Dragon’s Call II

Dragon’s Call II is a new sequel to Dragon’s Call from EverDream or RayMedia (the official website claimed), part of China-based NetDragon Incorporation. The new version undergoes a dramatic change of graphics, gameplay and storyline compared to the original, but its new version is hardly considered to be a new title in front of Legend Warrior, Pockie pirates, or  Dawn of Darkness.

Review:

Dragon’s Call II is hardly considered to be a new title. You know exactly what is coming the very moment you see the game interface.
If you ever played Dawn of Darkness: Glory Calling on Facebook, you will be familiar with the basic gameplay of Dragon Call II: you have your avatar run from left to right, talk with NPCs, accept missions, and go straight to the right of the town, select the instance and again go all the way from left to right, kill all the monsters and evils in the way until they are cleared up and a box drops onto the ground from nowhere, and you claim the gold, experience or other items you may need.
That might sound a little bit complicated. But the game manages to make it easy by offering the most convenient mission-tracking system. You click the underlined contents in the mission bar and you pretty much have it all covered. That is still true in instance maps, which is quite different from many MMORPGs out there. Of course, you will have to click the dialog boxes to chat with NPCs so that they would hand out missions. The long and omnipresent conversations help make the game immersive and intriguing – if you ever read them at all.
With the automatic mission-tracking system that is still functioning well in instance maps, you fall into the fixed pattern in which you only need to click the quest bar and click through the conversations.
Battles are automatically performed and the results pretty much depend on how many members you’ve got on your team and how powerful their weapons are. Every time you enter an instance map, you have your avatar go rightward and whenever it encounters an enemy, a battle is triggered and you can only watch the dazzling battling visuals and wait for the results. Once in a while, you will need to spend gold in refining the weapons so that your avatar and other fighters would cause more damages while defend against attacks from enemies.
Thanks to the almost 100% automatic battling and mission-tracking systems, Dragon Call II is anything but a challenging and exciting game that hardcore gamers crave for. Anybody can easily follow the quests and stories without meeting any obstacles whatsoever. However, that also means there is a high chance that you might be bored. After all, the mission-tracking thing decreases the fun of exploring the world, while the automatic battling indicates you wouldn’t be able to design battle strategies and enjoy the fun of participating in battles.
The worst of all is not the completely automatic battling, intelligent mission-tracking system, or the tedious trips between your instance maps and the towns. It is the fact that all those stuffs have been seen and, criticized, already. Aside from the sort of refined graphics, you might find nothing much different between Dragon Call and Pockie Pirates.
The only way to relish Dragon’s Call II, I’m afraid, is to read through all the instructions and conversations and involve yourself in the story rather than really play it. If you happen to be one of those guys who totally ignores stories and care only about fighting and enhancing battle skills, well, forget about it.

Terra Militaris

Terra Militaris is a browser game developed by Snail Games behind Age of Wulin, and the Chosen. It is a rebuild of Ministry of War, and Imperial Warfare, in an effort to attack European gamers as 帝国文明 gains popularity in China. The game is now published by a handful of online games publishers, including Kongregate, Snail Games, Facebook, Gpotato, and Aeria games.
Become the leader of an ancient world power and lead your troops to conquer MMORTS Terra Militaris in the numerous struggles for dominance of the continents.  As a representative of the Romans, Persians, Egyptians, Chinese, you will initiate the war to the rest of others. Each kingdom has its own individual cultural benefits.
All of the titles are inspired from Microsoft’s Age of Empires Online, while rendering the addiction and enjoyment onto the web browser. Terra Militaris starts at an early epoch in human history. Your people are still relatively underdeveloped and only has some land and some cabins.
You need to build settlements for your workers who are able to produce raw materials that are vital to train troops and do research, build new buildings and form an ancient city. Of course you should always have your eye on the research of new findings. Engaging in trade, cultural exchange and military attack are the core elements of the game, increases the interaction and warfare among players.
Afterwards, you will have to establish your alliance where your allies could work together to attack other kingdoms. Therefore, it is not common to fight for more territories and resources.  All battles in Terra Militaris takes place in real-time and give you full control over your troops. Each time you launch your attack, you should assign a General or Commander to boss your armies and win ingame experience, strength and special equipment, making your commander particularly valuable in the fight.
The same codes that has been employed in Terra Militaris can be found anywhere in Chinese MMORPG Games such as Warflow, Batheo. Even those Chinese bad programming is embedded into Facebook games such as Dragons of Atlantis, Samurai Dynasty.

