best City Builder Building Games.
I too believe that this is a nice game if you enjoy roguelike games.
When I first saw the list of buildable buildings I was worried the game wouldnt have much depth, as there are exactly 15 buildings which can be built.
So .. I was worried I will just figure out how things work and lose interest in the game after a few days, because I found some safe winning strategy.
Luckily it was different!
The overall difficulty is quite high. After the tutorial campaign you get to play 4 tribes with increasing difficulty (you have to start with the lowest difficulty tribe). However, even that tribe took me quite some effort to win with.
– Real player with 25.2 hrs in game
Malmyr
I stumbled across this recently, and have been enjoying working through the campaign. I give this a thumbs up primarily because of the enthusiastic and helpful developer responses to questions I had, and I feel I got my moneys worth of entertainment value. These guys deserve some more attention for their efforts. It is a game that I “like” but don’t “love”.
Malmyr offers some quite different mechanics to what you would normally expect, though not all of those are necessarily positive things (it is very mouse clicky) and can take some getting used to. Kind of revealing is the lack of a lets play series out there - people tend to bounce off it after a few hours I think. Fundamentally the game is more of a puzzler than a true building game - space is limited and the randomly generated tiles can require some planning before you commit to building. I am hoping to finish the campaign, I am always a sucker for trying to “finish” a game. I haven’t tried the sandbox mode though I may give that a quick shot once I knock off the last two missions, we shall see. I just have too many other games that are begging for my time and this just doesn’t have that magic X factor or depth of strategy tp keep coming back to.
– Real player with 77.2 hrs in game
Read More: Best City Builder Building Games.
Malmyr is THE game you’ve been waiting for a long time! What a pleasant surprise!
Malmyr is the perfect mix of real-time strategy and puzzle game. Because in Malmyr building your city is not made as easy as in other building games. Instead, you have to ensure an always sufficient flow of raw materials through increasingly complex road systems. but malmyr always remains clear, fair and, above all, relaxing. Relaxation is the perfect word to describe malmyr. You have no time pressure, you can correct mistakes at any time without losing your progress.
– Real player with 23.8 hrs in game
Mint Works
Language errors all over the place.I found the tutorial not very clear, especially for such a simple game. I have only played the solo mode so far and the displayed AI move is so fast I cant work out what is happening most of the time. Gradually I am getting used to it but this implementation is much harder to follow than it needs to be. Layout of the screen is also in need of improvement.
Cannot recommend at its full cost at this stage.
– Real player with 0.8 hrs in game
A nice, ultra-lean spin on the worker placement genre. I haven’t had the chance to play the online yet, but the solo game is pretty challenging so far and goes extremely fast. Each round I’ve played so far I’ve pieced together a bit more of a strategy and it has that “can’t quite do everything you want on your turn” feel that’s the hallmark of a good worker game. My only complaint is the music is very repetitive and while you can turn it off, the game feels a little empty without anything in the backgroud, but otherwise this is a great digital board game. I love that this has cross-platform as well, in my opinion you can’t have a digital board game without that.
– Real player with 0.5 hrs in game
PLUG WARS - The Game
The Plug is your connection for anything you need. There’s nobody more important in the streets than the Plug. But when he’s captured by authorities, once-loyal Bosses become rivals, vying to take over his position in the game. Build your Sqwuad by recruiting neighborhood hustlers to ‘jump off da porch’ and go to war for you. Form your strategy, make power moves, and call the shots! Stack up your money and eliminate the competition. See if you got what it takes to make it out the streets and survive the “Plug War.” Play ‘til the last Boss standing, or be the first to collect 8 Big Mane Tokens.
A 2-4 player battle-royale, street strategy board game at 90-120 minutes of playtime. Ages 17 and older. (Use Discretion)
Battle Map Studio
Decent map maker considering the fact that it’s early access. Would love a way to make custom assets. And an option for steam remote play would be amazing as my players have no need to make maps, only play on them. OR make a heavily discounted version of the program that only allows playing.
The UI is garbage as of now, hopefuly it improves over time. Will probably just use it to make custom top down 2d maps until it gets usable. Will rewrite the review when/if i test this thing out a bit more.
– Real player with 0.5 hrs in game
If a game requires internet to be played please disclose that information.
