=== Mobile Game Review -- Hooked Inc: Fisher Tycoon - Idle Progression - 8/10 ===

What Are We Reviewing?

Today I have another Idle Progression-type game for you called Hooked Inc: Fisher Tycoon. Now it's hard to get around the mass of Idle Progression games that exist on mobile devices, sure they're mostly all free so you could try them on your own... or you can take a a look at my experience to see whether or not your interest is great enough to skip the time cost altogether.

Gameplay:
As with all idle games there is an active and an idle portion of the game. The active part involves swiping across the screen to catch fish. Catching fish means you make money which can be used to buy upgrades which make fish worth more which means more money and so on and so forth.

Every so often you'll receive chests which may have money or.... emeralds in them (which is the second type of currency in the game), or there are of course quests which give rewards for performing tasks such as the above which is to acquire 40 upgrades which then gives 3 emeralds.

What are emeralds used for you ask? Emeralds are used for hiring employees which increase productivity both online and offline. How great is that? These employees can even be upgraded to be better by spending emeralds on them.

There is a fun little spinner in this game which gives you a free spin to get bonuses including increased income for a period of time which can be spun additionally by watching advertisements for even more bonuses.

What is the point of all of this? Well to earn experience of course which can be claimed by taking the action of going back to the start of the game from step one only earning 1% more income per point of experience and 100% more income per star... which is again gained by completing quests and things.

So at this point we've hit all the usual points of an idle game where you have regular income, alternate income, and a prestige-type thing which resets your progress so that you can get further into the game faster. Pretty straightforward.

There's a fun little difference in this game compared to others where there are boxes which float down every once in a while that have items within them. These items have different abilities including increasing fish value and even the ability to catch birds!


Graphics:
The artwork is nice on the eyes, very thematic showing wood, wind, water, and fish. It all makes sense when it comes to fish and fishing with nothing sorely out of place. My only "complaint" would be that there isn't much incentive to watch the screen because most of the time you're carelessly swiping back and forth or putting the phone down because it's another advertisement.

I will however take a quick moment to note that I LOVE that this game gives REAL incentive to watching advertisements. Normally an advertisement would be something you start and put the phone down for a minute just to get an x2 multiplier on your earnings which is... sort of a whatever kind of thing to do when it comes to money, but in Hooked Inc: Fisher Tycoon you get 10 Crowns every time you watch an ad which eventually levels up to get more upgrades. Finally a game that REALLY rewards you for watching advertisements!

Sound:
I've always enjoyed the sound of the ocean and birds (in this case seagulls), which is one of the reasons I really want to go back to Hawaii one day. On the other hand, the music got really old really fast. REALLY fast.


Replayability:
This is always the biggest point of a game is how long can you continue playing a game for? I did find Hooked Inc: Fisher Tycoon very fun, but as with all idle games, it tends to fall off after a while once you get over the honeymoon phase. Idle games will unfortunately never been in the hall of fame on my list of games because the gameplay never changes; it's a very short look of getting the game upgrades and performing the same actions, restarting for a higher multiplier, then doing it all again.


SUMMARY:
There are a few points which set this game apart from other idle-games I've played before:

1) If you enjoy fish, you'll enjoy this game.

2) It's not all about passive income, there's a lot of progress to be made when actively playing and the mechanic to doing so is all about swiping (which is much easier on the hands than tapping).

3) Advertisements that play into the future of the game.

I've said it before and I'll say it again, idle-games are not my favourite; they get old very fast. HOWEVER, in terms of what an idle-game is looking to do... Hooked Inc: Fisher Tycoon is a really good one with differences that make it interesting.

I have to knock off a couple points when an idle game stops progressing so quickly or runs out of things to do, so I will be giving Hooked Inc: Fisher Tycoon 8/10. It really is one of the better idle-games out there, but I still have a problem with a game that relies on watching advertisements to progress further into the game.

~ DaemonVirus

=== Mobile Game Review -- Car Merger - Idle Clicker - 2 / 10 ===

Games where you progress while you are offline are some of the easiest games to play on a phone. Car merger is one such game where you perform activities online to then make more money while you are offline.

The gameplay of car merger is quite simple really: starting from the beginning you would purchase one car of level 1 and set it to work racing around a track which earns money over time both while you are playing the game and while you have the game closed. Once enough money has been earned, you will then be able to purchase a second car of level 1. At this point you have two choices: the first would be to put both cars to work racing around the track earning money over time. The second would be to move one of these cars on top of the other of these cars which would create one car of level 2.

As the levels of the cars racing around the track increase, they earn more money. A big component of a game with an idle progression element is making more money... Which means anytime you can make more money that's usually the correct choice. Really, the only time you would want to not level up your car might be if you want to have the maximum number of cars on the track at one time. In most cases you straight up make more money by merging cars together to make a higher level car... But occasionally if you don't have enough money to purchase the car you need and are about to go offline, having the maximum number of cars on the track earns you an additional 10% income.