The Settlers Online

Note: Ubisoft has officially named The Settlers Online as Castle Empire Online, which is nothing but the German version of Die Siedler Online.

Let’s turn the hands of the clock back into the opening years of the Renaissance when the mid-Europe is just awakening stretching its arms from a long sleep. Somewhere in this world, vast virgin lands spread out with Nature-bestowed thick forest, great mountains, productive grassland, and fertile plain with dimpling rivers meandering through. There are not many settlers here yet, visionaries have already foreseen the futuristic empire hustling and hustling with life, though. You can turn that vista into reality in The Settlers Online.
The Settlers Online is a free-to-play, browser-based, strategy MMO centering on the theme of empire building. As the web version of the pervasive PC game The Settlers of the Ubisoft, The Settlers Online is of more convenience for those who love online strategy warfare game yet loathe requirements on computer configuration or subscription fee. And now, players can just access to it through browsers, enter the delightful game world with refreshing and nostalgic graphic style, and enjoy the gameplay to heart’s content.
As the proverb goes, Rome is not built in a day. To construct the great empire, players have to start from taking care of the unexploited lands and build first settlement, providing the shelter to local people. On the small patches of undeveloped lands, players can set about sketching layout for their ideal villages. Taking various factors such as terrain and building functions into consideration, players can build different styles of architecture in the most suitable location, so as to attract more population to settle down.
With increasing settlers, players can further to develop production streamline for more resources and gradually turn villages into thriving cities. As economy grows, players should also consider developing military units, which is indispensable in defense and offense. Army serves its primary duty to safeguard its own village or city from harassment of intruders, whereas it can also be sent out to attack other cities for resources. Given the existence of potential military conflicts, alliance can be formed to strengthen each member’s forces. Besides, as the game proceeds, players also have chance to win important role in guilds, which will bring about honor, fame and treasure.
Isn’t it delightful to see a small village gradually evolve into a great empire under your excellent governance? Isn’t it wonderful to see your dream come true? Then waste no time and start with piling up the first wall.

Review: The Settlers Online

Almost a year has passed since the official release of The Settlers Online and we take this opportunity to have a closer look at the game.
Two years ago, Ubisoft announced that they were working on a browser version based on the classic game The Settlers. One year later, the developers officially published the game. Since then, the game has changed a lot, which is why we think it necessary to take a closer look at the developments and to find out whether the browser version will be fun to play.

Build, build, and build little houses!

In The Settlers Online, you will get your own island, which is divided into different sectors and most of them are still unexplored at the beginning of the game. You have only one building from the get-go, which is the town hall that also functions as a warehouse. And to create a flourishing settlement, you can start with the construction of the first fundamental building.
With lots of buildings to construct, you need more building materials than just lumber. You have to produce raw materials such as stone, copper and coal by dispatching geologists to prospect for the materials.
Over time, you would have a small thriving settlement, which mainly consists of residential buildings that work to increase the production of your settlers. Roads are only for decoration, in contrast to its predecessors and counterparts; goods are collected across country. You have to make a clever use of the space. It is possible to send a scout to explore the surrounding unexplored sectors that are still covered by clouds. Unfortunately, the bandits would capture some areas and you have to retreat before you are able to take them back. Therefore, you have to separate barracks and weapons production manufactures to keep your troop working even when you lose part of your territory.

More room for everyone!

