Category: Game Releases

It may have been GamesCom this week, but mobile gaming could care less about several hundred thousand gamers descending on Cologne to talk about games that aren’t on mobile. While I’ve been away plenty has been happening (although not as much in the premium space, which is a shame), so there’s plenty to catch up on.

Meanwhile, in the world of mobile gaming…

Out Now

There’s not much we’d call ‘stand-out’ on the release schedule this week. People say nice things about Gris, although since it’s an Adventure game it’s not something we’d look at in the first instance so I can’t exactly ‘recommend’ it at this stage – it’s a premium game on mobile though, which is something.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RdrvV25zoA8?controls=0]

If you read our review of Void Tyrant but are an Android user, you may be pleased to hear that the game has released a ‘beta’ on Google Play that you can install for free. It’s a bit late to the card game/rogue-like party, but still worth a try if you enjoy those kinds of games.

Also, Gears Pop! Has released on iOS and Android now. This is a free-to-play strategy game in the same vein as Clash Royale, just set in the Gears of War universe. If everyone in the Gears of War universe looked like a Funko Pop. You’ve got to collect the figures, and assemble a Squad, although the mechanics seem kind of intriguing – you play a character to one of two lanes, and they’ll advance until they hit cover. They’ll stay there until they capture the territory and then move on. Different characters then build on this by having different behaviors, abilities etc… and you can also call in things like the Hammer of Dawn to assist you as well.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3DWmvdixgKk?controls=0]

Might be worth checking out it, might not be. We’ll get back to you.

For sports fans, Club Soccer Director 2020 is also a new game that was released recently on iOS and Android. Again, being free-to-play it’s not something we’d immediately look at but considering you don’t get many sports games released on mobile I thought it was worth flagging up anyway.

Upcoming Games

There’s actually a fair few upcoming game announcements you might be interested in hearing about, so we’re going to summarize some of them for you here quickly:

Pokemon Masters is due to release next week on iOS and Android come August 29th. Just to refresh your memory, this is a 3v3 battler game that tries to capture more of what the original gameboy games had going for them, instead of being another AR experience like Pokemon GO. You need to collect Trainers and Pokemon and form Sync pairs, then use them to battle other players or the AI in the story mode.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oIwGe83JUo8?controls=0]

In other news, Tropico is finally coming to Android in a couple of weeks on September 5th.

And finally, Mi Clos is creating a sequel to the excellent Out There, which was released in 2014. Out There: Oceans of Time won’t be coming until Winter 2020, but it’s certainly coming and we’ve got a teaser trailer to get us hyped.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c43gIRWl6qw?controls=0]

Updates

Raiders of the North Sea (Review)

The 1.2 update is already out for the excellent digital port of Raiders of the North Sea. As well as some AI tweaks, Card readability improvements on phones and faster animations, this patch also adds a much needed Pass and Play mode! Huzzah! You can read the full patch notes here.

Santorini The Board Game (Review)

This other excellent board game port has had two smaller updates this week, mainly look at fixing specific bugs related to specific Gods that you can choose in the game.

Sales

I like it when there’s a good sales week, means there’s an increased likelihood of excellent mobile games getting into the hands of players who need to play them. Here’s what I’ve got for you:

• Beholder 2 – we only reviewed it last week, but Beholder 2 is now available for $5.99. It was $4.99 just after launch, but not sure if it’ll drop back to that price anytime soon.
• Transistor – One of our favourite RPGs, this Action-RPG is available for only a couple of dollars (although it was even cheaper back in February).
• Rebel Inc. – this is more like it. While Rebel Inc was never that expensive to begin with, it’s now half price for anyone who’s yet to partake. This game is available on Android, but the monetisation structure is a little bit different there. Looks like the IAPs are all discounted too, though.
• Cultist Simulator – even though this only released in April, it’s already on sale again for the second time and the cheapest price yet. Sadly, this discount hasn’t been extended to Android.
• Necrodancer: Amplified – the Amplified re-release of Crypt of the Necrodancer is down to $1.99 for the second time since it launched in June.
• Immortal Rogue – Kyle Barrett’s intriguing rogue-like experiment is on sale for, as far as we can tell, the first time ever. It’s down to below half-price, so now might be a good time to jump in. Again, the discount doesn’t extend to android, sadly.
• Kingdom New Lands – this fascinating side-scrolling 2D strategy game is down to half price on both iOS and Android, but it’s not the cheapest price it’s ever been, so beware.

Seen anything else you liked? Played any of the above? Let us know in the comments!

Let me start by stating unequivocally that I am a fan of puzzle games and inspired spin-offs. Every great game usually has a cluster of kissing cousins, throw a stone and find one. Bearing this in mind, most mobile gamers remember the recent Hitman– Lara Croft– ‘Go’ series of games, as much for their taut level design as visual polish. Well, Spy Tactics is supposed to be a dead ringer for Hitman Go, and it soullessly succeeds. It’s an incredible value, and has clearly been a labor of love, but it is irredeemably marred by confounding controls and an ultimately derivative design.

Just like in the Go series, each level is presented like a diorama representing a small objective. The spy moves along a series of nodes, silently disarming patrols whilst picking up that eternal McGuffin briefcase. Counting steps and cycles becomes paramount, as does establishing a causal sequence. Take out Guard A to open the door, extending B’s patrol such that my agent can grab the briefcase. So on and so forth, ad nauseum, unfortunately. As far as spatial puzzles go, the format is decent but also rather exhaustible, for each level can usually be solved by splitting it into chunks and simply experimenting with every possible move. To get around this, new levels frequently introduce new mechanics, like snipers or single-use weapons, which Spy Tactics uses to wrinkle what is otherwise a very uniform play experience. This by itself isn’t a fatal setback; Sudoku puzzle books are similarly predictable in progression but still compelling.

