Games and More

Yesterdays I talked a bit about the game Ikariam.  Today I thought I would go into a little more detail and give a few tips.

You begin the game on an island with as many as 16 other villages.  Each island has two resources available:  wood and a luxury item (wine, marble, crystal glass, or sulfur).  All of the building cost wood to create and/or upgrade.  Every building but the academy will eventual cost marble as well.  The academy requires crystal glass to upgrade.

The palace and the governor’s residence require wood for the first level, marble to complete the second, then crystal glass and finally wine.  To establish a colony you must have a palace and you can only have as many colonies as your palace has levels.  Additionally you will need to build governor’s residences in your colonies with the same number of levels as colonies otherwise corruption will run rampant in your colony.

The town hall, academy, barracks, trading post and town wall can all be built immediately.  All other buildings require research in the academy to create.  The more levels your academy has the more scientists you can have researching producing faster results.

So as far as deciding which colonies to create in what order consider that all buildings (except the academy) eventually require marble to create and/or upgrade.  Crystal glass is needed to upgrade the academy and train spies.  Sulfur is needed to train soldiers.  Wine is for keeping your citizens happy.

I hope that helps you establish fruitful colonies and have great success at the game.

If you liked the idea of Travian but found the game play to involved or perhaps you are simply looking for another game in which to conquer try playing Ikariam.  The initial start up is easier.  Instead of balancing four resources in order to expand you only need to worry about lumber to begin.  Also, Ikariam uses gold so trade is easier to facilitate.

However, do be careful how you spend your initial luxury goods because the are necessary for later expansion and are not always available through trade.  Also, you can not settle new territory until you have created a palace (and you are only allowed one colony per palace level).  As each island only has one luxury good chose your colony placement with care.

Good luck.

Travian is a building and conquering online game.  You start with a small village and try to conquer the world.  I linked to it in a previous post, but now I thought I’d give a few tips.

In your starting village you only have 20 building sites (not including the rally point).  However, there are thirty-one building you can construct.  So choose your buildings with care.  Are you going to be a world conqueror?  Then stick with the military buildings.  Are you going to be a diplomat?  Then stick with the trade buildings.  Also bear in mind that your palace can only be built once and the stonemason can only be built in that town.

And before you get all gun hoe with thoughts of conquering remember your palace has to be a level 10 before you can conquer or found new villages.  I hope this helps you on your quest to take over the world.

Yesterday Peter gave us a link to another good Kenken site.  If you’d like to go directly to the online puzzles click here.  If you’d like to go directly to the printable puzzles click here.  Thanks again Peter.

Today’s game, Paint Buckets, requires a registration.  I keep an alternate email for these type of registrations so that my regular email is not flooded with junk mail.  The game can be played for free or you can choose to compete for cash.  (I recommend the free variety.)

If you have ever played with the Microsoft application Paint the play is similar.  You are attempting to turn a picture into a single color.  You have three paint buckets in each color pictured.  When you pour a paint bucket onto a square each adjacent square of the same color will also change color.

The game play is relatively simple.  But each new picture presents its own challenges.  Hope you enjoy.

If you enjoyed the tutorial in yesterday’s post you will really enjoy the new link I have for you today.  The New York Times puts out six new Kenken puzzles daily.  Three of the puzzles are on a 4×4 grid and three are on a 6×6 grid.  The difficulties range from easy to hard.

There is a “reveal” button to help you when you get stuck.  It will reveal the solution for one square.  You can use the reveal button multiple times if necessary.  After you have filled in all the squares the “check” button appears which will check your work for you.  If you have any errors they will be lit up in red and the phrase “try again” will bounce on the screen.  If you have no errors “congratulations” will bounce on the screen.

Give these puzzles a try.  If you like them you’ll soon find yourself looking for more.

Enjoyed Sudoku but looking for a new challenge?  Or maybe you are looking for some learning games for your children?  Miyamoto came up with a new puzzle game that will fill both needs.  As a teacher he was looking for a learning tool for his students so he designed Kenken.

