Tue 27 Sep 2011
App Reviews and News
Risk
Your task is simple. World domination. And world domination can only be achieved through destroying your enemies on their own turf and adding their lands into your vast and growing empire. First you start by amiably dividing up the regions of the world between yourself and your opponents. Hey, even ruthless despots must abide by the rules of engagement.
There is much strategy involved in the choosing of which areas to occupy, and how many troops to place on them, as taking over entire continents awards you with bonus troops. You generally want to amass your troops at bottlenecks where fighting is likely to occur, and along the borders of your regions. The great thing about Risk is that the strategy changes dramatically depending on how many people are playing, making it almost like a whole new game.
After the initial setup is complete, the real battle begins, and consists of furthering fortifying your lands, and attacking enemy positions. Games can often go back and forth for quite awhile, too long in some cases, a common knock on the board game. The iPhone version speeds up all the dice rolling and piece removing though, making games breeze by much faster.
The graphics are solid, with brightly hued colors and well delineated areas breaking up the map and regions. Battles are accompanied by nice images of soldiers firing off various weapons. There isn’t much else to the game graphics-wise, but what’s there looks good.
The biggest disappointment with Risk is the fact that there’s no online play. It’s not overly difficult to incorporate online play for a turn-based game like this, so its exclusion is a huge disappointment. You can play local multiplayer over wi-fi or Bluetooth, but use the pass and play feature using one device, but that’s hardly enough to make up for the lack of true online multiplayer. Risk was made to be played with other people, and this version just makes it more difficult than it should be to do that.
Still, as far as strategy games go, Risk is one of the most enjoyable ones you’ll find on the iPhone, and far preferable to breaking out the actual board game, which is a far more tedious affair to play. If you don’t mind playing the computer, or have some friends who could play you locally, this is a must buy.
RATING – 4.5/5
Platform – iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad (iOS 3.0 or later).
Genre – Board Game
Price - $2.99
There is much strategy involved in the choosing of which areas to occupy, and how many troops to place on them, as taking over entire continents awards you with bonus troops. You generally want to amass your troops at bottlenecks where fighting is likely to occur, and along the borders of your regions. The great thing about Risk is that the strategy changes dramatically depending on how many people are playing, making it almost like a whole new game.
After the initial setup is complete, the real battle begins, and consists of furthering fortifying your lands, and attacking enemy positions. Games can often go back and forth for quite awhile, too long in some cases, a common knock on the board game. The iPhone version speeds up all the dice rolling and piece removing though, making games breeze by much faster.
The graphics are solid, with brightly hued colors and well delineated areas breaking up the map and regions. Battles are accompanied by nice images of soldiers firing off various weapons. There isn’t much else to the game graphics-wise, but what’s there looks good.
The biggest disappointment with Risk is the fact that there’s no online play. It’s not overly difficult to incorporate online play for a turn-based game like this, so its exclusion is a huge disappointment. You can play local multiplayer over wi-fi or Bluetooth, but use the pass and play feature using one device, but that’s hardly enough to make up for the lack of true online multiplayer. Risk was made to be played with other people, and this version just makes it more difficult than it should be to do that.
Still, as far as strategy games go, Risk is one of the most enjoyable ones you’ll find on the iPhone, and far preferable to breaking out the actual board game, which is a far more tedious affair to play. If you don’t mind playing the computer, or have some friends who could play you locally, this is a must buy.
RATING – 4.5/5
Platform – iPhone, iPod Touch, iPad (iOS 3.0 or later).
Genre – Board Game
Price - $2.99
