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Apple Arcade |OT| Here's to the Gaming Ones
- Thread starter infiniteloop
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wtf, does Way of the Turtle just end like that? kinda annoying. I expected the game to be "finished". I beat the mini arena that opened up to you after lighting all three flames up, then it read "end of chapter 3 tbc" and now I have to beat the arena again. It's a pretty fun and polished game but meh :( If that's how Apple plans you to stay subbed idk. I'm still waiting for the next episode of Murder Mystery, but for that game the "episodic" content schedule at least makes sense.
I doubt this was Apple's idea, and was more so a function of these developers rushing to make the Apple Arcade launch deadline.
Tried three of the games added to Mac recently:
Pac-Man Party Royale: I actually like this quite a bit, it's like a cooler take on Pac-Man Battle Royale. The way you speed up as you eat more pellets is a really neat mechanic. Just one problem... NO ONLINE! Well, it seems there's online if you share a room code, but who's going to bother doing that? Apparently they'll be releasing more modes in the future, hopefully online against randoms is one of them.
Rayman Mini: Not much to say about this one beyond the fact that it's yet another extremely solid Rayman auto-runner. I'll certainly be completing it.
Sonic Racing: As a big Sega fan, this was the main game I've been hyped to try alongside ChuChu Rocket (still waiting on that Mac version) and... lol. Just lol. This may be the most blatant and shameless case of turning a F2P game into a premium product that I've ever seen. All the same monetization and progression gimmicks from Sonic Forces: Speed Battle are here, except it doesn't cost money, so instead you just sit through endless screens of upgrading characters and collecting cards for no reason.
Worst of all, the gameplay is so bad that a braindead chimp could be proficient at it. I know it's made for mobile, but you literally just turn left and right to do laps around lifeless tracks while mashing the item button to spam the overpowered items that you pick up every 5 seconds. In all the races I played I only lost a single one early on to a no-lifer who had way better Wisps than me. Mario Kart Tour blows this out of the water, can't say I'm disappointed that it'll never make it to Android.
Pac-Man Party Royale: I actually like this quite a bit, it's like a cooler take on Pac-Man Battle Royale. The way you speed up as you eat more pellets is a really neat mechanic. Just one problem... NO ONLINE! Well, it seems there's online if you share a room code, but who's going to bother doing that? Apparently they'll be releasing more modes in the future, hopefully online against randoms is one of them.
Rayman Mini: Not much to say about this one beyond the fact that it's yet another extremely solid Rayman auto-runner. I'll certainly be completing it.
Sonic Racing: As a big Sega fan, this was the main game I've been hyped to try alongside ChuChu Rocket (still waiting on that Mac version) and... lol. Just lol. This may be the most blatant and shameless case of turning a F2P game into a premium product that I've ever seen. All the same monetization and progression gimmicks from Sonic Forces: Speed Battle are here, except it doesn't cost money, so instead you just sit through endless screens of upgrading characters and collecting cards for no reason.
Worst of all, the gameplay is so bad that a braindead chimp could be proficient at it. I know it's made for mobile, but you literally just turn left and right to do laps around lifeless tracks while mashing the item button to spam the overpowered items that you pick up every 5 seconds. In all the races I played I only lost a single one early on to a no-lifer who had way better Wisps than me. Mario Kart Tour blows this out of the water, can't say I'm disappointed that it'll never make it to Android.
Not really to my knowledge, I guess the fastest way is to AirDrop them via the long-press menu so you don't have to manually search them in the AppStore?
I think it's quite clear that a lot of games were rushed, whether minor or majorly, to make Apple Arcade, between the games ending abruptly and technical issues some games have (my own experience with What The Golf was riddled with issues). Shame that the service isn't quite exuding the premium vibe that it should, but hopefully that irons itself out in time.
Grindstone is still keeping my interest, but I think there are many stages in there that don't really have a compelling hook mechanics-wise. The latest update introduced an odd bug - tutorial text is off-screen and I can't read any of it. Happening in the 40s/50s levels.
Assemble With Care is a short, sweet little game. It's a lovely experience as you soak in the game's restorative vibe. It's not going to blow anyone away but I enjoyed it for what it is.
Bleak Sword is a fun action game that controls surprisingly well, given that it's all swiping and touches.
Grindstone is still keeping my interest, but I think there are many stages in there that don't really have a compelling hook mechanics-wise. The latest update introduced an odd bug - tutorial text is off-screen and I can't read any of it. Happening in the 40s/50s levels.
Assemble With Care is a short, sweet little game. It's a lovely experience as you soak in the game's restorative vibe. It's not going to blow anyone away but I enjoyed it for what it is.
Bleak Sword is a fun action game that controls surprisingly well, given that it's all swiping and touches.
Trying to share from the home screen, I get a "Not available to share" message.
I always pictured this service as a dedicated app from which you could view your synced library and hit a download button to bring it to the device you're on. Basically like Apple Music, without the ability to stream of course.
