Lately I've been playing a lot of game demos. I'm working on 4 different designs right now - I think I know what I'm going to work on after Font Fiend ships but, day by day, I can be afflicted by a new idea that changes my mind.
Anyhow, one of the games I am considering is a more elaborate business game. It will borrow some elements that worked from Real E$tate Empire but it's going to be set in a city and about building a collection of businesses rather than about houses. I sometimes think of it as Monopoly on steroids so, when I saw Monopoly 3 last week I thought I would download the game and give it a go. I have to say that I expected a lot more. On the positive side it let you play with a whole page of game rules - very nice as most folks have their own set of house rules that they play by. On the bad side (and maybe there is a way around this that I couldn't find - but I couldn't find it) was how slow the game plays. Rather than clicking on a button to select numbers of opponents you have to select them one by one. Far worse, the in game animations take forever - it took me about five minutes to make two moves. The in game animations are extensive but really didn't do anything for me and, once again, I couldn't find a way to turn them off so I could just play the game. The in game trading system was confusing - wasn't clear to me when I pressed the submit trade proposal that the button had been accepted or what the outcome was. Disappointing. I like Monopoly and the kids even had a handheld version a few years back that I played quite a bit over one Christmas holiday But even though I was looking forward to an hour demo of Monopoly, I just couldn't get behind this one and shut it down after about 15 minutes.
style: inset; border-color: black black black black;
border-width: 3px;
background-color: #000000">
