Katrina Johnson

Based on my first experiences with Toontown and Puzzle Pirates, it seems that Toontown is much more focused on social interactions. One of my first tasks in Toontown was to make at least one friend. I found it very easy to make friends here, as I asked several people to be my friend and almost all accepted. Unfortunately, this ease of friending makes the friendship more hollow.

In Puzzle Pirates, all of my first tasks were independent. While my duty puzzles did help members of the crew (each of us had a duty like carpentry, bilge pumping, and sailing), each was a series of puzzles that I completed alone. The constant “duty reports” reminded me that I was working alongside a crew, but these interruptions didn’t really encourage social interaction.

After completing three duty puzzles in Puzzle Pirates, I decided to explore the town. I went into a building that looked like a restaurant. I tried to check out a few games at tables where I saw one or two people seated. However, most of the activities were limited to paying members. I then went over to a table with a crowd of people. It was a central table that allowed players to access multiple parlor games. However, none of these people appeared to be talking to each other, at least outside of games. The multiplayer games may have had conversations, but the crowd in the outside world was silent.

Toontown had a very different atmosphere. There was much more chatter, from the taunts of enemies to the very vocal creatures at the headquarters. Even if these animals didn’t have a mission for you, they would talk to you. I received several friend requests and even was surprised when a message appeared on my screen later, stating that one of my friends needed help in battle. I teleported to them immediately and found that two of her other friends had done the same. There were four of us in battle, all determined to help our friend. This friend was someone I knew nothing about other than the facts that she was in danger and she had asked me to be her friend. If her other two friends knew as little about her as I did, then the game must have done something special to establish a connection between us.

How does Toontown unite people better than Puzzle Pirates? Toontown keeps everyone on the same side. While you fight against enemies, you can always have a friend in battle and you never seem to fight other players. In Puzzle Pirates, the spirit of pirates reigns true: pirates are out for small crews or for themselves. The activities are more isolated and there are more selfish goals. It does not seem like gifts are encouraged like they are with the big gift button in Toontown’s “Cattlelog.” While I am not opposed to social interaction, I am more inclined to play a game like Puzzle Pirates because it feels much less invasive and the social dynamic is less of a focus.

I downloaded Prince of Persia: Classic to play with my friend over the weekend. He had told me that it was supposed to be great and he was very excited to try it out. Assuming that it would be worth the $10 or so, I decided not to waste my time with a demo and go straight for the full version.

First, my friend and I took turns playing. When one of us would complete a level or die repeatedly, we'd switch off. This worked pretty well through the first few levels. The visuals looked great and the Prince moved swiftly. The combat mechanics seemed a little rough, but I thought that I just needed more time to get used to it.

We progressed until the fourth level, when suddenly we got stuck. Perhaps it was the fact that we had found so few of the health increase potions. Maybe it was the combat system. Whatever it was, we both got frustrated because we had an incredibly hard time defeating a common enemy. Once in a while we did beat the enemy, but there was no checkpoint right afterwards, and a misstep in a difficult jump sequence made it all worthless. Prince of Persia: Classic is very unforgiving.

I stopped playing the game after multiple attempts at the fourth level. I was ready to give it up entirely. Fortunately, my friend is more patient or perhaps just more stubborn. After a short break, he continued to play through the game and is nearly finished now. However, it was not without repeated swearing and complaining that he progressed that far. While he did not face the same block that we found earlier, he still didn't seem to be having a lot of fun.

It seems that we may have run into such frustration for two reasons: not finding the life potions and the lack of consistency in combat. The fact that we didn't find all the potions to give our Prince more health was entirely within our control, but the combat was not. Although we could have looked up the secret locations to extend our health or explored more on our own, many of the potions were well-hidden. Areas that don't appear to be accessible until you jump to them suddenly become visible. However, this leap-before-you-look philosophy can be very dangerous. As I mentioned earlier, one bad jump can set you back several minutes, especially when there are difficult enemies. While the areas become very obvious once you discover them, it seems to work well only upon repeat plays of the levels. I am not the kind of player who enjoys returning to games over and over, and I think this type of play may have worked better in the arcade setting.

