Why we need to pay attention to Farm Heroes (or any other game from King.com)

I’m a hardcore gamer. I love Bloodborne’s challenges. I’m very excited to complete Batman: Arkhan Knight with 100% of the missions. I really like to die and try again the experience of Dark Souls.

On the other hand, I’m a casual gamer too. I think – for a work in game design and gaming studies – it’s essential to explore both worlds (and the intersection between them).

I’ve played a lot of mobile games the last three years for two reasons: 1) they’re extremely fun; 2) most of the time I’m far from my videogames. So, I downloaded lots of games in my iPhone/iPad. There are many good ideas, interfaces and mechanics, but I want to focus on the games from King.com. Yeah, you certainly know one or two games from them; Candy Crush is an icon from this publisher.



However, I intend to talk about another game in this post: Farm Heroes Saga. Farm Heroes has some important points to think (and rethink) game design: 1) the core mechanics is simple (you need to join three pieces of a kind to eliminate them from the interface and earn points); 2) the simple mechanics evolves with new characters (you start with fruits and vegetables, but after some time there’re animals, fireworks and many other powers); 3) There’s a social model embedded in Farm Heroes that create a community inside the gaming universe, where players can share lives and special powers; 4) There’s a business model in the game and you can spend real money to buy powers, lives, gold bars and special features (very similar to all King.com games); 5) Finally: it’s free, fun, colorful and has a friendly interface.

The ideas from this game remind me the words of Juul (2010) in the book A casual revolution. Check the video with the gameplay:



The conclusion is: King.com creates a complete model of casual games with very integrated social, business and fun aspects. Every game replicates the same model with a new skin. With great number of games, their chances of profit increase a lot.

I celebrate King.com’s work in the casual gaming industry.

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Reference:

JUUL, Jesper. A casual revolution. Cambridge: The MIT Press, 2010.

The Swapper: a good game to observe puzzle mechanics

The Swapper is my new favourite entertainment. The game is a puzzle-platformer developed in 2014 by Facepalm Games, a small Finnish independent studio.

The game has awesome features allied to the puzzle mechanics and it's possible to see a perfect balance between narrative, scenario, mechanics and interface. Let's talk about each one of them.



The narrative is about a space traveller trying to get out of a mysterious abandoned space station. The dark scenario is perfect and there's an aura of fear and anxiety all the time.

The game operates in a side scrolling 2D and this choice of interface is determinant for the puzzle development.

The game mechanics is very clever. Your space explorer has a clone weapon and it's possible to "launch" a clone of your character in an unachievable part of the scenario to complete a puzzle. Check a video below:



Another weapon allows transferring your conscience to the clone to finish the puzzles. The Swapper is a good exercise of level and puzzle design to observe.

The main idea of the game is to collect some orbs to open panels and try to runaway from the space station.

Fullerton says (2008, p.324) that puzzles are also a key element in creating conflict in almost all single player games. There is an innate tension in solving the puzzle. They can contextualize the choices that players make by valuing them as they move toward or away from the solution.

The Swapper is my most played game of this year. Waiting for new content from Facepalm.

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Reference:

FULLERTON, Tracy; SWAIN, Christopher; HOFFMAN, Steven. Game design workshop: a playcentric approach to creating innovative games. Burlington: Morgan Kaufmann Publishers, 2008.

Tooth Protectors: an Atari advergame

This game is one of my favorite examples for my game design classes. In 1983, in a partnership with Atari, Johnson & Johnson launched a curious game named Tooth Protectors. The experimental project inserted some features from the modern advergames in its interface and it’s possible to see the brand in the opening screen with some product placement (toothbrush, dental floss and mouthwash).



The game mechanics is very simple and the player must protect teeth from the attack of the cavities. You earn points by folding the harmful elements that fall from the top of the screen. In the video below you can have an idea of the game:



Despite being very simple, Tooth Protectors is the precursor of many examples we see today and a good example of how to do a “ludic archeology”. It’s important to observe that the main branding elements - even in a rudimentary way - are all represented in the proposed interface.



We have other good examples of advergames from Atari platform. I intend to discuss deeply in another post doing a presentation with other examples of different gaming generations.

Go gamers!

Talking about my new mobile game DOMINAEDRO

Last week my new game, DOMINAEDRO, landed at the App Store. The game is a strategic puzzle that mixes dominoes and tic-tac-toe. It’s is an abstract battle between two players that uses pieces of domino as weapons.

The game, originally, was analogic and was launched as an independent title in the beginning of this year. After lots of positive reviews from Brazilian (and even European) sites I decided to transform the analogic version into a digital game.

The game is very simple and I will share the main idea of the rules below. The game’s grid is arranged with nine numbers randomly selected by the system. In a decreasing order: the highest number will be allocated in the center, intermediate values will be around the highest one, and lower values will be on the corners.



Your starting hand has 3 domino pieces. The player with the lowest sum of numbers in a single piece starts the game. On your turn, you must try to put a single piece in the grid respecting the following rules:

1) A number in a domino can only touch a piece with the same number, or lower, in the grid.
2) Like in a domino game, pieces connected on the grid must have the same numbers.
3) Every time you choose a piece, the system will point out the spaces allowed for allocating on the table.



You earn points by dominating a sum on the grid. For that, you should be the player with the highest sum of numbers around a value. In case of a tie, the sum of the second values of dominoes sets the winner. In case of a tie in both sides of the dominoes, the winner will be the player with more pieces.

The game ends when you cannot allocate more pieces on the grid. Each piece not allocated is worth -1 point. Values of the grid that were not completely surrounded by pieces are scored normally.

If a player has dominated all values in a row, column or diagonal, they win 4 extra points for each line. The player with the most points wins the game. Check a short video demo with the game mechanics below:



You can download DOMINAEDRO for free. Click here for more information. I’m waiting for your suggestions, critics and improvements.

Go gamers!