nothing edifying » games

Kingdom Rush

mim — Mon, 30 Jan 2012 10:08:39 +0000

We bought Kingdom Rush for the iPad and this weekend we have been totally addicted! It’s a tower defense game, which we like, and it’s on sale, so we figured why not. Compared to The Creeps!, which I have previously recommended, I think Kingdom Rush is more polished, and there’s kind of a story. Yut thought maybe deeper too. But it’s shorter, only thirteen levels, The Creeps! had lots of levels for the free version with lots of in-game purchase levels; I haven’t totally finished all of the included levels yet. We’ve played through all thirteen levels in Kingdom Rush at least once on Easy, but haven’t gone back to look at the other modes for each level. This game also has a building with units to guard and stop the creep which was somewhat reminiscent of Ninja Town which was one of my favorite Nintendo DS games (seriously you should pick that up if you have a DS whatever), so I was extra predisposed to like it, I think. Anyway, I liked it! If you like tower defense games and want to play one, I am recommending this. (And also The Creeps!) [via Tools & Toys]

By the way, I wrote this post on an iPad, using the WordPress app. I think if I was on a computer, I probably would’ve linked to the Kingdom Rush and The Creeps! websites. And the specific post wherein I wrote about the Creeps, but it just felt like kind of a pain. The plan is, I’ll edit and add those in later. :) I mention this ’cause it kind of clarifies how I feel like the process is convenient enough to mean the difference between blogging and not blogging, but isn’t really great yet.

Edited: I added in some links! Also, you can try Kingdom Rush, there’s a free Flash-based version. I still think it’s worth getting. Playing TDs (tower defense games) on the iPad is a nice experience — the touchscreen is a good interface, and it’s nice to play wherever.

Game Apps

mim — Wed, 04 Jan 2012 06:33:14 +0000

Adi Robertson of The Verge reported today that there were a record-breaking 1.2 billion apps downloaded in the run up to Christmas, for both iOS and Android. The focus seems to be on the number of iOS (iPod Touch, iPhone, and iPad) and Android (too many to enumerate) devices activated or whatever, but when I read the headline, my first thought was, haha boy were we exemplars of the trend.

We were on break and there were a lot of sales and we had time to look through lists and try out new stuff and our niece and nephew like to borrow our devices for games so we downloaded So. Much. Stuff. Especially games. Standouts from that week were The Creeps! and The Creeps! HD from Super Squawk Software and Jetpack Joyride from Halfbrick (the makers of Fruit Ninja which I also have). Yut and the nephew (and I think neb) liked Jetpack, but I haven’t tried it; Yut, the nephew and I all liked The Creeps! which was just a really good implementation of a tower defense style game. I think the base games were all on sale for free, but are worth money. The Creeps! HD for the iPad is nicer than The Creeps! cos it was nice to play on the bigger screen.

In case you were looking for a couple of games to pass the time. :)

Don’t Run Out of Internet*

mim — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 06:44:36 +0000

Many years ago we were trying to decide what to do, and since Jimyo was always looking for people to play Monopoly with him, we agreed to play Monopoly. Hours and hours later, we were still at it, and I had a headache. Compounding this was that we’d all made terrible deals with Jimyo (terrible for him; he was in elementary school I think) and it looked like the game was going to last forever. We were playing as fast as we could but omg, Monopoly had stopped being fun. We don’t play Monopoly anymore, it just takes too long! Longer even than Trivial Pursuit! But that’s a topic for another day.

Too bad it didn’t go like this:

[via kottke]

I don’t know if it’s actually the theoretically shortest game of Monopoly, but they are so funny with their nerdy glee! I wonder what’s the shortest game of Monopoly wherein everyone plays the way people normally play (but without auctions). I mean, like buying properties when they have the chance and stuff.

* CT likes to complain that she’s run out of stuff to look at online. I like to tell her that it’s impossible to run out of internet and then send some random interesting link to something. :)

Oops I Did It Again

mim — Mon, 18 Jan 2010 13:19:02 +0000

We installed Civ. Well it’s Civilization IV — I think when I previously mentioned playing too much Civ, it was Civ III. Not that we haven’t had Civ IV but the madness can only continue for so long! We were furloughed ’til past the New Year and one day I said, “Y’know, let’s play Civ!” And the madness ensued: staying up until 3am (at least — we’ve, uh, missed seeing the dawn before), wearing pajamas all day, eating in front of the computer at odd hours, all of it.

So…besides all of the holiday traveling and everything, that’s why it’s like I’ve fallen off the face of the earth. :D

What I Did (Part of) This Weekend

mim — Mon, 16 Nov 2009 19:04:17 +0000

Like a school essay “What I did this summer,” only covering a much shorter period of time. And okay, not very essay-like. Regardless, it starts like this:

In case you haven’t guessed, I played a lot of …

Not only that, I’ve started downloading things for my Sims. (Cos that’s just what I needed, more ways to spend time on The Sims.)

But well, what Sim wouldn’t want to garden in Dior couture? :p

Oh and if you’re wondering, yes, you can play The Sims 3 in windowed mode. And I love it!

Original dress can be seen at NYMag — it’s number 33 of 36.
Dior dress for The Sims 3 downloaded from iCON.

