Shenan-do it : Slitherine updates progress with Shenandoah titles

Not your father’s Shenandoah war game.

It’s been quite a while since we’ve heard from Shenandoah Studios, probably because they were acquired by Slitherine last year. That said, Shenandoah was working on a new war game centered on Gettysburg when that all went down and, since the acquisition, we haven’t heard much of anything about where the Shenandoah titles stand with Slitherine at the helm.

This morning the silence broke and we now know that Slitherine is busy converting all the prior Crisis in Command games from Shenandoah to the Unity engine which will make them available on both Android and PC alongside their current iPad iterations. Battle of the Bulge is the app currently being worked on, and they are targeting a May release.

As for Gettysburg: The Tide Turns, they are close to beta and should be putting out a call for beta testers in the near future. Eric Lee Smith is still supervising the game and, compared to the other Crisis in Command games, it’s a completely different animal. That is, the look and feel of the game will be completely different than what Shenandoah did with Battle of the Bulge, Drive on Moscow, and El Alamein. Also good news, they are targeting a 2015 release for Gettysburg as well.

Check out the original Gettysburg Kickstarter video from way back when after the break.

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It’s coming round the bend: Martin Wallace’s Steam still on target for Q3

Looks like we’ll have to reroute this train to go through Rock Ridge.

Martin Wallace is one of the greatest board game designers out there, and yet none of his designs have made it to the digital realm. His most popular games–Steam, Brass, Automobile–tend to be on the heavy side of board gaming. Actually, that might be too light a word. They tend to be on the very heavy side of board gaming. They generally involve complex economic models that are unforgiving to those who make mistakes. The thought of making an AI to play one of these boggles the mind a bit, so it’s understandable that none have made the transition.

Of course, last year we discovered that both Steam and Brass would be coming to tablets in 2015. Other than those announcements, however, we’ve not had any news since August. Brad over at 164 was lucky enough to attend PAX East this year where he met up with Mayfair and was able to snag a bit of info.

First of all, Steam is currently in alpha with an expected release date of Q3 2015. In what might be a first in software development, they are actually ahead of schedule and might even be able to deliver before Q3. For now, however, Q3 is the target. They also announced that all the official maps for Steam will be available in the app. No word on whether that will be via IAP or not, but it’s good to know that the app will come with a ton of variety.

Best of all, Brad got his hands on some screens. One of the new screens is at the top of this post, a couple more after the break. For even more, head over to Board Game Geek. Along with the screens, we’ve also got Brad’s video interview with Mayfair’s Alex Yeager on the other side.

Bidding for turn order at the start of the game. Only in a Martin Wallace title can you be screwed before the game even starts.

Choosing your action for the round. City Growth allows you to put more goods into a city location.

I’m trying to be cynical, but this really looks pretty.

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Forget-me-dot: Dotello is new puzzler for iOS/Android

Move dots anywhere? Is this really a puzzle game?

I’m sure there were many before it, but the first minimalist puzzle game I can remember that really grabbed my attention was Letterpress. It was a great game, sure, but the presentation was simple, relaxing, and, dare I say, pleasant. Since then, it seems like every other puzzle game has latched onto the graphic style. That’s not a terrible thing, but it would be nice if we could move on and try something new.

Dotello is a new puzzler that hasn’t moved on. Minimalist seems too weak a word. It’s dots on a white background. It doesn’t look bad, by any means, but the trailer also doesn’t do a very good job of telling me what the hell the point is. It looks like a match-3 game, but looks like you can move the dots to wherever you want instead of the usual sliding mechanism. In any regards, it’s a puzzle game for iOS Universal, so I’ll probably at least give it a try. It’s free to play, as well, and the IAP only appears to let you continue a game. It’s a slow Friday, folks.

Nab Dotello for iOS Universal, and take a look at the trailer after the break.

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Tough choices: Hero of Kendrickstone latest from Choice of Games

Take a long look. This will be the last picture you see, and it’s the splash screen.

I’ll admit that I was skeptical about the interactive fiction offerings from Choice of Games, mainly because of their presentation. Seriously, these gamebooks look like Word and Excel had an incestuous lovechild. When I finally took the dip with Choice of Robots, the depth of the writing and storytelling simply blew most other gamebooks out of the water. Here was a book that forced you to make real, hard choices instead of just asking you if you wanted to take the left or right corridor.

Choice of Games’ latest leaves the future behind and heads to a setting where gamebooks have always thrived: fantasy. The new book is called The Hero of Kendrickstone and it puts you in the titular hero’s shoes. Of course, being a Choice of Games book, it’s huge at over 240,000 words and the choices you make aren’t always cut and dried.

The Hero of Kendrickstone is available right now for iOS Universal, Android, and Kindle devices and will run you $3 through March 27. After that, the price goes up. You can always play the first three chapters for free, if you want to try before you buy (scroll all the way to the bottom).

Check out the trailer after the break. In true Choice of Games form, it looks like it was built using PowerPoint.

