By request: my favorite games!

[annathepiper]

I got asked this question on Twitter, by way of being cc’d on a general question out to 50+ women asking what games they liked and what platforms they’re played on. I’m not actually 50 yet, but since I’m within reasonable distance, I promised my Twitter friend I’d do me a post about what games I play and how!

First and foremost, as long-time online pals of mine will know, I’ve been a lifelong player of Nethack, an ASCII-based dungeon adventure game that goes back into the dawn of Internet time. I started playing that thing on my very first computer back in college in 1987. I’m STILL periodically playing it on my Mac. There are ports to iOS but I haven’t tried those yet.

Aside from Nethack, my gaming interests fall into the general bucket of “casual games”, i.e., the sorts of games you can put onto your PC or Mac or mobile device, play at your own pace, and not have to worry too strenuously about game mechanics. Big recent famous examples of these are Angry Birds and Plants Vs. Zombies, both of which are indeed my bane and my delight. I love PvZ so much, in fact, that I’ve played the damn thing five or six times through on different platforms. (And it doesn’t help either that Popcap keeps adding new achievements!)

And, as many of you also know, I actually work for a casual games company in my day job, i.e., Big Fish Games. Which has upped my casual gaming habit considerably, I’m here to tell you!

Big Fish sells hundreds and hundreds of games, most of which are developed by other vendors. But we develop a few notable lines of games in-house too. I’m a HUGE fan of our Mystery Case Files series, a long-running series of games in the “Hidden Object” genre of casual gaming. (Hidden Object games being the sort where you have an adventure to play through, and many of the screens in the adventure involve a scene of jumbled objects. You have to find a specific list of objects in order to solve the scene, and often, you then have to use one or more of the objects you find to complete necessary game actions.) The earlier MCFs are less complex; the later ones have gotten cleverer not only in terms of plot, but also in terms of variety of puzzles to solve and necessary interactions with in-game characters. The last couple of MCFs have even featured live footage of character actors.

I’ve played the MCFs up through 13th Skull; I still need to play Escape From Ravenhearst (warning on this one, it’s significantly darker in tone than the rest of the series, as well as in comparison to the vast majority of games we sell, so be aware of that) and the newest one, Shadow Lake. Of the ones I’ve played, my favorites are Return to Ravenhearst and Dire Grove. Return to Ravenhearst was the very first MCF I played, and I was impressed not only by the story (I thought at the time, “gosh, I’d love to read a novel version of this”), but also by the soundtrack, which was recorded by an orchestra in Berlin. You can in fact buy the soundtrack on bigfishgames.com if you want it! Dire Grove, meanwhile, had an excellent storyline and I’ve been having particular fun trying to play a French build of it, to improve my French vocabulary.

Another Hidden Object series we do is the Hidden Expedition series. These are more adventure-based than the MCFs, with less emphasis on paranormal/supernatural stuff. Like the MCFs, though, they’ve gotten more complex with the more recent installments. Of these, my favorite hands down is Hidden Expedition: Amazon, which, again, I’ve played on multiple platforms. Devil’s Triangle is fun, but be aware that it has a cliffhanger. Fortunately, its immediate sequel–Uncharted Islands–is also available.

One non-Hidden Object game we did in-house that I adore is Unwell Mel. This one’s a “Match 3″ game–and if you’ve ever played Bejeweled, you know how a Match 3 game works. What I like about Unwell Mel is the schtick that the character Mel has every disease in the book, and you’re the doctor trying to cure him. So all the levels you need to solve are filled with various little germs and/or food that Mel has eaten, and it’s really all rather charming and adorable.

And I can also highly, highly recommend our Mahjongg Towers game for iPad owners. Great work on that one, in playability and design and music. It works very well with the iPad’s multi-touch gestures as well.

I don’t often play games we sell on behalf of other vendors, but I have sampled several. Of the ones I’ve checked out, so far my favorites are the Dana Knightstone series (in which you’re playing a novelist, Dana Knightstone, solving mysteries; the games are arranged in a novel-like structure, and that’s fun) and the Empress of the Deep ones. Both are Hidden Object adventures.

I’ve played casual games on XP, Win 7, Mac OS, and iOS, and so far my favorite experience is actually on my iPad. The touchscreen is an excellent way to play a Hidden Object game, and the iPad’s got a big enough screen that a Hidden Object scene isn’t cramped–which makes objects easier to find. Especially when you can zoom the screen in and out with the appropriate finger gestures.

What about the rest of you out there? If you’re a woman in my age group or older, I’d be particularly interested in what games you like to play to relay to my friend–whether you’re a console gamer or a casual gamer, both, or something else entirely! What are your preferred gaming platforms?

Mirrored from angelahighland.com.

Comments

[eeyorerin]

I really like the Mystery Trackers series: The Void, Raincliff, Black Isle, and the Four Aces. They're similar to the Mystery Case Files series (but I think the MCF series has a bit more snark and humor as well as going darker in places) with the same good production values, puzzles, and clues. I also really like the Awakening series, mostly because I get to burninate things with a pocket dragon a lot. Also you have an owl familiar that gives you clues!