The second most frustrating part of the game was the combat system. If you tried to counter an attack one way and it failed, the next time that same method would work (and vice versa). It was incredibly inconsistent and lacked a cohesive pattern. In this way, it felt less like a skill-based game and more emphasis was placed on chance. Also, attack animations could take a long time, and button mashing would cause the Prince to execute all the commands in order, but slowly. It felt like watching a slow computer, clicking away while the cursor spins and you just have to watch while your Prince dies.

Although I did not play the game for as long as my friend, I experienced enough frustration to show me that Prince of Persia: Classic is not my type of game. If you want to read a more in-depth review from my friend who played with me, check it out here: Design Review: Prince of Persia Classic.

Club Penguin recently made headlines, as it was purchased by Disney for $350 million, with the potential of $700 million. What makes it so valuable?

Club Penguin is not a particularly engaging site for adults. It has only 15 mini games, most of which are relatively short play experiences. The content is limited and the virtual world is small. While it was designed for children, it is surprising to see how much of a success has come from so little.

This has lead me to wonder what exactly is the draw for children to this site. With 700,000 paying subscribers a month, something must keep kids coming back for more. In a few hours, I was able to discover that this site is about social interactions – but not in the typical chat fashion. It’s about materialism, and boasting to your friends about your cool igloo, awesome gear, or multiple coveted pets. In essence, all the features opened up by a paid subscription are the draw.

Club Penguin is not that much of a social game. Penguins didn’t seem to say much to eat other outside of “Hi,” “Boy or girl?” and the occasional “Where’s the dojo?” It seems that most users are spending their time playing games to get money to buy stuff (outfits, pets, toys and technology for their igloos, etc.). With the amount of users spending time in the games, it is fascinating that only four of the 15 games are multiplayer. Two of those games are mancala and a version of connect four. There is a lot of potential to get players engaged in a game together, and much of it is wasted.

If I were to improve the social element of this game, I would definitely add more multiplayer games. The addition of games in general would greatly improve the variety in the site, and it would become more interesting. One of the main draws of an online hangout seems to be the fun you can have playing with other people, and it is almost sad how little interaction Club Penguin promotes through the selection of games.

Outside of the games, there are few ways to connect with other people through activities. While there is a dance room, pizza restaurant, and other virtual spaces, there is little to do other than moving your penguin around and trying to make friends. It seems that there should be some sort of reward system for interacting with other people. Being able to have two penguins perform a special dance or working together to clean the pizza resturant at the end of the day could help teach teamwork.

Another social institutions in Club Penguin is the tour guide system. Members can take a quiz and become a tour guide. However, I found that these tour guides didn’t seem to help much when I asked questions. It would be more helpful to have “help penguins” around that took a more complicated test (or were AI-controlled) that helped new penguins get around. I found that one of the biggest annoyances early in my experiences of Club Penguin was the fact that people didn’t answer my questions.

While Club Penguin may be profitable, it definitely falls short of its potential, at least in the social area. Through the institution of incentives (and rewarding experiences) from social interactions, the game could turn into a thriving social mecca.

After months of writing about games by myself, I thought it would be fun to write with someone else. A good friend of mine and a fellow game blogger, Jettoki is the co-author of He Games, She Games. Each week, we play the same title and then write about it. Unlike this blog, the games anayzed on He Games, She Games are almost exclusively recent releases.

Click below to read our thoughts on Stuntman: Ignition, one of the games I tested this summer.

He Games, She Games

One of my favorite parts of being a video game design student is getting to play games for homework. This week, my assignment was to play Donkey Kong, the Game Boy title from 1994.

Usually, my main focus while playing a new game is the fun factor. An academic setting can really help to break me out of my narrow point of view and see a game in a new way. While playing Donkey Kong, I was supposed to look for design elements and good ideas to inspire a class game project.

What strikes me most about Donkey Kong was the simplicity of the levels. Many levels were entirely visible from the start – making for easy strategizing. It reminded me of the simple mazes I used to have in travel fun activity books, but better. This maze involved a couple of stops and active enemies to avoid.

