Paradise Beach

With autumn fast approaching, people who could not enjoy a well-deserved holiday in the sun are able to make up for it virtually by playing Paradise Beach, the latest creation by developer Astargames. In this building simulation you can get along without sunburn and expensive cocktails, but it certainly has its own catch. In a niche setting represented by popular titles such as Coconut Queen it is hard to stand out, but Paradise Beach does not have to dread any comparison.

As an up-and-coming manager it is your task to create beautiful and entertaining beach resorts on various islands. Supported by Mr. Gates and his granddaughter Emmy, the player will learn what it takes to design sites of relaxation and fun, where people can really experience their dream holiday. While the game omits the usual materials, you will have to keep an eye both on your account balance and how much energy is left for new facilities.

By building and upgrading ice cream stands, showers, cafés, and spas; planting more than a dozen sorts of trees and flowers; or adding sand castles, statues and fountains, you create beach resorts that’s as close to the visitors expectations as possible. Except for natural obstacles, such as rocks and small ponds, you can build anywhere. This trend to not restrict the player with only a small number of building sites is very welcome, because it makes games more complex and interesting, although this more “hardcore” approach might not appeal to every casual player. However, you still have to worry about space in another context.

This mainly derives from the constant and realistic interaction between the player and the resort’s visitors. These highly demanding visitors leave trash on every empty spot if you don’t add enough trash bins to the resort, and sometimes they are drowning and you have to react quickly to save them. On other occasions mischievous vandals will try to damage your facilities, or some guests will desperately beg you to find their phone or their towel which they lost during their visit.

Some of these tasks you can pass on to your staff members as soon as you hire them. The engineer will care about broken or damaged facilities, the custodian will empty full trash bins and remove banana peels or cans, the life guard will save people from drowning, and the security guard will throw out vandals. This is where the matter of space becomes important: every staff member is only responsible for a specific area, so that it is important to arrange facilities close to each other, and to make use of the staff members’ sphere of influence effectively.

The visitors of your beach resorts are extremely picky and sensitive – each visitor is individually responsive to his personal experience that depends on a variety of factors, this being the cleanliness of the island, the vegetation, how long they have to wait at the ice cream stand, the cafe, or various other facilities and whether there are enough showers or lounge chairs. This adds a lot of depth to the game, but unfortunately Paradise Beach lacks specific statistics.

The general mood of a visitor is indicated by a green, yellow, or red emoticon in a thought-bubble above his or her head. By clicking on this thought bubble, every visitor will tell you why he currently likes or dislikes your beach resort, but even with those clues it is hard to tell what the player can change or add to make a positive difference in the visitor’s rating. Constant alerts of annoyed or drowning visitors, vandals, an account balance which is changing faster than the national debt, and securing the provision of enough energy require the player’s attention and a lot of strategic thinking.

Fortunately Paradise Beach game features an untimed campaign. Ambitious players can try to finish any level in expert time, but to proceed you just have to meet all the goals of a level, the time does not matter in this respect.

The graphics are really detailed and all the holiday guests bustling around are a joy to look at, especially when the screen is dominated by green smileys. The individual interaction with the visitors creates a very exceptional experience, which cannot be compared to any other game in the casual market. While other building simulations depend strongly on fast-clicking and construction tasks, Paradise Beach introduces a new and welcome complexity, which involves individual visitors, strategic thinking in various directions and the classic elements of this genre at the same time.

Altogether Paradise Beach is a must-have for building simulation fans who are longing for a real challenge, while it is probably a no-go for people who prefer less complex games where it is not absolutely vague what you have to do to proceed in the game. Besides and certainly of major importance is the fact that the game is not a simple copy of an already existing game, but rather unique enough to provide an alternative and interesting gaming experience.

Review by David Becker

Tourist Trap

A town with $1 million in debts surely does sound familiar to a lot of people nowadays. Accumulating debt is very easy without a doubt, but what can be done to pay them back? What is still a mysterious question in reality is absolutely no problem in Tourist Trap, the new building simulation by developer Zemnott. But while the idea of building attractions sounds fun, Tourist Trap turns out to be as exciting as looking for a needle in a haystack.

