Today is my birthday and yep, I got one of those now! Along with a selection of 6 games already. So, you can definitely expect some reviews of Switch games in the future! And not in the far future, either. Perhaps even one of them will be covered this year, who knows?
Monopoly is still a highly popular board game today, so it only makes sense that it would exist in a quick play version.
Developed by Creobit, published by 8Floor and released on July 27th 2017, Business Tour is… well, I just said it. It’s a take on Monopoly made simpler and quicker, played through an online mode against random opponents. Some elements are changed to speed up the game or add new concepts.
It is, decidedly, one of the Monopolys of all time.
We still have the eight sets of two or three properties, and the four airports (now turned into “resort cities”). Community Chest is gone, but Chance is still there. Prison has been swapped for Lost Island, serving the same purpose. Free Parking is now a Championship space, and a player who lands on it can choose one of their properties to house said Championship, which will increase the cost of that space’s rent a lot. The Go To Jail space was swapped for World Tour, a quick plane trip to any property owned either by you or no one.
Running out of funds doesn't mean you're guaranteed to lose; you can come back from it, but it'll be tough.
There are multiple ways to win. The game has a strict 20-minute timer; if two or more players are still standing at the end of it, the game tallies the worth of their possessions and the one with the highest total wins. A player can also win if all of their opponents go bankrupt from being unable to pay a rent, even after selling their properties to make money back. Last but not least, if a player owns all of the properties from both sets on one side OR three full sets anywhere OR all four resort cities around the board, they win by default. Other minor elements of Monopoly stay, such as getting to roll again after rolling a double (and going to jail, or “Lost Island”, if you roll three doubles in a row).
Hey, look at that - I own all of the properties on one side of the board. I win!
The trading of properties is simplified; after paying the property of a rent owned by someone else (other than resort cities), you can repurchase it, but it will be costly. You can’t set the price or haggle. If a player runs out of money to pay a debt, they can sell back any of their properties, including resort cities, to pay the debt, or declare bankruptcy. If a player leaves the game before they’ve lost, the game keeps going with a bot replacing that player. The game comes with a variety of menus, an online mode, a way to play with friends, and even a board editor to make some games more special than others where you can choose new themes, different corner spaces, and so on.
Not everybody has time for a 3+-hour board game, so a quick version can help get that fix without having to set up an entire evening with friends.
Fun game, but at the end of the day, it’s still Speed Monopoly. Mechanics are changed, and it has a neat little style to it, but the overall game is recognizable underneath all the modifications. That does make it a lot more approachable and accessible, though as a result some elements ramp up the speed at which everything happens – most noticeable in the rent prices that grow much faster than in the Parker Brothers classic. Probably in an attempt to bankrupt players rapidly in the last few minutes. The added means of victory also help quite a bit in speeding up the board game we all know.
Ending the game after 20 minutes means that the end tally of properties can reveal the real winner. I lost, and it wasn't that close, but as the timer ended I wasn't sure who would really win!
However, there’s a free-to-play model to this one. Playing costs 100 blue chips. It’s not a steep cost seeing as you also earn chips back for winning a game. You can use real money to get coins which you can then spend on blue chips, cosmetic changes such as character skins, different dice and even some power-ups to help you in the game, like special dice that only give an even or an odd result. On the plus side, it means that none of them are necessary to enjoy the game, and therefore your only true worry would be to run out of blue chips. Thankfully, you start out with 5,000 of them, so it’ll be a while before you need more… In Free Play, at least. You do need to fork out money for an Investor Pass if you want better rewards in the more competitive Tournament mode, however.
I was at first wishing to do something a little more
joyful, but then I decided to go the other way. I assume that if you read this
blog, you’re interested in video games, right? I mean, you’re probably a fan of
Nintendo and whatnot, and maybe you also know a lot about the other consoles in
the great console battle. That’s what I assume, anyway. And so, it is likely
that you’ve run into a number of trends in game development, or in gaming in
general, that you simply cannot stand. You see a game use any of these and you
just go “Urghhhhhh… again?” Or worse even, what was up to that point a good
game becomes intolerable in your eyes. These are the gaming clichés that have
worn out their welcome, the missions that annoy the players rather than
encourage then, the characters who serve no purpose… we’ve all run into
stuff like that. The good games may contain a few instances of these gaming
tropes, the bad games may contain dozens of them.
