=== Mobile Game Review -- Connection - Puzzle - 10/10 ===

Welcome to Connection, a minimalist-style puzzle game all about connecting the dots.

With each level the player is presented with a series of spaces which must all be connected from a starting position through all the other spaces on the level. Each level presents varying numbers of colours and each space can be connected with any available colour as long as the chain remains unbroken and all spaces are covered.

Some spaces will have a dot within a circle which means it must be connected twice. This can be completed either by running the same colour through the space twice, or running two different colours through the space; this is the only way to have two different coloured lined cross each other.

Another mechanic in Connection are what I would call portals. These spaces come in pairs which allow the player to connect a line into one side of the portal and continue out from the other side; this would be the only way to have an unconnected line of the same colour in two different places.

The last mechanic of Connection (that I have come across so far) are empty coloured spaces. These spaces MUST be filled with only that specific colour and no other colour. With all of these available mechanics, there are many different forms of available levels... I have yet to break the surface of the game as the advertisements seem to indicate that there are more than 200 available levels to play.

Many level have more than one way to complete them...

And not all levels have the same type of layout, which may end up throwing your for a loop every once in a while.

Summary

Gameplay: I'm not usually the biggest puzzle-type person because they aren't as action-packed or strategic as I prefer, but this one is very fun and even though the same few mechanics are being used throughout each level, it's still a fun activity when killing time to exercise your brain.

Possibly my favourite part about this over other games, is that there's no energy-limit to stop the player from continuing to play more. There's nothing saying it costs 1 energy to play a level and you can only save up 1 energy per hour up to a maximum of 10. NOTHING LIKE THAT AT ALL. Which means as long as you're up to the task of arranging colourful lines, you can continue as long as you like.

Sound: There are some nice and satisfying clicks and some very chill music to listen to while completing each level. Though it's nothing special to talk about, it's very enjoyable and definitely doesn't take away from the game at all.

Replayability: As already mentioned, I keep wanting to play more and more levels even though they're the same mechanics over and over and over. I definitely wouldn't want to replay the same levels that I've already passed over again, but as long as I'm continuing to progress into newer levels, I would happily keep going forward through this game.

Sidenote: I wouldn't call this game difficult, though there are certainly times where you must give a little thought about how to arrange things... Reading the advertisement on the Connection page claims that if you can pass 200 levels in less than 30 minutes, you're a genius. I just did the math and figure that would be about 9 seconds per level. I'm sure if you practiced a lot at the mechanics and patterns that you'd be able to pass level quite quickly, but 200 levels at 9 seconds each seems like a pretty far stretch to actually be able to do without any prior knowledge of the game.

SCORE: I really enjoy Connection not as a measure of how smart I am, but rather as a simple and relaxing puzzle game. My score for Connection will be 10/10 because as far as puzzle games go, this one is the first which has really caught my eye and had me continue to play further and further even without any new mechanics being involved.

=== Reactor - Mobile Game Review, Idle City Builder - 6/10 ===

     Welcome everybody to my review of Reactor, what I would call an idle city builder. I have quite a bit of experience with idle building games as I have a phone and a lot of spare time to kill at times. I mean, sometimes I just want to open a game, upgrade some things and close the game. Yay, I feel like I'm being productive and progressing through the game because I'm now getting more than I was getting before!

     Unfortunately with this game, it's just not the best example of this style of game in my opinion. There are some games where you have to press a single button to progress faster than if you were to leave the game to itself. This game has a lot of buttons to press... at first. When you start playing Reactor, you have to build windmills which stay alive for a period of time until they run out and then you have to click them again to bring them back to life. During this lifespan they create power which you must then press another button to sell this power for money. This is all quite a convoluted process which isn't really all that much fun as the game starts.

     As usual there are a lot of things to buy which progressively make more and more money, but as with most games of this type, they're locked at first until you reach some sort of goal or pay an unlock fee or something of that nature. Sooo...

     Then you learn about research. This is another type of building which you can create which will make research points every second. This research can be put towards many different things including the ability to sell this power automatically. Alright, so now we can make buildings which automatically sell some power for money, but they take up a lot of space, and none of this is feeling fun to me yet. Research now leads into other types of power which can be created as well, but then things start getting really confusing and suddenly you realize you don't have any space left and you have to wait quite a bit of time to remove objects in the landscape which are in the way.