Your main task is to return the town of Kitschville to former glory, supported by a lot of bizarre and over-the-top characters who will provide you with new plans for attractions, amenities, and municipal buildings. You will be notified about new building plans by a light bulb above the city council, where fourteen consultants will present to you new buildings which will please their personal favorite demographic group.

The basic steps of Tourist Trap could not be easier. With the money on your account you can construct all the buildings, each of them attracting a different group of visitors of which there are five, namely families, truckers, college students, senior citizens and business professionals. Here the game’s lack of any complexity clearly shows, because the endless possibilities of customer groups with different interests is barely used at all.

You can decide on your own when to build which attraction or amenity, thereby vaguely influencing how many new visitors of a specific group you are going to attract. The attractions are actually fun, the “World’s Biggest Cowboy Boot,” the “Giant Robot,” “Peggy’s Peach Palace” or the “Briefcase Museum,” to name but a few. But apart from look and name, the buildings do not differ greatly. Attractions cannot be upgraded, in contrast to Amenities, whose upgrades simply extend the number of tourists they can accommodate.

Every building has to be connected to the highway by a path, and buildings for business professionals even need a paved road. Sometimes a hammer will appear over certain buildings, which simply means that they need repair quickly. The longer you wait with this, the more damaged they will become, and the more money you will have to pay for the repair. Even worse are fires, because you not only have to send a fire engine, but have to repair the building afterwards, too.

Unfortunately Tourist Trap game feels like an extremely light versions of similar available titles. The option to activate advertisement surely is a good idea, but with only three billboards to boost the popularity of specific attractions with only a very small effect just does not feel like a full and interesting feature. Furthermore you can construct every building where you want to, and add a great variety of rocks, trees and even a pond to change the landscape, which is basically a good thing and sounds engaging. But practically the game fails again to make good use of this potentially promising idea.

While it is vaguely stated that the addition of trees boosts the appeal of any attraction, you don’t actually have to care about that anyway, because even without this bonus appeal the game still is much too easy. In around two or three hours you will have created every possible attraction and collected the required amount of money to repay the debts of Kitschville. And what you are doing in the meantime cannot be called diversified at all – waiting for money, repairing buildings and blowing out fires, and those limited actions in a much slower pace than in similar titles.

Every once in a while you will get special challenges, for example to keep fifty senior citizens for three cycles at Kitschville, or to accumulate a certain amount of money within 30 cycles to extend the land on which you can build. Occasionally you will have to pay for uncommon expenses, or get some bonus money from generous donors, but even those small surprises are few and far between, and definitely not enough to rise the overall appeal of the game itself.

Another significant weakness of Tourist Trap are the graphics, which are as monotonous and sluggish as they can be. The buildings and the landscape are less detailed as those of similar titles, and you spend the whole campaign on the same map, which is not exactly adding any diversity. Of course it is at least something that some of the attractions are animated, but where are the tourists? The game is called Tourist Trap, the attractions display that you definitely have tourists, but Kitschville looks absolutely deserted, there is not a soul to be seen anywhere.

With that said, waiting and collecting money is not exactly what most gamers consider playing. There just is not enough to uphold the player’s interest, and instead of getting challenging in the end, Tourist Trap becomes a virtual version of “Waiting for Godot.” If you are really a deep-rooted fan of building simulations it surely cannot hurt to give the trial a whirl, but don’t expect more than a very short and mildly boring pastime.

Review by David Becker

Avenue Flo

Avenue Flo is an amazing simulation game with lots of challenging puzzles and quests to solve. Flo is back in this enjoyable sequel to Diner Dash games. So, get ready for a new adventure with lots of exciting surprises.

In Avenue Flo game, you need to help the main heroine save the most awaited wedding of DinerTown! Something strange is going on here and it’s up to you to figure out what. Join Flo as she sets on a quest, help her explore DinerTown, interact with neighbors, find the missing objects, and solve numerous puzzles and quests along the way.

Featuring more than 40 scenes with 20 challenging puzzles, extremely addictive game play, and great voice-overs, Avenue Flo is an intriguing adventure to follow.

