Holy Angry JRPG, Batman!

Dear Diary: The farmer told me I
had a big job ahead of me tomorrow

When I think of Angry Birds, I think of two things.  The gaming tycoon that is Rovio, who are having a lark floggin the this of their avien themed games, and of the classic tactical game Worms.

Why Worms?  Because back when I did little else but play it, I had a grand time firing bazookas at my opponents between Shotgun-Sniping them and shepherding them to their deaths (with Explosive Sheep).  And yes, there's little correlation between having geometrically designed parrots in a slingshot and squadrons of hilarious invertibrates in mortal combat, but it's there.

Getting back on track, the abused horse carcasse that is Angry Birds continues to make games to this day.  And only recently, due to my move to the US which I find rather curious, has it's latest iteration been released: Angry Birds Epic, a fantasy RPG.

The game is simple enough and features everything you'd expect from a Fantasy Role Playing Game.  Alchemy, Blacksmithing, and a number of classes suited to your five heroes, all to suit the same story that is written on the whip used for the flogging: To retrieve the eggs stolen by the Piggies.

This time though, rather than house in ramshackle buildings of any material they stole from a building site, they're every kind of baddie you can think of.  Soldiers, Noblepigs, Skyfarers, Pirates, Jungle Pigmies, Ghosts, Zombies, Ninjas...  Even the Swiss!  There's even an Airship!

Battle itself couldn't be simpler than greasing up a pig and telling 20 lonely farmers to catch it, and it's just as entertaining.  You have five fowl warriors with you, each with up to five classes of their own. Each class has two features, an offensive and a support ability.  The player picks and chooses what they'll use encounter after encounter, changing between hot spots on the map trail.

As is the want of Rovio, being social can be profitable too.  Friends can be requested for help in dungeons, and if you're popular enough to have five friends playing Epic, they can all help you open a friendship gate!  Sadly I don't have that many friends.  Just Richard who I think has gotten himself stuck amongst the Pigmies.

What kind of end is there for this game though?  Will it end up being a continual Pork Grind Fest?  Will I begin a never ending dungeon with no dragon waiting for a chicken dinner?  I may not know for weeks.  I have that with the only other game that contains birds with anger management issues I'm playing is Birzzle Fever.  Because inane tapping games are also my thing, it seems.

Would I recommend this game to friends though?  Certainly.  Not because I want friends to help me out when I want to do a daily dungeon with someone other than Piggy McCool, but because anyone who had a fun time playing Final Fantasy, Wild Arms, or any turn based game in the past 30 years, should give this free game a crack.

And while you're at it, befriend me.  Those gates have some awesome goodies behind them, and I want to save my Gold Snoutlings.

What if Blizzard made a Cow Clicker?

Click for more Minerals

I came across the term Cow Clicker a few years back when someone explained what it actually is, which turned out to be simply a joke from a guy about Social Games like Farmville by making a Social game where all you do is Click a Cow every six hours.  Ironically, it became quite popular.

I've been playing a handful of Cow Clickers similar to Farmville the last few years, starting with Tiny Village, a Stone Age themed town builder where the aim of the game is to build and build and keep going until there just isn't anything else.
After that I found Skylanders: Lost Islands.  Same idea, but with the added feature of being able to use my Skylander Figures to throw into the game.  I would send them on adventures, which were simply just countdowns with rewards of Gold after I had farmed for Energy, which I would then use for buildings that would either give me more money, energy, Kingdom Experience, or Gems which offered exclusive stuff.

I had left it in the capable hands of my mother, who to my knowledge has continued to build upon the villages and islands since.
Since I've moved to USA I hadn't even had an inkling of thought towards such Cow Clickers until one night at my Brother-in-law's house the TV was rambling off in the background while we played Cards Against Humanity with our respective spouses, and an ad came up for Clash of Clans.

It was a bit cute watching a skeleton run and run, dodging explosions and arrows while carrying a comical bomb in it's claws until it reached a rock wall, sat back with a sigh, and let the fuse go out.

Then there was something about Archers and Mr T on a Hog asking if he could join in...  It got me curious, so I downloaded it.  It's for free, so why not?

Only a few weeks have passed and I've levelled myself up a fair bit, thrown troops at enemy fortresses to attain whatever resources I can from them, while keeping my own resources and defences in check, trying out numerous combinations to optimise efficency while I wait for the countdown of structure upgrades allowing me to build more or better units and/or structures.

And from the same company I found Boom Beach, which all the same premises except using modern features and everyone placed on islands, attacked from a Gun Boat and Landing Craft, all of which you upgrade over time while defending your own base from the occasional attack, and so on and so forth.

It's a little fun, for a Cow Clicker, because you can be more interactive.  It's fun seeing AI bases and figuring out how to get around the defences while minimising casualties.

Anyone who knows me well enough knows that I'm a fan of Blizzard's Warcraft and Starcraft.  And I sit here looking at the games and wondering "What would an X-craft game be like if they reskinned this?"

Could it be as story intensive as either the Starcraft or Warcraft series?  Heck no, it would probably have someone going "Damn you meddling kids" and that's about it.

But the real drawback on this is that the game won't have the same strategy to it as the computer game normally would.  Though I'm sure there are ways around that.