Archive - 2013

My first review for GamingShogun.com was for a Risk clone turn-based strategy game for the iOS. I still play it after all this time because I love a good strategy game and that one holds up even after all the advances in phones and phone gaming. Heck there are consoles that now use phone technology at their cores to enable them to keep costs down while still giving great performance, phone gaming and graphics are now some serious business.  Now when reviewing a game for phones and tablets they need to be as good as a current gen console counterpart. With all that in mind it is a pleasure to recommend A Brief History Of The World.

Description:
Lead your empire to victory in this turn-based strategy game!  Play as the character of Julius Caesar, Genghis Khan, or Napoleon Bonaparte and command armies through 6 riveting epochs in history, with 42 major empires and 15 minor empires.  Choose from over 40 event cards to enhance replayability and alter the course of history.

All set to an epic soundtrack (or listen to tracks from your own music library) with beautiful graphics and original artwork from the Ragnar Brothers’ board game. With no setup time required, no pieces to lose, and no arguments about the rules, the future of board games is here and A Brief History of the World gives you exactly what you want — to play!

Features:
– Easy-to-learn and easy-to-play
– Comprehensive tutorial
– Play solo against varying levels of AI
– Enjoy a game with family and friends around the table or as “pass and play”
– Online multiplayer games available for up to 6 players
– Post your scores to Game Center and climb the leaderboards

Hands On:
So it doesn’t take long to realize that this is not your parents’ Risk game, though the base premise is very similar.  You start out with your countries and try to take over empires much like Risk.  At first it feels and looks like Risk then the cards are introduced.  The cards often give extra armies to move around or a way to move well beyond your territory to get a presence in an empire far from your borders.  When you go to take over a country with a standing army you have a dice roll just like in Risk but they can be effected by rules and Event cards to give each side an advantage in the roll.  This all sounds rather complicated but once you play through the tutorial a couple times it starts to make perfect sense.

Then the weird part of the game happens when you end your turn, the game awards bonuses for control of areas then the players/AI choose new empires.  So you don’t play the empire for more than one turn at a time and you don’t try to conquer the whole world like Risk.  Instead you just advance an empire the best you can in one round and the player with the most bonus coins at the end of all the rounds wins.  Because the game basically resets after each round a player can be in a painful dead last on the first couple of turns and still win the game.  This is particularly cool since in traditional Risk once you were getting slaughtered the fun left the game, the only thing you could do was maybe decide who else you wanted to win and help them by bashing futilely into their biggest enemy.  Risk lasts for hours, since this is just six turns doing the best you can it can be played relatively quick while still being a very different game every time.  The Event cards in particular are clever and really lend a freshness to the game while maintaining the classic board game feel.

Last Call:
A Brief History Of The World is designed to be a brief turn-based strategy game which is perfect for the on the go, play when you can iOS platforms.  It requires strategic thought and planning but can be played in a relatively short time.  It’s only $2.99 and has limitless replayability with no pay to win issues like many iOS apps these days.  I wouldn’t be surprised if a couple years down the line I still have this game on my phone, and with how many games I have to cycle through on my systems that is saying something.
[easyreview title=”A Brief History Of The World Review Score” cat1title=”Overall Score (out of 5)” cat1detail=”” cat1rating=”4″ ]