Someone may at first think this is a great bit of strategy to the game! Unfortunately, the payoff is just wasn't big enough to really care whether or not I bothered filling out my race track. Despite this, I still tried to have a good time... which was a little difficult... because half of the game was spent watching advertisements. At some point in the game an option unlocks which allows you to purchase cars of a higher starting level than level 1; but the bad part about this option is that nearly every time you open up the tab... You also open up an advertisement. Oh, and of course there's an option to WILLINGLY watch ANOTHER advertisement to get a car (which already doesn't cost very much compared to what you're making) FOR FREE! Most of these advertisements are pretty easy to skip, but I really don't want to be spending most of my game time closing advertisements. I may as well just be browsing the internet or watching television.

My final gripe about this game is quite simply... this:

I mean... hey, I get it, you have to show advertisements to make money otherwise you'll only lose money by providing a free game without anything worth purchasing inside the game. The problem with this I have is WHY give me the option to download the game and NOT consent to the terms... if you're then not going to let me close the window after changing the option? I'd much rather receive a notification that says "Look, this is how it works and you using the app means you consent to the terms." Don't give me the OPTION then tell me it's the wrong choice.

Verdict

Gameplay: Simple concept, easy to figure out. Controls are sometimes a little unresponsive while merging cars. Nice to make progress while not playing the game, but not really much to do once you've merged a bunch of cars. You just keep... merging more cars and waiting for longer and longer periods of time as the costs get higher.

Sound: Lots of cute fun sounds. Doesn't get annoying. Nothing special to talk about.

Replayability: Easy concept to jump in and out of. Nothing to work towards other than more money. Constantly getting interrupted by advertisements is no fun. Once you've merged one car, you've merged them all. Nothing changes other than how fast you make money as you merge more and more cars to race around the track.

SCORE: Unfortunately I just don't have all that much to say about this game. It works, that's about it. There isn't very far to go into this game before you run out of new content, there are way too many ads, and it feels like the game is teasing you when it gives the option of not consenting to the use of data and advertisements.

+ It's a working game
+ Easy to get into
+ Sounds are nice and don't get annoying

- Seriously NOT a deep game
- Once you've merged one car, there's nothing new besides changing advertisements
- There's way too many forced advertisements followed by options to watch MORE advertisements for "rewards"
- There is an option to not have to watch advertisements... but it's just a huge tease which doesn't let you play the game if you turn it off

Car Merger gets a score of 2 / 10 from me; after a short time into the game, it becomes very dry and repetitive with no new content to look forward to. AND STOP WITH THE ADVERTISEMENTS ALREADY!!!


~ Kyle Welykholowa

=== Mobile Game Review - Motor World: Bike Factory - Management - 3/10 ===

     Motor World: Bike Factory is a very fun game. Or at least... the idea is very fun. I've played this game before, back when it first came out actually. This game is a sibling to the game it's based off of by the same company called Motor World: Car Factory.

The gameplay is nice and easy: pick a vehicle to build, click the vehicle to start building, click the vehicle again and again each time the next part is ready to be built until the vehicle is done, then wait for an amount of time until the vehicle gets sold for a profit. As you progress through the game, you can use dollars to buy better workers who work faster and/or are more efficient. You also unlock new vehicles which require more work points to finish and get sold for a higher profit. This gameplay is so simple, yet so much fun!

The energy resource in this game which lets you do work is donuts. Each worker has a certain supply of work points which must be refilled using a donut every time they run out. Donuts can be acquired by waiting for them to refill over time, or sometimes you'll find them while working on vehicles. You can also sometimes find mystery cards which can give you random bonuses such as refilling your donuts or allowing you to construct a vehicle for free rather than paying for it.

Now, for the observant people out there, you'll notice that I'm talking good about this game, but im only giving it 3/10. The reason for this is because I genuinely do love the gameplay of the original game (and this one because it's the same), but there are a few downsides to this game in particular.

First, the gameplay is the same; there's no difference between this game and the original Motor World: Car Factory other than this one is building bikes instead of cars. Also, this may have changed since last I played, but the total vehicle options are fewer than in the other game. The second reason I'm giving this game such a low score, is because I really wanted to get back into it, but upon downloading it and playing it once again... it seems to now be swamped with advertisements! I could happily waste tons of time playing this game continuously before, but now I have to watch a 30 second advertisement every time I finish constructing a bike! Maybe I could live with this with bikes that take longer to build, but when you're making really cheap and fast to build bikes... you end up watching more advertisements than gameplay.

*****
     I've now given the game a proper chance and played through the beginning tutorial phase until I've gotten past that and a little further beyond. Unfortunately the game hasn't gotten any better. I did have a ton of fun while I was without internet and playing the game... because it wasn't able to give me tons of advertisements every time I close a menu. Realistically though... who's going to turn off their internet every time they want to play a game? Not to mention the fact that the game crashed after half of the advertisements as well! So unfortunately, as much as I wanted to give this game a higher score, it's just too buggy and in your face to enjoy.
*****
So in summary, Motor World: Bike Factory is not a bad game. It is however already done almost exactly the same, and the amount of advertisements really kills the fun of playing the game, almost to the point where the game is unplayable. ~ Kyle Welykholowa