[marzipan-pig.livejournal.com]

I've played like 2 or 3 games in my life:

Rogue (!) 1987 ish
Then Kylee had me play Vib Ribbon like once in the 90's
Then Kylee is my Christine Love supplier (all in the last year):
don't take it personally babe, it's just not your story (liked a lot)
Digital: a Love Story (liked but got overwhelmed by it)
Analog: a Hate Story (couldn't get into it but seemed interesting)

And I think I've seen the beginning screens for Portal once.

That is my whole entire 25 year videogaming history!

[marzipan-pig.livejournal.com]

And actually a female best friend started me on Rogue, too, so apparently that's my gateway risk factor. We used to hack into it (a TOTALLY new and mindblowing concept for me at the time!) and change the monsters etcs to the names of our teachers and projects and stuff.

[kisanthe.livejournal.com]

I'm a far stretch from 50 yet, but I play console and PC games like nobody's business (though not so many of the former anymore). My mother used to play a lot on consoles, but now she only plays Champions Return to Arms (a fantasy-themed beat-stuff-up, get-sweet-loot game). On the PC, she enjoys Lin City, Mah-Jongg, Shisen-Sho, and Frozen Bubble on Linux. I'm a much keener PC gamer: Nethack, the Sims, Master of Magic, Crusader Kings 2, Dragon Age, Baldur's Gate, Academagia, Morrowind, Oblivion, Guild Wars, etc. etc. etc.

Neither of us has any experience with the latest console generation. Her preferred platform is the PS2; mine is the PC. The advent of sites like Good Old Games makes it possible for me to get old nostalgic favorites and even sometimes newer stuff for super cheap, and it's awesome.

[rmd.livejournal.com]

I'm just a few years shy of 50. I like some casual games on my phone/ipad (pvz, a-breaker, doodlejump, a port of rogue), and even my multiplayer games on console and pc are fairly casual - puzzle pirates (which has the option for lots of involved stuff, but I tend towards the more casual puzzles rather than intrigue and politics) and team fortress 2. I *heart* TF2, and it's a much better experience on the pc than on the xbox. some of my favorite single player things on xbox are casual games - pinball, full house poker (multiplayer).

I love the Half Life and Portal games - my most recent delight was playing through Black Mesa, which is a beautiful rewrite (with a few changes, and only up thru the portal to xen) of the original HL in the HL2 graphics engine. I have a bit of a problem with HL2 and subsequent episodes, and the same problem with Bioshock (which I played and enjoyed), which is that I get slightly motion sick after playing for a short while. If things are particularly jumpy and swooshy, I can only play for 10min at a time.

I used to play old unix games back in the early and mid 80's. Adventure, mille bourne, snake, worm, etc.

I tried Halo and never really got into it. I'm not sure why.

I've occasionally gone through bouts of playing various civilization games on the pc and mac.

We recently discovered SPACETEAM here, and have been playing it occasionally. (If y'all at the Murk haven't tried space team, I recommend you check it out - I think its sense of humor is right up your alley.) It's a multiplayer game for apple iThings for 2-4 players on wifi or bluetooth together.

[annathepiper]

Cool, thanks! :)

Hee, I get more enjoyment out of watching people play console games than I do the games themselves, really. I do appreciate the immersive stories in a lot of them! Portal and Bioshock are excellent examples.

[apel.livejournal.com]

Thanks so much to annathepiper for asking and all of you commenters for sharing your favorites.

I'm designing a financial site that targets older people, and in particular older women. We want to use some gamification designs -- that's why I'm looking for games that interest middle-aged women. The games you all have mentioned will come in very handy as interaction design inspiration.

[marzipan-pig.livejournal.com]

OK and totally oldschool that tank/asteroids thing, centipede, and later Tetris. (Somehow those all seem similar in simplicty/elegance to me).

[annathepiper]

Tetris! I did my share of Tetris back in the day. Also Arkanoid on my Amiga!

[annathepiper]

Cool, thanks for chiming in for apel! And thank your mom as well. :)

I DO love many variations of Mah Jongg games, that's for sure. On many of the mobile devices or computers I've owned over the years, I've generally always had some form of Mah Jongg game. I've got one on my iThings right now, even aside from the one we sell at Big Fish.

[annathepiper]

Right, the Awakening series! I've tried the first of those, and liked it fairly well. I've got to see which of the next couple we've released in mobile form.

And noted re: Mystery Trackers! I've seen we have a couple of those for the iThings as well. :)

[annathepiper]

Hee. :) I've watched a lot more console games being played than I have played myself. But then, I find that quite a bit of fun sometimes all by itself!

[annathepiper]

I'm impressed that you tried Rogue! I tried that a few times myself but since I'd tried Nethack first, I couldn't get into it.

I'm deeply charmed though that Nethack pays homage to its ancestor though by including the Rogue level in every game. :)

[annathepiper]

My pleasure! Plus it's fun for me to see what others are playing, and eeyorerin tossed me a couple of recs for other games Big Fish sells that I should be playing!

[apel.livejournal.com]

Speaking of Amiga games, I used to love Worms. So funny!