[Editor's note: These read more like game reviews than blogs, but I haven't played enough of any of these games to give a truly informed opinion. That said, I wrote about them anyway. Enjoy!]
Look familiar?
So I recently bought an iPad. I've wanted a full-sized tablet for a while, and although I prefer Android to iOS(I've had a Nexus 7 for a couple of years, and I like it a lot), iOS just has more to offer on the app store—specifically when it comes to games. Android is catching up, but there have been too many games that I couldn't get because they were only on iOS, or weren't expected to port over to Android for months. I also wanted a device from which I could record, and my Elgato can take an iPad input through a lightning to HDMI converter. So be it!
Since I've never played around with a full-sized tablet before, I wanted some cheap (read: free) games to test it out. I was looking for something a bit more substantial than basic freeware, so I decided to grab some of the more popular free-to-play games out there with the intention of ignoring the microtransactions. FYI, there are some terrible free to play games out there! These games would happily shove you to the ground and jam your delicious lunch money directly into their gaping maws. Not all games are created equal, however, and I found a few that looked promising.
Turns out I'm not big on free to play tablet games. Go figure.
Terra Battle
Terra Battle is an inoffensive puzzle battler with light RPG mechanics. You recruit a party of six adventurers and traverse the world to prevent a vaguely described impending disaster, facing stage after stage of monsters on a mighty battle-board of destiny. Victory rewards you with loot and experience! Defeat boots you back to the world map, sans the energy it cost to start the fight.
The board is a grid, and it's littered with monsters and traps. You engage the monsters by surrounding them with your adventurers, Othello style. When they (or you) are surrounded, the attack is initiated, special powers are triggered and damage is dealt. You can only move one character on your turn, but you can bump your other adventures into adjacent slots on the grid as you go. The puzzle is in determining the path to move your single character, bumping others into position for an effective attack before you run out of time. The moment you start moving, the clock is ticking, and if you run out you're stuck wherever you wound up. Your attacks also benefit from your characters who are not directly engaged in the Othello pincer attack, as long as they have a clear horizontal or vertical view of the attacking allies. Anyone who isn't in position isn't doing you any good.
ULTRA COMBOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
Terra Battle uses an energy system, which I always feel is a bummer. You spend energy to start a fight. Out of energy? Wait a while for it to replenish, or pay for more. I know this is standard in a lot of games, but it always feels like the wrong way to go. Even using cold, cruel business logic, it seems that you want people playing the game as much as possible in order to present more shopping opportunities. Locking them out locks out their money as well. Running out of energy doesn't make me want to buy more. It just makes me want to play another game—and there are plenty of others to play.
That said, I rarely run out of energy before I run out of interest.. The game is entertaining enough, but only in small bursts. I haven't found much variation in the puzzle part of combat. The enemies may get a little tougher, and the bosses throw out a few curve-balls, but most of the battles are a straightforward slugfest between you and the monsters. My team isn't the best—recruitment is random, and I haven't had much luck drawing the top tier adventurers—but I haven't had any problems bashing my way through the story campaign so far. Usually I play a bit during commercials and such, set it down for a few hours, and then finish whatever fight I was on.
There's a story, something about looking for the Creator of the world so you can avert some unspecified disaster, but not much to speak of. Many of the chapters boil down to: “The twisted monsters keep coming. Wave after wave of them assault your group.” Then: fight! The boss music is pretty good, though.
Verdict: A casual time waster at best. I probably won't play much more of it.
Hearthstone
I don't even need to write about this one. (But I'm going to.) Hearthstone is a popular collectable card game from Blizzard, and plenty has already been said about it. It's popular on Twitch, has tournaments, all-star players, the works. I enjoy CCGs—I've been buying Magic cards for years. Why not give it a try?
The format is standard for a CCG. You buy cards, build decks and use them to play against other people online. You choose a hero when you build a deck, and each hero has a unique power and set of cards that only they can play. There are a variety of card combinations that make up a good (or terrible) deck, and half the fun is sorting through your collection to work out the best cards to play together. There are cards and heroes that stand out from the rest, but overall it's a very well balanced system. Considering the number of heroes and unique cards, that level of balance is an impressive feat.
Grow a second pair of eyes, Garrosh.
Gold is the currency of choice in Hearthstone. With gold you can purchase booster packs, play expansion challenges, or enter the Arena for a good old fashioned throw-down. You start off with a set of basic cards; if you want more, you have to earn (or purchase) gold. Hearthstone offers daily challenges for those who do not want to purchase gold with cash, and a dedicated player can earn a steady stream of booster packs by completing them. A casual player, not so much—at least at first. (Of course that depends on your definition of casual.)
On the up-side, you don't need gold just to play. There's nothing stopping you from getting into as many games as you want. Once you've built your deck, you can immediately test it against the A.I. or take it for a spin against another player. No energy here—play as much as you want. That's what I'm talking about!