     The game seems little complicated for an idle game to me compared to the other options out there. I'm sure there are people who would enjoy this type of thing, but this isn't really what I'm looking for when I'm looking for a mobile game. I just find the way this game tries to balance certain buildings with the space that you have a little frustrating; especially when it makes me wait for 4 sets of 60 minutes every time I want to remove a mountain or a tree in the game.

     This isn't an awful game; I would play more of this game if I didn't already have better and more fun games to play. I'm going to have to give this game a 6/10 because doesn't catch my attention, but it's not bad.

~ Kyle Welykholowa

=== Idle Heroes - Mobile Game Review, Idle Progression - 10/10 ===

     Alright, so I've been wanting to do a review of Idle Heroes for quite some time now. Idle Heroes is an idle progression game which tends to be a great type of game for those on the go who sometimes need to kill a little bit of time on their phone between tasks and other events. There are good idle games and bad ones and usually they all have the same format, but different artwork and presentation. Idle Heroes brings something completely new to the table for me.

     Idles Heroes isn't just about getting to the next amount of money that buys an upgrade to get more money faster. This game has you upgrade your heroes using money you generate while offline so that you can do more while online. Having higher level heroes lets you progress through the game in multiple ways including the campaign where you get more money as you get further into it, the tower of oblivion where you fight challenges to earn rewards, and the brave trial where you fight up to 15 opponents for rewards based on how far you get.

     Combat in this game is very simple, you click battle and they attack and use their special abilities whenever they are able to. There really isn't much for me to say about it, but that's not a bad thing at all. This game is really straightforward and I'm giving it a perfect score because a good game doesn't need to be complicated. You get 10 tasks every day which you can complete for rewards which you can then use to upgrade your heroes or purchase items. There are at least 5 ways to earn different types of currency which can be used to purchase new heroes or upgrades for them.

     There really isn't anything bad I can think of about this game other than it can take a while to progress to the next stage at some points. Every once in a while you face up against a boss or a harder group of enemies which can sometimes take a while to level up enough to be able to defeat, but that doesn't take much away from the game because there's so much else which can still be done even when you're stuck on another part.

     So Idle Heroes gets a 10/10 from me for being a great game that I just cannot put down in my spare time.

Thanks everybody and have a wonderful day! ^_^

~ Kyle Welykholowa

=== Tiny Sheep - Mobile Game Review 8/10 ===

     So even after saying I would stop playing Egg Inc., I find myself still playing it just because--oh wait... this is Tiny Sheep. I don't often find idle games to be a lot of fun, but recently I have found a few which I believe are worth mentioning.

     Tiny sheep is a game where you clone sheep in an effort to make money by selling different kinds of wool based on what farm you have. You have to make more and more sheep which passively earn you money until your farm value is high enough that you can upgrade your farm to the next wool type. The visuals are fun and if you enjoyed Egg Inc., you'll enjoy this game as well. The biggest different really, is in whether you would prefer chickens or sheep.

     Now, recreating a previous formula in a new way is not a bad thing at all; this game is certainly fun. The problem I see with recreating something in a different image is that it either has to have some improvements, or it won't be terribly more interesting than the previous iteration. Unfortunately for me, this game is so incredibly similar to Egg Inc., that I feel as though I have to give it a lower score than I gave to Egg Inc. Tiny Sheep does make you feel like you are progressing quite quickly due to using large values of money and giving you lots of large bonuses through watching ads, but upon closer inspection, it feels to me either as though the rate of progress is the same as before, or less.

     I'm not sure what to say about this game that hasn't really already been said in my Egg Inc. review (which I keep mentioning a lot, and for that I'm sorry). I do really like the visuals in this game; I think I actually like them more than Egg Inc. You still have birds (drones) to tap on to make extra money, there is golden wool (golden eggs) for more important long-term research, and you're still filling barns (hen houses) and driving your wool (eggs) off to the world for profits.

     Tiny Sheep is a fun game, but it isn't a new game. It's not bad, but it's not something fresh. I'm going to give it an 8/10 for Idle Games for those reasons and put it to rest after having just got it, because I already know this game inside and out.

     Have a great one everybody! ^_^

~ Kyle Welykholowa

Egg Inc. - Mobile Game Review - 10/10

     I've been playing this game for a few months now because it's just so much fun. Egg Inc. is an idle game where you press a button to hatch chickens which then run across your screen into a hen house where they then lay eggs for you to sell. As I read that, it makes the game sound incredibly interactive, but really the chickens laying eggs and making money from the eggs being sold is just something that is implied behind the scenes.

