Meryl.net Home About Blog Clients Services Contact

Casual Games Reviews, News & Talk

PC Game Review Virtual Villagers 3: The Secret City

Thursday, June 5th, 2008 at 10:29 AM 18 comments Category: Casual Games Reviews, News & Talk, Game Reviews, PC Games, Strategy Games

My people have returned! My people have returned! I don’t play any Sims-style games except Virtual Villagers (VV). I do like Sims games, but they require time I don’t have. But when it comes to the tribal crew, I’m there.

A human year has passed since we helped the villagers through their trials and tribulations in The Lost Children.

Virtual Villagers 3: The Secret City takes our people to a new spot on Isola. They moved on from the other part of Isola to seek more land for their growing tribe. In landing on the northern side of Isola, they find an previous lived-in place.

Unlike past VV games, the tribe doesn’t start from scratch considering this was an abandoned city. All doesn’t come easy as they have to repair run down buildings and figure out how to get more food than the occasional mushroom. The tribe can’t go fishing in the shark-infested ocean, so they must brush up on alchemy and research to find other solutions.

Like the previous two games, the villagers can gain skills in five areas: farming, building, researching, healing, and parenting. Healing has been a difficult area to master, but that has changed with this one as the game offers more opportunities to build up a villager’s medical knowledge. Parenting is probably the most difficult to master — as it should — and repeatedly pregnant and pairing up of the villagers doesn’t quite help them master parenting.

Building up tech points takes a long time, so we must have patience. I hate limiting myself to checking on my people to twice a day. However, checking them too often resembles watching a pot boil. In the early years of the game, you’ll need to check in more often because food is a challenge. You will come to a point when it won’t be, but not for a long time.

The biggest new feature is the factions. Players need to choose between Nature and Magic factions. Nature helps with food while Magic increases longevity. This feature will compel players to create at least two tribes — one from each faction.

Other new features include having a tribal chief with special powers, a medical area, a special plant that only appears based on the chosen faction, weather, collections (turtle shells, coral, tablets, and feathers), and areas of technology (restoration, alchemy, and leadership). Science and Medicine appeared in the previous edition and return in Virtual Villagers 3: The Secret City.

Villagers again come with likes and dislikes that can make some tasks harder or easier for them. Sometimes, you have to give up on the idea of helping one become an elder (mastering three skills) because a villager refuses to try something no matter how many times you push. The kids also take on traits from their parents. This time, they have an opportunity to become a master before they’re 18 because the tribal leader can give lectures once a day, which makes the kids smarter.

Also new to Virtual Villagers 3: The Secret City is the trophies-type screen with 10 awards you can achieve. However, when you earn an award, it’s a non-event. The only way you know your tribe receives an award is by going to the awards screen.

You have four speed options. Virtual Villagers 3: The Secret City continues to be a persistent game. This means that when you exit the game, they tribe lives on. I use the fastest speed and it’s still not fast enough. Really, you should savor the game and be patient. However, some of us don’t have that luxury.

Maybe it would work to have a sliding scale that outlines the human time and tribal time. For instance, a mother won’t do anything except take care of her baby for two years — 120 minutes (time depends on the chosen game speed) in human time. Or perhaps, add options to stop the game when food gets to zero. What do I know? I’m not a game developer.

The hardest part of the game — for me anyway — is leaving my villagers alone. I try to cut down to checking them two or three times a day (keep the fire burning, at least), but I jump in more than that. After completing 10 of the 16 puzzles, I need level 3 for the remaining puzzles and that takes hundreds of thousand tech points as I need to upgrade all five areas of technology plus my faction’s level. Ay yi yi.

Adventure / strategy games don’t run long because of the involved programming considering they have little repetition (like hidden object and arcade games). Yet, Virtual Villagers 3: The Secret City lasts a long time and gives players their money’s worth. I dare you to try it for an hour, if you’ve never played. Whether you’ve played the previous two has no bearing on this one. You can start with this and play the others later or start with Virtual Villagers.

No matter — you can’t help but love them like children. They have their moments and give you plenty of laughs with an occasional, “Aw, man!”