– Real player with 0.1 hrs in game
Laruaville 7 - Match 3 Adventure
This game is actually quite a bit of fun. You do lots of different things. Mostly Match 3, but other things, too. Hidden object, solitaire, bonus games (beat the computer, cursed coin), and spot the difference. There are settings to play it casual, limited moves, timer and limited moves. The music can be disabled, and it is separate from the sounds.
It starts out, bam, no tutorial or hand holding. There are objects and hazards there that hopefully you’ve seen before. I would not recommend this for a first time player. Seasoned veteran, definitely. There is kinda of a story, but you know how that goes. It’s mostly those floaty people talking to each other and arguing over stuff.
– Real player with 13.8 hrs in game
Don’t let the dated looks of this game keep you from getting it (on sale, of course.) The plastic toy CG animation and Playskool color palette disguises a pretty fun and involved Match 3+ game (the in-game guide for the Match 3 gameplay is 14 pages long.) There’s nothing revolutionary here, but what it has is done well. Besides the Match 3, every so often you get basic solitaire levels, find the difference between two pictures, and hidden objects scenes. Not the most exciting features, but a nice break nevertheless. AND, as you play, bonus Match 3 levels open in a separate section.
– Real player with 8.8 hrs in game
First Days of Atlantis
It’s definitely a step back from traditional city builders, but in this case that’s kind of a good thing. It’s challenging enough to pique one’s interest trying to unlock the higher tier buildings, but relaxing enough that it’s a good time sink if you just need something to do while you relax. All in all, not a bad little game, especially if you catch it on sale.
– Real player with 5.1 hrs in game
Great mix of City Builder and highscore hunt. I especially like the little details like boats, people and sheep (which you can pet btw.) that move around and make the city you build feel alive.
– Real player with 2.9 hrs in game
Defend the Rook
Great game, highly recommend trying it out. It might seem a little easy at first for this type of game where often you are meant to die a bunch and slowly become stronger with upgrades. You have 1-10 ascension levels, but the first 4 are super easy and then 7+ becomes pretty tough. I’m not super excited about how it scales at 7+ because it feels like artificial difficulty, everything starts to cost twice as much so you can’t upgrade everything. I would prefer the enemies becoming more challenging rather than having less upgrades.
– Real player with 68.9 hrs in game
Neat roguelite strategy game. Beat it on the highest difficulty, enjoyed figuring it out. I had fun with it and recommend it, but I’ll list stuff that bothered me:
-Your core loadout before any towers/traps are your castle and three heroes (warrior/rogue/mage) by default. You unlock variants of these classes as you play. It quickly became apparent to me that the easiest way to win was “buff the ranged characters” and turtle in the corner with defensive buffs. It’d be nice if the upgrades supported different goals. I believe I had one playthrough where my warrior carried me, and it’s because he had full map range, so he was basically a third ranged character.
– Real player with 28.2 hrs in game
Creeper Goo
A NEW TAKE ON THE RTS GENRE
The creeper is crawling through hills and canyons to your base while you try to stop it in its tracks by building a space station, constructing weapons and structures and ultimately encapsulating the sources of this insidious enemy. In this new take to the tower defense genre, you will have to defend your city against an adversary that comes at you from all directions. In order to defeat the imminent creeper tsunami, you will need to research better technologies, shoot down enemy creeper missiles and capture enough land for collecting energy efficiently. The goo is so strong and corrosive, that the slightest touch would mean the end of any building, even including your mighty city. In this crucial battle against this awful ocean of goo, can you lead your city and your people to the ultimate salvation?
UNIQUE STRATEGY GAME FEATURES
Play in a 3D environment where you send construction and ammunition packets to your buildings and fight against a fluid that has the sole aim of drowning your city. Build lightning towers and missile launchers to push back the enemy. Practice defending your zone by building flak towers on strategic points and fending off enemy aerial assaults. Build superweapons to quickly evaporate large chunks of creeper and assist your counteroffensive. Finally capture the emitters using capsules to win the game.
UNLIMITED GAMEPLAY
Generate your own maps using the built-in map generator or create new maps using the map editor. Play the creations of other players by downloading user generated maps and contribute to the growing creeper nation by having your say and rating these maps. Showcase your artistic ability by creating beautiful landscapes and let the world play your masterpiece and give it the rating it rightfully deserves.