• Over 40 scenes to explore
• 20 in-scene puzzles or mini games
• Engaging story with full voice over
• Hear Flo’s voice for the first time

Cake Mania Main Street

Basic Idea as I See it:
This Cake Mania is a time management game to the fourth power. Jill and have moved back to her home town of Bakersfield to find it mostly shut down due to the opening of a mall close by. So she brings in her friends to open their own shops to help raise money to spruce up the town and attract more people. Of course, Jill opens Evans Bakery, her new husband, Jack, opens up a burger joint, Tiny opens up a sushi restaurant, and Risha opens up a flower shop. All of the shops have 25 of their own levels and a different dynamic of time management play. The goal is to make as much money as possible – half of which goes to the town to buy other tourist attractions and to upgrade the shops as a whole, while the money the shops keep go into upgrading the equipment inside.

Graphics:
Cake Mania Main Street pushes the super bright and colorful envelope. The storyboard part of the game is comic like, which is entertaining. I would suggest taking the time to watch these the first time through, because once skipped, they’re gone for good. The shops themselves, products, and characters are all very distinctive and pleasant. There are even people walking by outside the windows. I also like that there is a proactive environmental aspect to the town view… no cars, only bikes!

Sounds:
The background music in Cake Mania: Main Street feels a little outdated, but doesn’t get in the way. I can’t really imagine different music while playing and I believe that it changes to create the appropriate environment. The sounds that are part of the game, such as when customers enter the shops, use their talents to affect others, or when items finished cooking/baking/growing are distinctive in the best way. They alert without distracting and add to the overall experience and entertainment of playing.

Controls:
Mouse controlled. The game creates a custom cursor while playing, which is pretty cool. The control concepts, click to move, click to create, etc. are easy to grasp, and thoroughly explained in the tutorial. The one thing I have to say here is that it’s not always effective. Either the clicking has to be precise in location or timing. I found that sometimes, for instance, Jill wouldn’t put the cake down, and since players can click ahead, mistakes happen much easier when one click in the chain is missed, causing slight frustration, but not failure.

Flow:
Players start with Evans Bakery to attract people to the town with Jill’s famous cakes. After playing through a number of levels there, the option to open Jack’s Burger Barn is granted. Once through a few burger-flipping levels, flower arranging becomes an option. And once some bouquets are made, it’s Sumo Sushi time. I appreciate both the ability to jump around to the different shops without having to completely finish one before playing another as well as the ability to get used to one mechanism before taking on a new one. The monologues before each “day” in the shops could be a little disjointed that way, but the flow to the actual game play is pretty seamless no matter what players choose. Hint* if it gets a little too difficult, start the level over and try different equipment upgrades.

Fun Factor:
I had a good time trying out all the different shops, meeting all the different characters, even buying up more tourist attractions for the town. Cake Mania: Main Street offers challenge to keep it exciting, variety to keep it interesting, quirky characters to keep it amusing, and quality game mechanics to keep it fun.

Female Aspect:
This game seems to be pretty geared toward females with the colors and types of shops involved, without being too overtly girly. The cast of characters and customers seem pretty balanced in both gender and personality. I will say that I was looking forward to the “girly”est one – the flower shop – the most. I like that the main character, Jill, is a strong female in that she’s a successful small business owner who is proactive in her community and stands up for what she believes in while still living a full life with a husband and a new house and… other things.

Replay Value:
Although opening different shops bring a nice variety to the time management aspect of the game, one time through might have been good for me, personally. I don’t feel the pull to compete with previous scores since I played to the “Supserstar Goal” the first time through each level (which does make the first playthrough last). It is possible and easily accessible to replay any completed level, though it is tough to remember which level is which just looking at the picture/map of each shop. Maybe with clever titles instead of the day numbers, it would be easier. Replayability might be helped in Cake Mania: Main Street with the addition of new specific time/ score challenges with limitations on equipment or space, the ability to try previous levels with different equipment upgrades, or with completely separate mini games. I think that some of the other tourist attractions might have served well as mini games.