Nevertheless the level design feels boilerplate. Yes, it is at times vexing and challenging, but Spy Tactics as a whole lacks that spark, the galvanizing ‘aha’ moments which punctuate what at times can be a tedious and difficult experience. A good puzzle games taunts and leads its player to wider understanding. Spy Tactics does teach rules of thumb and tricks of the trade, but it does so haphazardly and mostly through rote repetition. Good design means intentional traps and breadcrumbs, basically creating what is very much like a mental dialogue with the player. Puzzles functioning like riddles, asking for specific insights to proceed and refusing entry to the unwitting. Well, some puzzles just ask you try again and again, and will give inches of progress as a reward for mute persistence. Spy Tactics is more the latter, asking for minor experiments and variations on the theme. Nothing to totally stump the player, nothing to totally delight them either.

String the levels together and you have something like a campaign, with an animated introduction to drive the narrative, like the first series of levels, which are ostensibly about ousting a corrupt police chief. The writing here is wonderfully punchy, brimming with do-or-die intensity. It is accompanied by the requisite espionage jazz. The flavor is welcome but nonetheless a little cheesy, especially as divorced as it is from the actual puzzle experience. As set dressing, though, it’s distinctive and shows an imaginative, if deadpan, take on domestic spycraft. Points for flair.

Because so much of puzzle-solving involves minute variations and experimentation, the lack of an undo function is nonsensical. It adds an arbitrary hurdle to the proceedings, especially when a puzzle is some forty-odd moves long to complete successfully but one miscalculates or misclicks at the finish. Some frustration actually builds concentration and engagement, but an excess really kills the buzz. In effect, the lack of an undo function means players must have a razor-sharp memory and foresight since any plan is set in stone from the get-go. It’s an odd limitation.

The controls are accurate but over-sensitive so that it is trivially easy to send your agent in the totally wrong direction. While the board and view can be rotated freely, the movement is tied to swipes along an invisible compass rose, and so even if you rotate the field 180 degrees, the movement stays the same, which is just begging for trouble. Also, the animations on enemies are a bit of a drag on the flow of play. None of these alone is a serious drawback, but taken together they make for a puzzle game that is harder to play than it is to solve, and this imbalance leaves an unpleasant impression. Ideally the controls and interface should be as transparent and smooth as possible, but this sadly isn’t the case here. More’s the pity, for the free rotate does actually show off the clean visual design in a rather nifty way. It’s actually pretty crucial to see past some terrain using rotation, so the fact that it jars with the static movement inputs is just maddening.

Then again, I’m a bit of a glutton for punishment, both from a mobile standpoint (Darkest Dungeon, Cultist Simulator) and a puzzle one (Baba Is You, English Country Tune). So a little pushback is good game philosophy, gets the creative juices flowing in the player. But here Spy Tactics runs into another mismatch: its puzzles are clear-cut and straightforward, if admittedly decent, but the physical act of solving them is the convoluted, protracted, time-consuming, unforgiving part. So the overall effect is a drag. Then there’s the clone issue to mull over. While the thematic dressing is original and piquant, the actual mechanics of Spy Tactics are lifted pretty much copy-paste from Hitman Go, which tiresome at best if not downright problematic.

Spy Tactics does indeed boast 40 levels and its gameplay is just like that other game you might also like, but in an age with a glut of affordable entertainment I would urge a little more discernment. It’s technically well-made and has some points in its favor, but overall does not merit a try unless there’s been a Franchise-Go-sized hole in your life.

I feel a little bit guilty – I went all the way to Cologne and all I came back with this lousy Commandos 2 story. Truth be told there wasn’t as much visibility on what mobile games were going to be at the show as I thought there’d be. Certainly, I didn’t see much that I thought would fit into our core remit pass through, but it’s possible I may have missed something.

Commandos 2 HD coming to iPad though was something I was very keen to to bring back, and the news is both good and bad, as you can guess. Bad news – it’s not looking like we’re going to see the mobile versions until 2020.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tb90nBvuwl4?controls=0]

This is based with conversations I had with the developers at the show – their aim is to have the PC, Console and Switch versions ready before the end of the year, but they haven’t even begun testing or prototyping on mobile devices yet. We imagine that won’t happen until the main versions are all-but-done.

The good news is that it’s still shaping up quite nicely – none of the gameplay has been changed, barring any concessions that arise as a result of the upscaling/re-designing of the assets. The commando models, for example, have been completely redone in 3D. The static level art has had to be upscaled, and new explosion/particle effects are still to come. But it’s still the same Commandos – the developer shared an anecdote about how, when he first played Commandos 2 as a teenager it took him an entire day to complete the second tutorial mission.

Granted, a big part of that is that the game doesn’t have much of a tutorial (something that’s definitely getting changed for the HD version), but the key point they were keen to get across is that the genre-defining tactical puzzle mechanics and difficulty won’t be fiddled with.

How this will translate to mobile is the question that we’ll have to wait and see. I can’t imagine running the game will be much of an issue – it’ll come down to how they design the UI and touch controls. I have a feeling a virtual joystick might come in handy, and they’ll need to make sure they design an easy-to-use way to navigate the myriad of contextual actions present.

We’ll keep you posted!