I went through a short phase in high school where I was obsessed with playing browser-bases strategy games. The most serious of my addiction was a game called Planetarion, a science-fiction strategy game where the player would start with his or her own planet, which was also part of a small galaxy that was filled with other players’ planets. Then, you would build your planet’s facilities and collect resources, all while exploring surrounding space, building orbital defenses, and customizing your own fleet of starships.
It was a very popular game among my friends and me. However, as the story of our lives in high school, the game soon went pay-to-play, leaving us stranded and frustrated. Who in their right mind would pay a monthly fee to play a browser-based game? Seriously. At least when you’re paying monthly for MMOs, you’re paying for pixels, models, and other visual things that seem tangible enough to spend money on.
Once Planetarion was shut down, however, we migrated to and from other browser games, some built around WW2 and others around fantasy. Sadly, we never really found anything quite as exciting as Planetarion.
About a year and a half after Planetarion went pay to play, I stumbled across Hattrick, an online football (soccer) management game that featured no visual gameplay. Instead, everything is factored during a match and then automatically written by the system to look like a press release. You create your team, name it, build your arena, hire a coaching staff, set player formations, trade players, manage your youth squad, and more. There is just a ton of features and options to this game, and, if that wasn’t enough, it does nothing but improve every year.
I’ve been playing Hattrick since 2002, and the team I have now is the team I had then. Hell, my star midfielder that was originally generated for my team back in 2002 is now my head coach! It is necessary to note, however, that Hattrick is unlike a majority of fantasy-based management games on the web because it doesn’t feature real-life players and statistics. All the players are generated by the system and given fictional names.
Since I’ve been playing Hattrick, the desire to really jump back into browser-based games has diminished. I just haven’t found one that I really like and that I won’t have to pay to play. I’m sure as hell not going back to Planetarion after all these years. It would feel so alien to me that I wouldn’t last more than a day before quitting. Check out the Planetarion Wiki!
When you first begin, you must name your hero, who can be upgraded as he levels up in the game, and then you must select what type of nation you’re going to have. The different types include General, which has equal attack/defense power; Visionary, which specializes in defense; Warmonger, which specializes in attack (they weren’t too subtle with this one); Mogul, which specializes in trade and has significant economic advantages; and Magician, which specializes in magic.
The resources in the game include gold, which you use to purchase buildings, explore new territory, and train troops; Acres, which you need to explore to build new buildings; and Mana, which you need for your hero to cast spells. You gain gold on an hourly basis and the amount you earn depends on simple mathematics involving the number of mines you have compared to how much your upkeep costs are.
There is a leader board that displays the top players in each category, but other than that, there isn’t really a definite goal or objective. Land is basically infinite because there is no defined space in which the players fight. This means that as long as you have enough gold, you can just keep exploring more and more land to your heart’s content. I told you it was simple.
Of course, Warbook’s simplicity, added to its implementation via Facebook, makes it surprisingly fun. Your Facebook friends, once signed up, are displayed within your Warbook application, allowing you to see their stats and information. If Warbook was a stand-alone online game like Planetarion, its simplicity would be its downfall. However, because it is built into Facebook, it is able to thrive.
No comments:
Post a Comment