Tags: casual games, PC Games, virtual villagers Subscribe:

RSS or

E-mail

18 comments

Posted by: bb on June 17th, 2008, 8:49 AM
i can’t figure out how to get a leader and i really need help! I love vv and i am so glad they came out with a third game! please help!!!
Posted by: catherine on June 19th, 2008, 8:12 AM
ya u can just bring ppl up to the red thinf on the black thing by the red things and have them try on the robe
Posted by: KoKo on June 23rd, 2008, 2:00 AM
i can’t figure out how to get the award for having triplets plz help!!
Posted by: Meryl on June 23rd, 2008, 7:45 AM
I haven’t gotten it either… only had twins and I’ve gotten everything else (except for the collection). I’ve tried making the fertility potion a few times, but no luck.
Posted by: tac on June 24th, 2008, 10:24 AM
For the feritlity part I know that you need to have two lotus and a rose. You can also use the tiger lily and rose as well. I have had to restart this game over, because of not pausing it when I have been gone a long period of time. I am not sure how to do the cloud with the lightning bolt, but I guess I have to keep finding ways to figure it out. I did pick my faction once I unblocked the cave. It states that the prince uses the magic faction and the princess used nature,so going by this my leader uses magic. If anyone has any helpful tips please share, because we all could use some help.
Posted by: Someone on June 27th, 2008, 9:36 PM
Tac-
the cloud w/ bolt of lightning is the weather dancing. You will need Leadership level two and three adept farmers. Drag your cheif and three farmers on the fire. All four villagers will dance and learn they can control the weather. Hope that helps!!!
Posted by: jo on July 6th, 2008, 11:32 AM
my chife has been ruling for over 50 years but i have not gotten a reward can anyone help plz !!!!!!!!!!!!!
Posted by: Carman on August 7th, 2008, 11:46 AM
I can’t get any of my villagers to become master parents…i make the men parents because they take less time parenting, i have also tried telling the children stories with them a little help so I can make a “jack of all trades” Thanks
Posted by: maria on August 10th, 2008, 11:12 PM
get a lady to be a master in all trades then start get parenting skills - make babies till she reaches 50. then she will stop making babies but still gain parenting skills when they “go inside” it takes a fair few goes but keep “at it”
Posted by: lizzie on August 16th, 2008, 4:47 PM
how do you get lvl 2 in your faction?
please help!!!
Posted by: Cassandra on August 21st, 2008, 8:27 AM
How do i heal the tribal cheif? I have tryed using the master doctor but that doesnt work either???
Posted by: Rachel on August 21st, 2008, 5:05 PM
The tribal chief only dies of old age so dont worry just make the half health potion - 2 Lotus 1 Cactus -

And to get level 2 in your faction click tech and see how much it is then research till you get enough to points to buy it.

Hope that helps
Posted by: Sarah on September 24th, 2008, 2:21 PM
ok so i have all three trees but now whenever they get food and put it in the food bin the number never goes up!
what should i do?
Posted by: Boo on November 5th, 2008, 5:43 PM
Hey does anyone know what the thing in the cave means? I just don’t get it! Does that mean that I have to get an elder and pick a princess and a prince or what?
Posted by: Lieke on November 12th, 2008, 9:23 AM
How do you become a master in building or research? ‘Cause I can’t get any furter than adept… I let them research over and over but they still don’t become master (building is not working ’cause they have build everything they can until I “upgrade” them with my tech points)
Posted by: Lieke on November 12th, 2008, 9:29 AM
Ow and When I harvest fruit the people bring it to the hut but It’s not counted as food, the number just stays the same, while the honey was counted as food but now it’s empty so i have only the fruit left… Why doesn’t it count? they’ll starve if this doesn’t work!!
Posted by: BP on November 14th, 2008, 5:35 AM
The fruit get counted when they are plucked from the trees and not when they are brought to the granary. A bit silly but there you have it.
Posted by: Lieke on November 14th, 2008, 1:46 PM
Yeah I see! Stupid me! And I’m a master too now But I have a master in research and my alchemie-level is 2 but still none of my potions I make work. It allways says that there’s no potion ready, I tried a lot of the things that were listed on the walkthroughs I read but none seems to work.