Released: Dream Day Wedding: Viva Las Vegas

Play the next part in the hit hidden object wedding series, Dream Day Wedding: Viva Las Vegas. As the hottest new wedding planner in the country, your reputation is taking you from the Big Apple to Sin City! A high rolling bride is placing all bets on you to prepare for her big day. The stakes are high as you manage important tasks while keeping the bride, groom, and mother of the bride happy in this opulent destination. Get ready to hit the jackpot!

• Try your luck in the casino to earn and spend points
• Adventure and escape puzzles
• Mini games and wedding crisis levels
• All-new “Choose a Story” - your decision could affect the path of the game

Try Dream Day Wedding: Viva Las Vegas.

Game du Jour: Week of 21 June 2009

The following games will be discounted next week on Game du Jour, the ‘one-deal-a-day’ website dedicated to indie and casual games:

Sun. June 21st: 30% off on Farm Frenzy 2

Mon. June 22nd: 30% off on Farm Frenzy -Pizza Party!

Tue. June 23rd: 30% off on Alex Gordon

Wed. June 24th: 30% off on Beach Party Craze

Thu. June 25th: 30% off on Magic Ball 3

Fri. June 26th: 60% off on Nanotron

Sat. June 27th: 60% off on Lucky’s Puzzle Carnival

PC Game Review: Faerie Solitaire

One of the first Windows-based computer games I played was Golf solitaire. I can’t figure out how such a simple game could be so addicting even years later. I bore easily with repetition, but not with Golf. And the game has received some amazing interpretation into adventures including Faerie Solitaire.

The story told in Adventure mode makes little sense even though the game delivers most of it in small bites. So I won’t even go into what it’s about. I’m not sure myself. But the game more than makes up for it.

First, here how the Golf solitaire works: You take cards off the table that are one up or one down from the card in the pile. So if your pile card shows a king. You look for any open aces or queens (they can’t have a card on top of them). Let’s say you find an ace, put that on top of the king.

Now you need either a king or two. Keep taking cards off the foundation until you have no more moves. Then take another card from the stock pile and repeat. Clear the table for a perfect game, a goal you’ll need to reach in order to move on in some levels.

Every level consists of nine rounds of solitaire and has its own goals. You need to reach those goals by the time you finish the nine games. If not, you’ll replay the level. Otherwise, you move on to the next location (it’s that story thing again). Goals can be X number of perfect games, X amount of cash, fill purple meter within X minutes or make X moves in a row (without taking a card from the stock pile). You get cash for every play you make.

Of course, you’ll have power ups and barriers to keep Faerie Solitaire — but not so much that it becomes a confusing mess. Every now and then you’ll get a bonus card between 1 and 10. You can use these cards like you do when you take a new card from the stock pile except these won’t restart your “moves in a row” number so use these cards wisely.

Some columns won’t budge because they’re locked in by a thorn. To unlock the thorn column, you need to clear out the column that has a rose over it. Same goes for frozen cards. You need to clear the cards in front of the fiery one so you can use it to melt the frozen cards, which are always face down.

When you clear a column, you might find a surprise. It could be an egg or one of three elements that you need to evolve your new pet. Eggs appear randomly throughout the game. Finishing Adventure mode won’t ensure you find all the eggs. That’s where the replay value comes in. You’ll want to replay the different modes so you can uncover more eggs.

You can buy special power ups from Faerie Land and visit the Hatchery to hatch your found eggs. Once hatched, the creatures are babies. Each creature has a required amount of elements you need to collect to be able to evolve them. The creatures on the lower end require fewer elements than those on the higher end. It’s not clear what it takes to evolve a creature because I’ve collected the things it needs, but it’s not evolved right away. Nonetheless, it’s still a fun and cool feature.

Special power ups give you another undo (undo the last move), help your pets evolve faster, see the next card in the deck, reveal more cards on the table and so on.

I never once replay a level in Adventure mode. It was a breeze for the most part. The hard part doesn’t come in until near the end and when you unlock and play the five challenge levels. Now those called for a lot of replay until I could beat them. You can also replay any level.

The game had one annoying bug that comes and goes. When you start a new level, it needs to give you the objectives. Sometimes it pops up on the screen before you play and others nothing happen. You can always access the objectives by going to the menu. The game should let you view the objectives without leaving the game.

This is not a lazy game. Golf solitaire requires some planning ahead. Faerie Solitaire with its added barriers and extras calls for more strategy than a basic game of Golf. Although the graphics aren’t impressive and the story pointless, the game had me hooked for the entire weekend and it’s become one of my favorite solitaire games. I still want to play because I want to find the rest of the eggs. But beyond that, I’ll have to move on to another game — but that’s part of a reviewer’s job.

Download Faerie Solitaire.

PC Game Review: Wedding Dash: Ready, Aim, Love!

Love. Quirky family members. Wedding crashers. Beautiful brides. Bridezillas. Groom kongs. Who doesn’t love a wedding even with all of its craziness? Quinn returns in Wedding Dash: Ready, Aim, Love! for a third helping as a wedding planner who happily serves her clients in this blissful (most of the time) time management series.