The foes in Donkey Kong were refreshingly different from the 3D platformer enemies I’ve grown accustomed to defeating. Some enemies can be easily avoided, but their heads can be used as platforms to jump to a higher level. Other enemies wouldn’t kill you outright upon contact with them, but they could knock you off ledges and be a general nuisance. These annoying enemies didn’t have complex A.I. behavior, but the level design was sophisticated enough to make them a formidable obstacle.

I had a hard time getting past the first level in Donkey Kong. I’ll be the first to admit that I’m very bad at Mario games, so it should come as no surprise that I had trouble controlling Mario in Donkey Kong. This game is much older than games I normally play, and the control scheme was much more simple. Instead of worrying about all the angles to make a jump, timing was most often the most important factor. I found myself climbing up the broken ladders, sure that I was out of the deathy barrels’ range, only to discover that the collision was slightly less accurate than newer games and I would soon be dead.

I hold no grudge against Donkey Kong. In fact, I really admire all the creativity in the level design and the simplicity in the puzzles. It’s great to see a game that focused on design before graphics and made the most of the limitations of its time. While this game may not be fun for someone like me accustomed to modern mechanics, I still find it an admirable classic.

I knew very little about Rune Factory until my friend Jettoki began playing it. I teased him about the silly sounds and cute anime style, but he insisted on its merits. I picked it up myself and found that it wasn't what I expected.

Check out our thoughts about Rune Factory on our new blog He Games, She Games.

Rune Factory: A Fantasy Harvest Moon

Many of the games I’ve played for this class have strong themes. Aside from SET and Cranium, Werewolf, Toon Town, Puzzle Pirates, and Club Penguin all seemed to have themes as a central part of the game. SET didn’t appear to have a particular theme, as it was very basic and composed primarily of color, pattern and number groupings. While Cranium did adhere to a particular style, it did not seem to have a theme, especially when compared to the other games.

Werewolf was the only themed game that was not online. The theme was not tangible; if someone heard the conversation in the game it could be mistaken for a detective game. The theme mainly was used to add fun to the game and make it unique, since it’s more interesting to tease a friend about being a werewolf (meaning their character wouldn’t have a choice to murder) as opposed to a cold-blooded killer.

The online games seemed to use their themes to bind together a serious of games and activities. Toon Town was more about having a themed hangout and serious of activities, while Club Penguin and Puzzle Pirates used their themes more to support their mini-games. While all seem to use themes quite effectively, the online games (more than Werewolf) have the advantage of an over world to set the atmosphere. Themes in online hangouts like Club Penguin are almost expected, as people need to choose this world over their own.

There was quite a range in mechanics for these games. SET’s mechanics were very simple and were less tangible. Although your progress could be measured through the number of cards you held, the actual process of finding a set takes place entirely in the mind. Werewolf also had an usual set of mechanics that largely depended on social dynamics to function. While the process of choosing someone to eliminate could in many places happen in seconds, the debate that sprung out of the choice is what made the game interesting. The mechanics themselves didn’t seem to make the game fun; it was the fact that people disagreed.

Cranium was set up to use mechanics that would help loosen inhibitions and make it a fun experience. Unlike Werewolf, the mechanics themselves were meant to make the game fun. While this game would also be dead without a good social dynamic (laughing makes it fun), the process of humming, drawing, and pantomiming all helped to create a fun experience. Also, the tangibility of the pieces moving across the board adds in a race element that makes Cranium a real game.

The online games had many different sets of mechanics within their worlds. Toon Town had a combat system and multiple simple mini-games. The combat system was engineered to keep up relationships, as you can call in friends for help. Unlike Toon Town, Club Penguin can be a much more private experience. While you can have your penguin waddle around town, showing off all the new clothes you bought after playing many games, there are few multiplayer games. The friendship aspect is more of an element in the over world and much less important in the simple flash-based mini-games.

Also, Puzzle Pirates is structured much like Club Penguin, in that the games are simple. However, as the name implies, the games in Puzzle Pirates are largely dependent on puzzle-based mechanics. Many of the games are simply puzzles with extra rules or strong themes. As a fan of puzzles, I find the puzzle mechanic to be very engaging. It is probably one of the largest contributors to my long-standing interest in the DS version of Puzzle Quest.