Sorry, you're totally right – it seems as if you can't share Arcade apps. I expected it to work like regular apps. What the hell, must be a bug
Playing through Cardpocalypse and really shocked at how much I'm liking it. It's a card battling RPG set in a school, where the card game is a game all the students are obsessed with called Power Pets. It's from the developer of Guild of Dungeoneering.
The game's art direction is... almost grotesque? It doesn't match the story at all and is SUCH an odd creative decision. But basically everything else about the game I really like.
The card battling mechanic is basically like Hearthstone-light, and is better than it has any right to be. Multiple factions that are all balanced, and so-on. But where the whole thing really shines is in the game leaning into the idea that this is kids playing a game. So you get to do things like place stickers over your cards to change their stats or keywords, you trade for new cards with candy, you create your own custom cards from scratch, you eventually start house-ruling the entire game itself and change some of how it plays.
It's LONG too, with lots of sidequests and optional content. Been playing it 3 evenings now and I think I'm halfway through.
The game's art direction is... almost grotesque? It doesn't match the story at all and is SUCH an odd creative decision. But basically everything else about the game I really like.
The card battling mechanic is basically like Hearthstone-light, and is better than it has any right to be. Multiple factions that are all balanced, and so-on. But where the whole thing really shines is in the game leaning into the idea that this is kids playing a game. So you get to do things like place stickers over your cards to change their stats or keywords, you trade for new cards with candy, you create your own custom cards from scratch, you eventually start house-ruling the entire game itself and change some of how it plays.
It's LONG too, with lots of sidequests and optional content. Been playing it 3 evenings now and I think I'm halfway through.
I'm kind of addicted to Mini Motorways. Have certainly been getting gradually better as I learn various lesson. Highest score is 990 (so close to 1000 ahhh).
I do hope they update it, because it feels kind of broken in a couple ways once your network gets big enough. Sometimes it feels like it just decides to make you lose and doesn't produce enough houses to keep up with the demand it wants. Generally, if you ever see the red warning sign above a building it's already too late and there's nothing you can do to prevent you from winning. Another thing that's really weird is I'm pretty sure the stoplights are a complete trap. The cars are good enough at managing their own intersections, that the stop and start on the stoplights generally just makes the place you put it worse. My score definitely improved once I stopped placing them. Also, there's been a few times where one car just completely freezes and gums up an entire road.
I do hope they update it, because it feels kind of broken in a couple ways once your network gets big enough. Sometimes it feels like it just decides to make you lose and doesn't produce enough houses to keep up with the demand it wants. Generally, if you ever see the red warning sign above a building it's already too late and there's nothing you can do to prevent you from winning. Another thing that's really weird is I'm pretty sure the stoplights are a complete trap. The cars are good enough at managing their own intersections, that the stop and start on the stoplights generally just makes the place you put it worse. My score definitely improved once I stopped placing them. Also, there's been a few times where one car just completely freezes and gums up an entire road.
Totally agree. I was able to get to about 700 points on each map and called it quits after that.
I just looked through the Dinosaur Polo Club Twitter account and it seems like they're going to add intersection options, fix the car stopping and fix that annoying audio bug where everything sounds terrible after a few play sessions, among other things. I also hope they add some more challenges besides getting the 250 point mark.
The foundation and design is solid - they just need to smooth out the stuff that surrounds it.
It seems Apple TV may be the chief way to play any of these games with a controller.. not a bad way to get their foot in the door with a (relatively) inexpensive entertainment system
Grindstone is perfection with the patch to play music/podcasts in the background
It's still basically the only game I've played
It's still basically the only game I've played
I love the idea of Mini Motorways but in practice, it feels kind of like a half-idea. I feel like it's missing half a concept or something to make it more manageable and more of a game/less of a sim.
Looking over at Mini Metro, which I hadn't played in a bit, it's kind of shocking how much more there is to that game. Multiple difficulty modes, a progression, more kinds of things to unlock as you go in a map, a daily challenge, etc. Now of course some of this stuff may have been added over the years and I don't remember how it was when it first came out, but it does continue to play into the "well this was kind of rushed". I do hope they get Motorways their eventually, because I love games where you setup paths and autonomous things navigate them.
Finished Cardpocalypse. Really enjoyed it as I was saying in my impressions above. About two thirds through the game I found a deck arch-type that just destroyed all opponents which took some of the thrill out of it, but that seems to be just about how every card-RPG goes so eh.
Gameloft's Ballistic Baseball is pretty bad and disappointing. Played and quickly deleted.
Going through the Interactive Fiction game NeoCab now. Not loving it but I do appreciate that it's actually fairly video gamey, thanks to deciding where to go and which fairs to pick up.
Gameloft's Ballistic Baseball is pretty bad and disappointing. Played and quickly deleted.
Going through the Interactive Fiction game NeoCab now. Not loving it but I do appreciate that it's actually fairly video gamey, thanks to deciding where to go and which fairs to pick up.