The number of buildings on the island kind of tells how developed it is. Nevertheless, that number is limited by the building permits you have at hand. Although you can obtain them by spending the premium currency, you still have to expand and develop your city as much as you can to get more permits. The same applies to the number of available settlers: every building needs workers who in turn require accommodations. The same is true to the soldiers hired in the barracks. If you already employed all the settlers you have, you must build new residential houses to invite more people, which in turn require more building permits. That adds variety and calls for some planning in advance.
After completing missions and defeating robbers, players will get experience points and enough experience points would lead to your upgrades, which bring small rewards and access to new buildings. At level 18, for example, you unlock the iron mine, which allows you to produce iron swords and then recruit militias. That’s encouraging and it keeps you in good spirits, especially when the opponents always have better and advanced troops.

Intense attention to details

The game boasts great and beautifully designed graphics that you would crave for more even at the first glimpse. In The Settlers Online you can zoom in from different angles. For example, you can have a bird’s view of the whole island and then come right down to the buildings. Actually, zoom in as much as it is allowed and you will be able to notice many details in beautiful animation. If you go around the place, you would see animals roaming in the woods, lumberjacks chopping trees and smoke blowing off the chimneys. All those make it really entertaining and relaxing. What are missing from the game, however, are the hard-working porters who bring the goods produced in the camp for their new destination.
The details have a price though: computers with poor performance can sometimes be a little overwhelmed. Also, there might be breakdowns occasionally but since the developers improved the game considerably in recent months you can now enjoy the graphics on computers significantly weaker.

Production chains

The gameplay of Settlers has always been based on the production chains of various commodities. The browser spin-off is no exception: you can brew beer with wheat and water, treat the soldiers at the barracks and then provide weapons to train the soldiers. However, gold ore is processed into bars using coal, which is subsequently used to manufacture currency. All production steps are logically connected and are easy to follow. Some goods can be further refined later in the game. For instance, players of higher levels can produce steel and steel swords, which are much better that the copper ones. Sadly, the lack of transportation and roads makes it different from a real production chain.

Everything has an end

Almost all the resources in the game are available only to a limited extent, the farm is harvestable at specified intervals, the well dries up and the mine might be exhausted. You will not have enough materials for your estates because many buildings need to be rebuilt. You might need to plant crops in new farms and dig some new wells once in a while. And when it comes to ore, you would have to send a geologist to prospect for it, which will take some time. Those who would not want to wait that long can spend a bit of premium currency. Besides, it is also possible to produce useful items in the food stores: fish stocks can be increased if you add the required food, which is made from bread.
Should you still be missing certain products, you can check the market for good deals. The game now allows players to exchange their extra goods with teammates. You can decide what and how much to exchange for goods you want.

Long-term motivation and outlook

Those who look for new challenges might as well try missions that give a time-limited access to another island. In that case, you must obtain all the extra rewards and experience points. But since all the quests all revolve around combat missions and you always have to wait until the troop strength is replenished, you can easily get bored.
Thankfully, the developers know about that problem and they try to keep the players with assorted events, ranging from Halloween Special, Easter egg hunting to Championship Event, where defeating an opposing army on a football-type card is at the center. In addition, Blue Byte and Ubisoft have announced that the game will be expanded to include other functions and will offer a PvP mode sometime. That means you will be allowed to compete against your friends and their armies. The developers didn’t provide details on that front, but it’s still nice to see that they spare no efforts to further enhance the game.

Conclusion:

The Settlers Online proves to be a very good implementation of the classic game. It’s fun just to enlarge one’s estate, develop new products and explore the island. But once you have conquered all, boredom arises. To make up for that, the developers keep coming up with imaginative events and updates to entertain players, which alone deserves some praise.

Features:

Make sure that your colonists always have enough raw materials and products available. You can improve your work force for your settlers, leaving them for all my devotion to your cause.
To increase your settlement, you must explore the surroundings and discover new areas where you’ll find not only valuable natural resources, but also you must push you to defend your settlement and. Are you ready to take good care of your people and increase your influence?
Together with your friends, you will feel much better to share fun with each other. Various options allow players to exchange items in the settlers world. Trade with other players in the buddy list and chat with them in the built-in chat.
Compete with your friends and experience the exciting adventures in the world of the settlers. Explore new islands and save your kingdom from the dangers.
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