I keep looking at the Cascadia app because it is begging me to download, but I just came across a 1-Star review titled “Digital Wolf is not good at this” that questions why publishers continue to let Digital Wolf (their word, not mine) ruin games.
Sometimes I like to pretend some of these reviews are just corporate warfare because it’s the only thing that makes them make sense.
Naysayers aka “Trolls” in this digital age. It’s good. Evergreen The Board Game app didn’t click with me. I tried hard to like it but moved on. Cascadia though gelled right from the get go. Dire Wolf had padded the app nicely - online and AI multiplayer / what I assume is the solo mode from the cardboard version / challenges / a career progression. It seems to be a little bit of a battery hog, particularly in comparison to Clank but there’s been a couple of updates since release and might have improved a little.
Dredge is out on iOS. I don’t know if it’s flown under the radar or not because it is one of those indie darlings that I can’t gauge the popularity of. It’s a mix of fishing and lovecraftian horror with a pretty simple loop of fishing for money to get better gear to fish for better fish, etc., with the twist that there are some things lurking in the water that are best to avoid for your own sanity. Each fish has its own little mini game for catching, you can haul whatever you can fit in your boat Tetris-style, and you have to juggle how much you want to equip your boat versus how much space you want for your catch. Admittedly, I’ve only played part of the way through, but that’s because it was a game rental and I decided to wait for the full version on iOS. The game looks to be a bit pricey but you can download and try for free.
Piqued my interest. Looks Fallen London / Sunless Sea ish?
I haven’t played those, so I can’t comment. Expanding a little more on what I said, there’s also an element of exploration; as you improve your ship you are able to sail further and explore new seas and new ports. Fish are better, but danger is greater. You’ll also have an opportunity to improve your ports as well through upgrading certain services.
It’s an intriguing atmospheric game with a good loop.
I really enjoy Dredge on Switch and reviewed it here a while ago:
There’s nothing about the controls that would make me think it wouldn’t convert well to ios.
I liked Dredge, but my elder child adored it. Curious that “cozy” and “unsettling” blend so well; perhaps a reflection of the unsettling nature of reality, such that it feels more honest?
Did a quick bit of research and it appears Dredge is priced the same on iOS as it is on Steam, which I find refreshing. The $12.49 launch discount for the full game unlock matches the lowest Steam price thus far.
I preordered it… though I have no idea when or how much I paid/when that money came out of the account…
I have a 5hr plane trip today, will have to make sure it is on my iPad and charged!
It’s free to try, so you haven’t paid anything yet!
But that sale! They make it really hard to not impulse buy the thing when it’s $12 or so off.
Dredge is a great game. Its not massively long (I got 12 hours out of it having explored most of the secrets) so if thats an issue for you I thought Id mention it.
But it’ll be a great fit for ios if they get the controls right. Lends itself nicely to bite size sessions, or longer sessions if you really want to get into it
Impressions of recent Next Fest demos:
Into the Restless Ruins: My favorite demo by far. Start with fog-obscured dungeon rooms scattered across the board; your cards are rooms you add to connect parts of the dungeon and improve your health, attack power, time to explore, etc. After using your build points, explore what you’ve built to uncover pre-defined rooms, earn points to improve your deck, and eventually reach the boss after several build/explore cycles. Exploration feels a little Dungeon of the Endless-esque, and the deckbuilding meshes nicely with that layer.
Is This Seat Taken?: Cute puzzler where you place “people” (blocks with attitude, really) in vehicles or rooms. The challenge is each person has one or two constraints–maybe they want a window seat, or to be next to a specific friend. The demo nicely adds varieties of constraints to make the puzzles trickier as levels progress.
Monster Train 2: The title should tell you whether you’re interested or not.
Siegecaster: I really wanted to like this game but didn’t get it. Semi real-time tower defense, where you build walls around gems that grant you abilities and new towers. You have the ability to cycle between the building and attack layers, and the attacks don’t pause for building. Devs posted tutorial videos after I tried it, so I may go back after watching those.
Tempopo: Puzzle game from the Unpacking devs. Basically, for each level, you place “actions” on a board so when your characters start moving, the correct actions lead them to pick up tokens and reach the exit. If it were just that, I might like it, but this game’s theme is way weirder. The tokens are singing flowers, you collect them to rebuild some creepy little kid’s musical garden, and your “characters” look like pink flower bulbs with eyes … ? Mumbled one last “what the fuck?” after a giant flying tortoise took its third lap around one of my levels and closed the game for good.
Calico is set to release digitally in a week as “Quilts and Cats of Calico.” I’ve never played the board game, but this is the second game from the developer of Wingspan and looks to continue their tradition of great-looking apps. Wingspan is by no means perfect and has had its issues, but this is a developer I’m inclined to support.
Rolling Realms is out on iOS, but it appears to be iPad-only, which is a shame. It isn’t a game I’m yearning for, but it’s something I would likely grab if it were on phone.
Not out on Android, so that’s been my goto for it.
Calico is out now on iOS. I can’t decide if I want to kill the trigger on this or Cascadia for an upcoming flight.
@Codington needs to add both to the vote for next seasons ladder polls.
Both of these games look great I just watched dice tower reviews of them, but I need to buy Istanbul and learn how to play before that game comes up in the ladder.
Istanbul should be simple to learn.
Cascadia ís pretty classic Dire Wolf - not perfect, but well done.
Unfortunately, it’s also worse than most in terms of an async experience - not because of Dire Wolf’s implementation, but because of the nature of the game. It just doesn’t translate all that well to async. Playing at table is already pretty close to solitaire other than some minor competition for terrain majority, but on mobile async there’s basically no interaction to speak of.
Still a good game if you’re into “puzzle with a theme” type games, but a bit like watching paint dry as far as the async experience goes IMO.