     So this game looks nice. It has a sort of art-style that I like to see and it's a pretty simple game. The most interactive thing about this game is that you get to shoot down drones which either make you large amounts of money, or golden eggs. Money is used to upgrade your eggs and farm so that you make more money faster and to hatch more chickens faster. Golden eggs are used for epic upgrades which persist even if you prestige.

     Prestige is a common thing to see in idle games. It's a way to make the game last longer by starting over again from the beginning, only with the added bonus of, say... + 1% to the money you make for each object you have related to the prestige system. In this game, it's another type of egg called a soul egg.

     (If you couldn't tell, a lot of this game revolves around eggs.)

     I found Egg Inc. on the Google Play store by accident just because I was browsing and instantly fell in love with it. I think it's a great adaptation of the idle genre. A game where you make progress, then continue to make some progress even while you're not playing the game. It starts off quite quickly even without any prestige. You soon find yourself unlocking new eggs, selling your farm to start a new farm where you make more expensive eggs over and over again. Everything goes great! Until you hit that roadblock...

     Like every idle game, it ropes you in with the promise of fast and rewarding progress. Completing missions left and right for those oh so valuable golden eggs. Upgrading your egg to the next level again and again. Until finally, you find yourself with a quest that takes a looooooooooooong time. And when I say long, I mean some of these quests would take a week straight of holding down that "hatch chicken" button until you finally get the number of chickens required to complete the quest. Or longer if you leave the game to hatch chickens for you while you're not there. And during this time, you either can't upgrade your egg because that would cause you to have to start over with no chickens... or you just don't have enough farm value to upgrade even if you wanted to.

     Now, when I say this, I don't mean this is a bad game by any means. That's just part of the idle genre. The game wouldn't last very long if it didn't come to a point where you have much much MUCH higher goals to reach. But at this point... if you're like me, then you want so badly to continue playing because you want to 100% the game. But at the same time, if you have better things to do and more fun things to move on to, it's just not worth it to continue playing.

     Even after saying that, I absolutely recommend this game. I got my girlfriend hooked on it too just by asking her to hatch a few chickens for me while I was busy. If you want something to keep you busy during those times when you're bored out of your mind, this game does deliver. Even if you don't finish the game up to the very end, I absolutely think you should give this one a go. At this point, I firmly believe this is the best idle game I've played.

     Egg Inc. gets a 10 / 10 from me for the idle genre. Have a great day everybody!

~ Kyle Welykholowa

Blizzard is dropping the Battle Net brand.

     After years and years of playing some of my favourite games on the good old Battle.net, Blizzard will be dropping the brand and changing it to be Blizzard Tech. To me, this doesn't really change much except to put some nostalgic thoughts of playing games like Diablo II online with friends and other random strangers across the internet.

     I'm always intrigued when it comes to changing up branding and seeing where things go from there. It always seems to be a bit of a gamble to me. That, and I see some brands like Coke changing it up quite often. I can't imagine having an entire brand rely on me coming up with some sales-pitch with the hopes that it captivates the target audience. There's the very real chance that it fails miserably and you actually lose customers in the process.

     In this case (for long-time customers like myself), I imagine it'll be a little bit weird for a bit. Ultimately though, I think it makes a ton of sense; and I think a little bit of weirdness is a minor concern considering new customers will have an easier time adjusting to and finding the new system.

     Really, this is simply a thought-provoking announcement to me. Something which makes me remember the past with games like StarCraft and WarCraft, and look forward to the future. Oh how I love watching the beautiful progression of technology since my birth in 1992. It's amazing to me how I've grown up with it and through it and I cannot imagine how older generations must think about it when they remember their past.

     That's all for now. Have a great day everybody! ^_^

~ Kyle

A Beautiful Thing

     I've waited so long for this to happen and now I am the happiest person in the world. I hardly know what to do with myself. It has been an adventure thus far and now I look forward to more adventures coming up in the future with a beautiful and amazing girl in my life. I'm pretty much so excited that I just want to aea;jg;LSAJDFASHGOWAHETGLJAGHAAJSFGJ!~!!! and I don't really know how else to describe it.

     Obviously there will be some work to it for things to progress properly and much better than last time, but I'm certainly looking forward to the bright future ahead of me. I'm finding more hours of work and I'll soon be signing up for the right course for me.

     In the meantime, I'll be trying to find more time to stream, make YouTube videos, and be the best boyfriend in the world. I hope you all have a beautiful day and I hope you're all happy people. Don't ruin someone else's day, make it better.

     I love you Carley Dawn Larocque.

~ Kyle