Kenken is a puzzle that will help you review simple math.  The boards tend to be either 4×4 or 6×6.  As with Sudoku each row and column must have each number present.  Unlike Sudoku the board is divided up into cages.  Each cage has a clue–a number and a math function.  The numbers in that cage must equal the number in the clue when the math function in the clue is used.  So if you had a 2 square cage with a clue of 11+ then you would know that the numbers in that cage must be 5 and 6.  You would then use the surrounding clues to determine in what order the numbers should go.

If this new puzzle game sounds interesting to you give it a try at miyamoto-puzzle.com.  It is a nice tutorial that will slowly progress you from small addition only puzzles to the standard puzzle difficulty.

If you only have a few minutes a day–or only want to take a few minutes a day, try the My Farm application on Facebook.  (As with all Facebook applications you will be required to sign up with Facebook.  It is free.)  For just a few minutes a day you can run an online farm as well as fighting hunger.  (A portion of the proceeds go toward fighting world hunger.)

The application is still being designed and improved.  However, you can currently plant crops and grow orchards as well as buying a few farm animals.  The next improvements include raising farm animals and collecting eggs from the hens.

Also, as a Facebook game there is a social element.  You can visit friends’ farms and give them gifts of trees and animals.  Give it a try I’m sure you’ll enjoy it.

Do you enjoy building up forces?  Seeking out enemies to conquer?  Maybe building up a trade network and harvesting supplies?  Travian has all this and more.

You choose a race - Romans are the most versatile, Guals the best at defense and Teutons are good for attack (but not recommended for new players).  Then you are given a town to run.  To the right of the screen will be a little man who will guide you through the first few steps of running your town.  After you’ve completed the tutorial he will disappear.  You may feel you don’t need help getting started, however, you get bonuses for completing the various tasks in the tutorial so I recommend walking through it.

A nice feature of this game is the 14 day beginner’s luck.  None of the other players can attack you for 14 days.  This gives you a little time to figure out how the game works and to create a few military units.  This also gives you a little time to discover some of the other players and join an alliance.

Give it a try.  You wont be disappointed.

If you enjoy a good storyline you might be interested in trying out Hammerfall.  (It is a Facebook game and will therefore require you to register with Facebook.)  The game begins on an island in the town of Sumervale.  Quiet and protected, yet even there you hear rumors of change in the Empire.

There are no moving images but the still pictures are quite good though only thumbnail size.  There is also a map which helps you track were you’ve been and where you are going.

The only drawback is that periodically the game requires you to add guild members in order to advance the plot.  So either you have a lot of friend who want to play with you (or find them via the discussion boards) or you purchase honor points in order to acquire mercenaries from the sage.

As a child I always enjoyed playing trading card games because I am a collector.  The thrill of hunting out new cards, the anticipation when opening a new package of cards that was the reason I played.  Well Facebook has an online trading card game that takes advantage of those things.

Pack Rat is a collectors dream.  You choose a set of cards you’d like to collect like the “Arctic Adventure” or the “I do” collection.  (Each set has a different number of totals cards.)  Then you pursue your cards.

You can steal cards from your friends that is choose an inferior card from your deck and try to drop it in a friends deck for the card you desire.  If the cards are the same color or close in point value your odds of succeeding are higher.  Once you’ve stolen (or attempted to steal) from a friend their cards are temporarily safe and you can only propose trades with them.

Trades work like they do in all trading card games.  You offer them a card you think they want for a card you want.  You can also offer or ask for credits if the values of the two cards differ.

Credits are the game currency you can use them to purchase new cards from the stores.  You start the game with a little currency.  As you play you will occasionally find more currency hidden somewhere on the screen (sometimes under one of the cards in a friend’s deck).  Every once and awhile you will get really lucky and find a draw card, which allows you to draw a new card from the deck.

Pack Rat can be played free of charge or a $10 monthly fee will allow you access to broader markets for card purchases.  So unleash your inner collector and take a look at Pack Rat.  (You will have to register with Facebook in order to play.)