Obviously, my gaming experience will taint this Top
12, so if you’ve been reading this blog for a while, you might know a few of my
pet peeves. I will try to remove most tropes related to storytelling, as those
can be found in just about any story, beyond the realm of video games. However,
everything else is fair game; game development, gaming communities, trends,
gameplay elements… I’ll try to keep the rage to a minimum. But I’m sure you’ll
agree with me on more than a few elements on this list. Hell, you could
basically consider this list “12 common complaints directed at video games,
that I’ve seen, and that annoy me, ranked from what I consider the least bad to what I consider the worst”. Obviously that title would have been too long for Blogger. Remember
that these are my opinions, you’re free to disagree; Heck, if you’ve got
something in video games that really annoys you, and it’s not on the list, feel
free to discuss it in the comments! In fact, please do, I want to hear what irks you in gaming today. Alright, let’s get this started.
12. Rubber-band AI
How it is supposed to work.
A problem that mostly applies to racing games and
mini-games. When it comes to racing games, I’m very much in a “love it or hate
it” mindset, many factors can tip the balance of my opinion. I know for a fact
that AI, in video games, is very difficult to program, and thus there’s always
a chance of having something too easy or too difficult for a human player to go
against. Rubber-band AI is the practice in which the AI of CPU opponents in a
sport game is programmed in such a way that in case of potential defeat against
the player, these opponents will become harder, better, faster, stronger… and
smarter.
The problem with this method is that there has to be this fine balance
that very few games actually get right; when faced with possible defeat, the adversaries either stay relatively weak, or become so persistent and dangerous that you become the hopeless one. You know, I don’t mind when this
practice is fair. However, some games combine this with what is called
“cheating”, which computers can very easily do against human opponents (a particularly blatant example is in many Mario Kart games, where karts who are about to lose often reach impossible speeds or take impossible shortcuts if that means beating the player).
Rubber-band AI is not supposed to feel like the computer is cheating. It's meant to add difficulty without having to resort to cheap tactics, the idea is to have the
CPU opponents act like human players do when they don’t want to lose; they
give their all. That doesn't equate to cheating, human players who are about to lose don't suddenly gain infinite mushrooms or get inexplicably faster! Rubberband AI can be done well. I just don’t see it done well very often.
Hi everyone! Just a little update on new games I bought recently.
So, first of all, a week ago I bought a game called Bass Pro Shops' The Hunt. It is, well... a hunting game. And so far, it's a lot of fun, even if it's not really easy. Some parts are really difficult, but I am more than halfway through the game. Expect a review of it someday. Much later, probably.
Also, I bought a Wii Points card yesterday, so I bought two games on the Wii Shop Channel.
The first is Pokémon Rumble, because I just felt like having another Pokémon game in my collection. That game might be too easy, however. Eh, I'm just gonna finish it faster and I'll be able to review it soon!
Last but not least, there have been games I keep hearing about and I want to play, badly. With the announcement of Mega Man in Super Smash Bros 4, I bought the first Mega Man game for the Virtual Console. I'm finally gonna play with the famous android.
Also, maybe someday, if I run out of WiiWare or Virtual Console games, I might spend a post talking about the Demos you can buy for free. That ought to be interesting.
Don't forget to tune in Sunday at night for the second part of the Thrillville: Off The Rails review!
Okay, well... Thursday, July 31st, I bought Sonic and the Black Knight. It's a... fun game. I'll put it that way. However, this means you can expect me to review it someday. As to when... I can't tell, as I decide the games I'll review a month ahead of time only. Which is still fine.
Also, I went to Staples recently (my next university semester begins this September, so I needed a new pencil case), and to my not-so-great surprise, they sell Wii games at a cheap price. Among others, I saw Mario Super Sluggers. ...Oh, I feel like buying it next month... and maybe another game sold cheaply...
Whatever. I also intend to buy a Wii Points card, so that I'll buy more games on WiiWare and the Virtual Console. That's the problem with today's generation of consoles; you can pay using your credit card or Points Cards, but someday the Points Cards will be discontinued, and if you have problems buying Wii Points through a credit card... then you're in trouble. Oh well.
Anyway, on a side-note, I've been playing the game I'll review this Friday. I can hardly wait until then to post the first part of that review! ...But I'll still wait. I know I can wait, anyway.