Highly recommend.
The game is designed perfectly, gameplay and sound effects and music and pacing and of course the shocking effects, totally as close as possible to Inside level of goodness.
The game took me by surprise, the atmosphere is insane.
Reached half game point, cannot wait to see what's next.
I really wish that games on iOS had profiles as standard. You can't play the likes of What's The Golf with a family, which is really annoying. I'd love my little boy to be able to play that with a save of his own, as he really enjoys it!
AFAIK you can log to a different Game Center account in the Settings.
I wanted to like Down in Bermuda, but playing "find the shinies" is such a waste of time. I'd be nice if the threshold for the orb was lower than the actual total count in the level.
Yup - this completely killed the game for me, which I was otherwise mostly enjoying. It's such a fatal flaw. I hit like 19/20 on the first main island and looked EVERYWHERE for the one I was missing, and couldn't ever find it. Just ended up deleting the game.
OP
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Aren't they all released at the same time usually? The App Store shows 4 of the 5 games, Fallen Knight is so far MIA.
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Not sure if this is exactly what you want, but What the Golf lets you keep multiple saves. Hit the settings from the main menu and you'll see the option to switch between saves.
"Finished" Tale of Memo. Add it to the pile of Apple Arcade games that just... stop. It ends abruptly, complete with credit roll, at what the game cheerfully labels "End of Chapter 1!"
Beginning to wonder if some developers are exploiting Apple's "we'll pay you up front to make a game for us to give away" policy to deliver a barely-minimum-viable finished product and fulfill their obligation. It's interesting -- when we heard Apple was paying out Apple Arcade this way + potential bonuses for time played, we all were afraid of grind-filled games that never ended. But it looks like maybe the opposite may be true. Why make a 50-level game when a 25-level game will also do?
Anyway, I'm on to Stela now which is a shamelessly close take on Inside. I'm liking it.
Beginning to wonder if some developers are exploiting Apple's "we'll pay you up front to make a game for us to give away" policy to deliver a barely-minimum-viable finished product and fulfill their obligation. It's interesting -- when we heard Apple was paying out Apple Arcade this way + potential bonuses for time played, we all were afraid of grind-filled games that never ended. But it looks like maybe the opposite may be true. Why make a 50-level game when a 25-level game will also do?
Anyway, I'm on to Stela now which is a shamelessly close take on Inside. I'm liking it.
Anyone know how to delete save game files for certain games? I wanted to start Chu Chu Rocket again from the beginning to let other people play the game. Ideally, would like multiple profiles/save games like What the Golf but there doesn't seem to be such an option.
Speed Demons from arcade game style experts Radiangames is secretly one of the best games on Apple Arcade - I placed it at 6th today in my Apple Arcade game rankings and I'm tempted to move it up higher.
1. The game is HUGE. I've been playing it for days and days to and from work. I haven't counted but it must have nearly 200 events. I finally today unlocked the last of the events, and have plenty more to go back and 3-star.
2. The controls, on a phone, are among the best I've ever seen. It feels very odd and very off at first, so I urge you to stick with it. Eventually you'll realize that you're weaving through traffic, dodging around opponents and obstacles, all with your thumb just moving a couple of millimeters. It really does almost feel like your car moves just by thinking about it / willing it to move. I'm skeptical it would control as well on a tablet or TV - it feels optimized for phone.
3. There's good event variety with races, Burnout-style takedown events, time trials, etc.
4. The 28 vehicles all feel super distinct, from lumbering Semis to F1-style race cars, adding further variety each suite of events.
This is one of only 3 Apple Arcade games to earn a permanent home on my device (alongside Dear Reader and Grindstone).
1. The game is HUGE. I've been playing it for days and days to and from work. I haven't counted but it must have nearly 200 events. I finally today unlocked the last of the events, and have plenty more to go back and 3-star.
2. The controls, on a phone, are among the best I've ever seen. It feels very odd and very off at first, so I urge you to stick with it. Eventually you'll realize that you're weaving through traffic, dodging around opponents and obstacles, all with your thumb just moving a couple of millimeters. It really does almost feel like your car moves just by thinking about it / willing it to move. I'm skeptical it would control as well on a tablet or TV - it feels optimized for phone.
3. There's good event variety with races, Burnout-style takedown events, time trials, etc.
4. The 28 vehicles all feel super distinct, from lumbering Semis to F1-style race cars, adding further variety each suite of events.
This is one of only 3 Apple Arcade games to earn a permanent home on my device (alongside Dear Reader and Grindstone).
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Thanks! I'm a man possessed - I'm working through Don't Bug Me, Dead End Job, and Atone now in order to add them.
Atone in particular seems really special. Even Dead End Job is impressing me - it's like a slightly more casual Binding of Isaac, believe it or not.
Atone in particular seems really special. Even Dead End Job is impressing me - it's like a slightly more casual Binding of Isaac, believe it or not.
That's great! Will play those beautiful platformers today with DS4.