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Review: Card Crawl

Fresh meat

Just so we understand where this is going, let’s start by listing all the things that Card Crawl is not:

• Role-playing game
• Dungeon crawl
• Deep or heavy
• Easy

If you’re looking for a game that is those things, turn away. While Card Crawl puts on an RPG mask and presents itself as a dungeon-in-a-deck, it’s nothing of the sort. You’re character is merely a nameless card. You never level up. The challenges you face remain the same from game to game. What Card Crawl is, however, is a simple solitaire card game that is short, addictive, and has become my favorite new time waster.

Card Crawl has a closer connection to classic time wasters like Klondike or Free Cell than it does Baldur’s Gate. It is a solitaire card game with a static 54-card custom deck. That’s it. Like those classic solitaire games, your job is to get through the whole deck with no cards remaining at the end. Disappointed? You shouldn’t be, because it’s a fantastic design that fits that “I have 5 minutes to kill” niche that mobile puzzle games seem to fit into so nicely.

The deck of cards consists of 5 different suits: Weapons, Shields, Potions, Gold, and Monsters. The play area has two rows. The top row is the “dungeon” where new cards are dealt. The bottom row contains your character portrait, your “hands”, and your pack. Each turn you need to remove 3 of the 4 cards from the top row before the top row is refilled. So, if you’re dealt Shield, Sword, Monster, Gold. You might take the sword in one hand, shield in the other and put the gold in your pack. That would leave only the Monster and the top row would be refilled. Continue like this until the deck and top row are empty. Simple.

Too many potions, not enough hands.

Only it’s not simple. You see, once you put something in your hands, you cannot remove it without actually using it. So, let’s say you are dealt a weaker sword that does 3 damage, a weak shield that can withstand 3 damage, a powerful healing potion that can restore 10 health, and 3 Gold. Sounds great! No monsters and a lot of loot to grab. So, you put the 3-Sword and 3-Shield in your hands and stick the potion in your backpack for later. New cards are dealt and you reveal a powerful blade that does 7 damage, 10 gold, and a shield that protects against 7 damage. Great! No monsters again except, wait, where do I put all this great new stuff? In the garbage, that’s where. You cannot exchange it for something in your hand–the only way to remove a sword or shield is by attacking–so you’re left with crappy equipment in your hands while you have to throw the good stuff away until you’ve cleared out 3 of the top row’s cards. Luckily, if you throw items away, they are converted to gold which helps your final score. If you throw away the Gold cards, however, the dealer considers it a tip and you’ll get nothing. That’s really the crux of the game, and it’s a brilliant push-pull mechanism. You want to trash items, because you want to collect as much gold as you can, but without those items you probably won’t survive through the deck, and if you don’t survive through the deck you collect nothing. That’s right, thanks for coming, you’ll get nothing and like it. So, do you trash that potion that heals for 9 and collect 9 gold, knowing there’s a potion that heals 10 still somewhere in the deck, or do you hold onto it in case a really bad creature pops up next hand? Will the deck be unkind and force you to trash goodies? Will you use up your weapons and shields, freeing up both hands only to get dealt 4 monsters that you can no longer defend yourself against?

Yes, randomness abounds in this game and there will definitely be games where you aren’t going to make it through the dungeon no matter what you do because of how the deck is shuffled. Many, many games end with an empty deck but one or two Monsters left in the top row and not having a way to handle them other than letting them attack you and take you below 0 hit points. Of course, each run through takes only a few minutes, which is part of the charm. I have yet to play a game of Card Crawl where I came up just short that wasn’t immediately followed by starting a new game and playing at least one more time.

I’d really love that 9 Potion that I sold earlier.

I mentioned before that the deck of 54 cards is static. That’s not entirely true. 49 of the cards are identical each play through, but 5 of the cards represent your character’s special abilities. These are things like Sacrifice, which lets you damage a monster equal to the amount of damage your character has suffered, or Vanish which lets you discard everything from the top row and get dealt new cards. You begin the game with five, and can unlock more special cards by winning games and collecting gold. As you collect more of these, you can choose to play the game in a couple ways. Normal mode will randomly select five of your special powers, so you don’t know what you’re going to get, whereas Constructed mode allows you to select which five cards you want to take along with you. Both are fun, but I’m leaning toward Normal mode being my favorite. Something about not knowing which powers you have really shakes things up. Oh, and just in case you’re wondering, there is no IAP in the game, so the special cards can only be earned through playing.

The special powers seem to get more powerful, but they’re so situational that one might be powerful in one game and useless in the next.

Besides gameplay, the app is great to look at as well. The cards all have a hand drawn look to them and there are nice touches, such as your character’s portrait turning more and more skeletal as she takes damage. The main draw, however, is the ale swilling minotaur that’s dealing out the cards. Nothing will make you want to play another match quicker than his mocking laughter after you lose a match. I hate him and his entire bovine family.

I really hate this guy.

If you can’t tell, I’m really in love with Card Crawl. This has taken the place of my other fillers like Threes or Rules, and I don’t see myself heading back that way anytime soon. There’s something about a solitaire card game that really does it for me, and Card Crawl is one of the best I’ve played. I hope, in time, that new decks and new powers are offered, but even without expanding the game, I can see Card Crawl taking up space on my iDevices.

Card Crawl was played on both an iPad Air and iPhone 5.

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