Worst Evar

mim — Mon, 08 Jun 2009 14:44:30 +0000

It was the worst weekend of card playing ever. I was thinking of trying to use the quote from Dickens, “It was the best of times, it was the worst of times,” but dude, it wasn’t the best of times at all; I lost at cards to everyone! Not that I was always last, but I never won.

I lost to K at Scotch Bridge or Up and Down the River or Oh Heaven, Oh Hell (whatever that game is called), then to Mike at Napoleon, then to Yuli at Napoleon. All the young’uns are growing up and I’m growing old. I probably only didn’t lose to Jimyo cos he was playing Block Party and Plants vs. Zombies and other video games for part of the time. Gaaaaah.

Speaking of Plants vs. Zombies, I think it’s been a hit with the whole family. We’ve played a LOT of Plants vs. Zombies. :) Worthy buy at ~$20.

Still Bitter

mim — Sun, 18 Jan 2009 07:28:31 +0000

We went to visit my family this December holiday, and besides cards and video games and not enough sleep, Kay brought Taboo, which was surprisingly fun.

EXCEPT! One of our games we played females vs males (chicks vs. dicks:p), and on my turn, my word was “dungeon.” I thought I was being so clever and started saying, “role playing game, played on paper,” and what I thought was the kicker, “multi-sided dice.” All of my teammates had blank expressions on their faces. All of my opponents were practically rolling on the floor laughing. I mean dude, I’ve never playing Dungeons & Dragons, and neither had some of them, but we all knew what it was!!! The only one on my team who even managed a guess was Yuli, the youngest, who ventured, “Magic?” The rest of them came up with nothing but, “Uh…” GAAAAAH!!!

Then they tried to claim it was cos they weren’t dorky nerds. Hmmph. I mean, knowing what Dungeons & Dragons is doesn’t mean you’re a nerd (not that nerd is necessarily a bad thing); it’s a cultural thing, like Mario or Donkey Kong or MONA LISA, not a nerd thing! (Yes guys, I’m still going on about this. :p)

And, look, on today’s PostSecret:

There ya go, now all of you know what he’s referring to, kind of. See? Cultural! :D

Are You Smarter Than a 1-Year-Old?

mim — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 01:17:27 +0000

Okay, admit it, you didn’t even know all of these:p And you’re probably not as cute! (Or is it just me? :p) [kotaku]

December Happenings

mim — Sun, 04 Jan 2009 07:50:38 +0000

Happy New Year! I think we celebrate New Year’s (and birthdays, incidentally) by drunk dialing/texting people. Lovely, no? :)

I meant to post more than I did in December, I really did, but work got so busy and then I went to visit the family in MD, and dude we stayed up late all the time (Leaf likens it to Guantanamo, yet if I don’t keep up, Kay calls me a pansy!) and somehow I didn’t get on the computer to blog.

But I’m gonna be random and talk about December stuffs anyways, since I took photos for this, even though I didn’t post them. Whatevs!

So… I spilled wine all over my keyboard — dude you never saw me shut down my computer so fast before. I didn’t dawdle! Yut had to take it apart and I took a photo with the keys off, but I forgot to take one from before he cleaned it off. Duuuuuuude, the keyboard was dusty and dirty inside! It didn’t look too bad from the outside, but after the keys were off there was dust like a blanket of snow. Yeah gross! My keyboard wasn’t too hard to take apart and put back together, and once it dried, everything was hunky dory.

The other random thing that I took a photo of is my broken thumbnail. Dude, broken nails are yucks. I always have visions of my whole nail falling off and I’m almost to scared to look. Not that it was that bad, but it was bad enough. And my thumb tip was kinda sensitive for a week after cos it’s used to being covered by a little more nail. Typing kinda sucked… and all sorts of other things. Opposable thumbs, so important!

Guess what? It happened when I went bowling. Dude, I haven’t been bowling in like 8 years, and 2 days after Leaf and K mention that they break their thumbnails bowling, I go bowling and I break my thumbnail! Wacky! I suck at bowling btw. We played two games and I managed a 60-something the first game and I think a 40 my second game. I don’t know why they even make gutters on the lanes! WHY BOTHER?! :p

Various and Sundry from SF

mim — Sun, 14 Dec 2008 10:29:58 +0000

We went to the city today for dinner with Lingo at The Richmond, which is a rather nice and cozy and delicious place. Also, Lingo is a regular so the chef always comes out to say hello. Crazy eh?

Anyways, this is just to explain why we were on the BART playing Professor Layton (a fun puzzle game) on the DS, getting engrossed, and missing our station (which I twittered). The ride felt so long going to San Francisco, cos it was crowded enough that we couldn’t find seats, but it felt so short on the way home; gawd I don’t know how anyone goes anywhere without a DS. (Nintendo doesn’t pay me any money but they really oughta, doncha think? :p) Until we looked up and we were past our station. OOOOOPS.

Random other fact: we saw sooooo many people in SF wearing Santa costumes. Some of them were caroling! I don’t know, is this the weekend for Christmas/holiday parties??? I would’ve taken some photos but it was hella cold (40s) and I didn’t get a camera out in time. :p

And thanks for all the good wishes etc, I’m feeling better now. Luckily not a flu, cos I never quite got around to deciding about getting a flu shot, which means that I didn’t get one cos it’s no effort to not get one so it’s the default choice, if that makes any sort of sense. Still months of flu season though, so plenty of time to rue my decision or lack thereof. :p