Reviews & Articles

The 2010 Toy Fair and Engage! Expo brightened up the Jacob Javitz Center in New York, filling one wing of the gigantic convention plaza with overwhelming rows of the latest products for kids. Surfing through the sea of neon colors, odd shapes, discussion panels and sale-bent exhibitors, I managed to locate some games for kids that blend physical play with online interaction, including HexBug Nano, GigaPals and Bella Sara.

I’ve played many of the full-size versions of Bejeweled (in various names and incarnations). The basic premise is that you swap two objects to make a match of at least three of one kind of object in a row. The matches disappear, you earn points and all the little objects drop down on the screen with more filling in from the top. In Bejeweled, as you might guess by the name, you’re matching little sparkling jewels. If you’re good, you can play for quite a while on the full-size version.

It’s the one-minute timer that makes Bejeweled Blitz like gamer crack.

As a lover of older video game systems such as the Nintendo and the Super Nintendo (sorry I’m too young for the Atari days, I admit it), I would say I enjoy retro games quite a bit. Retro games usually resemble older graphics, older music styles, and are simple, fast and fun.

That’s the case with Captain Forever.

For those who play casual games almost exclusively — or if you’re like me, you owe your allegiance to no game genre, bwahah! — err, yeah ... portals for downloading games have been around since well, the beginning of casual games. That particular portion of the industry develops, publishes and distributes for each other — company for company — as if it’s the normal course of business. ...

Virtual worlds and microtransactions were the theme of this year’s Game Developers Conference. SmallWorlds fits this trend. Developed by Outsmart as a 3D browser-based game, Small Worlds is one of the best free-to-play games I saw at GDC 2009.

You may have heard of a little indie game that breaks the conventional mold. It is called You Have To Burn The Rope. You control this cute little guy who wields an axe and is sent into some short tunnel to kill the giant blob at the end. So how do you do this? Simple: Read the title of the game. Once the blob has been smashed/crashed/mashed (choose your favorite word, but I‘m going for all of them crunched together), it’s over. That’s it. By the time you’ve finished this paragraph, that’s how much time it takes you to play this game.

From the genre-bending, convention-bucking world of independent video games, Coil emerges to challenge the popular notion of what games can do, and what they can be about. Coil, a Flash-based game played entirely with the mouse, is clearly interested in breaking the traditional rules of game-making to present a new experience. Unfortunately, it rushes so eagerly into uncharted territory that it tends to get lost.

Some eight weeks ago, I began playing a multiplayer online game, and I've been hooked ever since. Yes, I hear the collective groan, "Ophelea, big deal. You're talking about half the games on the Internet!" Well, perhaps I am. But, this one is a little different, or I wouldn't have mentioned the time I've been playing — as verbose as I am want to be. You see, when I began playing, I was able to make a move every 7-15 minutes. Eight weeks later, I make maybe six to 10 moves a day. I am so hooked.

Runescape probably isn't a very familiar name to many, and as such doesn't inspire one to run out and buy it (you couldn't anyway). Maybe you've heard of it one time or another from a friend, but you won't find this game being reviewed by many game companies. 'Tis a shame.