Final Thoughts:
I like this game. I will say that there is a bit of mushy lovey doveyness, but that is balanced out by the edginess of some of the other characters. I like the concept, the story, the ending, and the overall positivity that came from playing it. While I do wish that there were a little more to it – like what do I do with all this money the town has earned when I have bought/opened/upgraded everything? – it will please Jill Evans fans to continue her life’s journey. If time management is your bag, or even if you are new to the genre, this is a good bet because of the variety it affords. It’s a pretty good collection of different time management opportunities all on one sweet street!

Review by Dawn,

Gaming Angels

Gemini Lost

If you’re roaming around and happen to see a giant, ominous shaft of light appear emanating from far off in the distance, the general rule of thumb is to steer clear. While ignoring this seemingly obvious safety precaution does not bode particularly well for the gaggle of curious townspeople in Gemini Lost, such foolishness is entertaining and rewarding for the omniscient overseer who invisibly influences them in their daily routines. That’s you, by the way.

All the trouble starts when a gaggle of youth (conveniently made up of three guys and three gals) first stumble upon an unexpected solar eclipse and then witness an even stranger occurrence where the eclipse lines-up with the Gemini constellation.

The resulting beam of light is too alluring to pass up, and their investigation into its source uncovers a strange wheel-like artifact with the signs of the zodiac inscribed in it. Messing around with the device, the kids find themselves accidentally teleported to another world. Making matters worse, the magical artifact that transports them there erupts, scattering many pieces across the lands and stranding the unfortunate adventurers.

These lost souls have little choice but to build their own village from scratch and seek to recover the missing pieces needed to repair the artifact and teleport back home. Unfortunately for the original colonists, they won’t live long enough to see their mission through, but some day their great, great, great, great grandchildren will ultimately succeed. It’s your job to gradually nudge generation after generation towards this ultimate goal, which provides the crux of Gemini Lost’s gameplay. Reaching this lofty objective isn’t nearly as spectacular as the sense of fun and accomplishment you’ll gain from reaching each milestone along the way.

Starting with a handful of villagers, you’ll assign them various important tasks based on their predispositions. Some like to mine ore and chop wood. Others prefer to grow vegetables and go fishing. You’ll also encounter crafty villagers who build structures and brainy residents who dabble in science and knowledge. By design, these are all tasks that keep the well-oiled machine of your town thriving. Doling out work both improves you’re villagers’ skills and gives you the precious resources required to expand your village. Neglect any particular tasks for too long, and order starts to break down.

There’s a lot more do to than just toil away at manual labor. Only a small portion of the map is initially accessible, so it becomes important to send your citizens out to interact with the land when they’re not immediately involved in some rigorous task. You’ll uncover critters to help, stuff to build, items to collect, and puzzles to solve. Overcoming these interesting obstacles leads to new developments in your budding civilization, opens up access to additional areas to explore, and provides a needed break from the mundane micromanagement of resource gathering.

Life goes on in Gemini Lost game, even when you’re not playing it. Residents slowly grow old and will eventually die. It’s a huge bummer when an experienced villager bites the dust, but this is something you must accept early on. Fortunately, there’s a way to let you combat the inevitable and keep your settlement from collapsing. Citizens can pick a spouse (based on their astrological sign compatibility), get married, and produce offspring that eventually grow old enough to pick up tasks. This cycle continues around the clock, unless you pause the game.

Scientific research unlocks ways to extend their lives, though it’s a temporary solution. Be a good steward of your people, and they’ll continue to spread their genes and allow future generations to continue the path of progression, even if the original goal seems a little pointless by the time you reach it.

It’s hard to ignore the fact that Gemini Lost borrows liberally from the Virtual Villagers series. The zodiac theme is new, but pretty much everything else about the game design and concept is similar. However, the developers really run with the concepts they’ve borrowed and ultimately deliver a tight, enjoyable experience. The visual flourishes, character animations, and colorful scenery are also superior to many similar titles out there.

Gemini Lost can be dangerously addictive, though there isn’t much reason to return to it once you’ve completed the game. That said, there are scores of tasks to accomplish that truly make you feel like the hard work you’ll pour into keeping your townspeople alive and well is worth the effort. Ultimately, this is what will keep you coming back until the job is done.

Review by Nathan Meunier