There is a matchmaking system that supposedly puts you against a player of equal skill...although that's where it often breaks down for me. I regularly find my basic deck competing with someone who is dropping rares and legendaries left and right, stomped before I even have a chance to get started. Since many of the daily challenges are 'Win X battles using X class', I often end up banging my head against a wall when trying to earn gold. Sure, I've earned a few packs, but that's where I argue that casual play (again, for a given definition of casual) won't get you very far. If you stick with it, maybe you'll get enough boosters to become competitive, which in turn would make it easier to earn that gold. Since I derive most (or at least half) of my pleasure from building decks in the first place, coming at it from the other direction is just disheartening.
Don't get me wrong—Hearthstone is doing it right. If you have the time and inclination, you can get enough traction to compete without spending a dime. And hey, it's a CCG—it's reasonable to base your business model on selling boosters. You can also break down unwanted cards and put the resulting components towards creating any card you want, building your deck one card at a time. I can't fault the game for not grabbing me, when it gives me a direct path to collecting the cards I want. I just don't have the time to get that traction...for now. Maybe someday I'll play enough to get there. But until then, I've always got my Magic cards.
Verdict: A great game if you can devote the time.
Final Fantasy Record Keeper
There have been several Final Fantasy mobile/tablet games, and I've more or less ignored them all. Most are either ridiculously overpriced or simply not worth the time. Final Fantasy Record Keeper is the most recent addition, and people actually seem to like this one. I grew up on Final Fantasy...why not check it out?
In a far-distant reality, there is a gallery of paintings that tell the stories of many different worlds. (Many of them focus on crystals. Go figure.) Stories of heroes redeemed and villains thwarted, lands in peril and the brave souls who stepped forth to save them. These magical paintings depict the legends of the various Final Fantasy games...until a mysterious phenomenon begins stealing those stories away. Professor Mog assigns you to recruit the heroes from those very legends and enter the paintings to save those worlds from whatever dark force is invading them. Yes, you too can stand tall beside Wakka and...Bard...to save...something something.
Kidding! Although I have yet to put Wakka into any party of mine. At least, not in a game...
Finally, a canonical setting for my Tidus/Kain/Wakka/Black Mage/Cloud slash fic!
Gameplay-wise, Record Keeper is a turn-based battler that draws inspiration from the earlier console games. You create a party from the heroes you've recruited, take them into the paintings and fight off waves of familiar Final Fantasy enemies. The fights are Active Time Battles (ATB), where you select commands for a character as soon as their action bar fills up, and the enemy waits for nobody. Each hero has his or her own abilities, as well as others that you can swap around to create the best team for the battle at hand. Fights result in the usual experience and loot, and you level up in order to face more difficult challenges. Final Fantasy!
The rest of the game is all about getting better equipment and skills for your heroes. Monsters will drop some, but the good stuff comes from a random draw that costs mythril. How do you get mythril? Well, you can gain a limited amount from playing through the story, and a bit more from the daily dungeons (which also pay out in increased gold, upgrade materials and experience), but earning mythril the hard way is something of a drip feed. Or, of course, you can buy it for cash. There is also a free daily draw for one piece of equipment, but I've never gotten anything worthwhile from it. Early into the game you'll acquire better equipment for your whole team than what you get from the free draw. Hey, at least you can sell it.
The mythril system doesn't feel egregious, but Record Keeper also uses the energy system, which, as mentioned earlier, is a bummer. You spend energy to fight, and the fights can go fast. I've burned through my entire energy pool in less than five minutes, and while you regenerate energy fairly quickly (one every three minutes) the dungeons get costly. I already gave my anti-energy speech earlier, so I won't belabor it, but it's something to keep in mind.
The real reason you're here, though, is probably nostalgia. The whole game is basically Final Fantasy fanservice (Final Fantiservice?...No.) You go to Cid's workshop to equip and modify your gear. Your heroes are pulled straight from the old games. The bosses are iconic. Every world plays the appropriate map music, and the battle themes are just how you remember them. Did that .gif above make you remember the victory theme, whether you wanted to or not? Then it's working.
I'll be honest: nostalgia is eighty percent of the reason I'm playing this game. The combat isn't particularly complicated, and grinding for mythril and equipment hasn't resulted in any Awww yeah! moments. But when that Final Fantasy IV boss music kicks in, I want to high-five my iPad. The basic menu screens make me want to jump in an airship just one more time. Watching Tifa pummel some stupid Guard Scorpion right in its stupid Guard Scorpion face just feels right. Even if you're not getting much in the way of the original stories (just a text box describing each scene—the characters don't even talk) there's just enough going on to trick the Final Fantasy lobe of my brain into releasing those those delicious chocobo endorphins.
Is it worth it? It may be too early to say. They haven't added every Final Fantasy game to the gallery, and those that are there aren't complete. The game itself isn't very exciting. But for a free-to-play, there's enough to keep me coming back. I don't know how long I'll stick with it, but for now I am entertained.
Verdict: This one needs a little more time in the oven, but it's got promise. Good for when you have five or ten minutes to waste.
So, I'm still on the prowl for a good tablet game. Odds are I'll have to spend money to find something I like—which is fine—but until then I'll keep looking for a FTP game worth the time. And hey—Sephiroth ain't gonna recruit himself. Just one more level of the Shinra's building...