She is planning the biggest wedding of her life — her own to Joe, the photographer. One hitch: he doesn’t know about it! An opening came up in a hot spot and it was either grab it in six weeks or wait years. She asks cupid for help, but he has a backlog of his own. If she helps him through his backlog, he’ll help her with her situation.

Like the previous games, your job is to seat guests and keep them happy or else face Bridezilla and Groom Kong. Of course, Quinn has a few tricks for managing manage guests when the food doesn’t get to them fast enough. She has cocktail tables and bells that bring out the cherubs.

She holds weddings in interesting locales beginning with an aquarium followed by a barn and two others. The game receives a few new features to make it the best one in the series. The cherubs can add one or two hands in helping Flo carry food and gifts, but they’re upgrades.

Before you start the reception, you have to figure out what the couple wants. In the past, you picked the three things that best meets their requests. in Wedding Dash: Ready, Aim, Love!, you also have to watch the budget and it’s possible to have several right answers. This is more enjoyable although it turns challenging in the later levels.

Guests may request champagne, the microphone to share a special message to the new couple, a song request or seating change. These give you bonus opportunities as well as chaining (doing the same actions in a row). Of course, Quinn has to deal with disasters ranging from over-celebrating bridesmaids and birds at the table to falling gifts and a missing dog.

The guests have personality traits to vary the pace. Some eat fast, others eat slow, one eats two of every course and one forgets to eat. While all of this sounds overwhelming, the game introduces new guests and features over time rather than all at once. The challenge level also slowly works from easy to tough.

Every venue comes with one cupid mini-game. Cute, but kind of pointless except to earn more coin. Cupid needs to shoot one man and one woman to match the given couple. Not only do you control the location of the arrow, but the strength of the shot.

As expected of Dash games, the game tells a great and fun story without overloading or confusing you. Two modes come in this one: adventure and endless. Wedding Dash: Ready, Aim, Love! has the honor of being my favorite of the Dash series. Diner Dash is simply too hard and the customers are bland compared to Wedding Dash’s.

PlayFirst knows how to put on a great wedding and succeeds again with Wedding Dash: Ready, Aim, Love!

Download Wedding Dash: Ready, Aim, Love!.

Game du Jour: Week of 7 June 2009

The following games will be discounted next week on Game du Jour, the ‘one-deal-a-day’ website dedicated to indie and casual games:

Sun. June 7th: 50% off on Dark Souls

Mon. June 8th: 100% off on Battles of Norghan

Tue. June 9th: 50% off on Titan Attacks

Wed. June 10th: 50% off on Ultratron

Thu. June 11th: 50% off on Droid Assault

Fri. June 12th: 50% off on Boulder Dash Episode I: Dig The Past

Sat. June 13th: 50% off on Kudos 2

Game du Jour: Week of 31 May 2009

The following games will be discounted next week on Game du Jour, the ‘one-deal-a-day’ website dedicated to indie and casual games:

Sun. May 31st: 50% off on Archibald’s Adventures

Mon. June 1st: 50% off on Larva Mortus

Tue. June 2nd: 20% off on KingMania

Wed. June 3rd: 20% off on Phantasia 2

Thu. June 4th: 20% off on Crystal Cave Gold

Fri. June 5th: 20% off on Styrateg

Sat. June 6th: 70% off on Open Fire Gold

Game du Jour Week of 17 May 2009

The following games will be discounted next week on Game du Jour, the ‘one-deal-a-day’ website dedicated to indie and casual games:

Sun. May 17th: 50% off on Universal Boxing Manager

Mon. May 18th: 50% off on The Goalkeeper

Tue. May 19th: 50% off on TV Station Manager

Wed. May 20th: 50% off on President Forever 2008 + Primaries

Thu. May 21st: 50% off on Prime Minister Forever - Canada 2008

Fri. May 22nd: 50% off on ArkanDROID

Sat. May 23rd: 100% off on Adron

PC Game Review: Wandering Willows

I don’t think I’ve come across anything like the fanciful Wandering Willows since I’ve ventured into the casual gaming arena. You could call it a cross between role-playing games, Virtual Villagers, adventure games, simulations and Pokemon. Let’s just say it brings an innovative new world to the casual games industry.

Floating in a hot air balloon, a bird pokes a hole in the balloon whisking you to a land where people are happy. Well, a few grumps do live there to keep things lively and humorous. You’re not the first person to arrive on this island. Everyone who has come before you has stayed. But like Dorothy of Wizard of Oz, you want to go home and that means you need to get to know the island’s residents because they can help fix your balloon.

Before you start exploring Grassland Island, you need to create an avatar complete with style and colors for hair, eyes, and skin. Now you’re ready to start your adventures with a pet who climbs and digs for you. PETA folks can take comfort knowing these are beautifully and intricately drawn animated pets and you take good care of them by making sure their energy levels stay up by feeding the animal its favorite foods (it lets you know what it likes and dislikes).

You only have one pet with you at all times, but can change your pets at your heart’s desire. As you meet other creatures on the island, you’ll occasionally come across an egg that you can incubate.

Every creature has three numbers — thus resembling RPGs — climbing, digging and energy. As it climbs and digs, its energy levels drop. The amount of drop depends on its strength and the strength of the object or animal it interacts with. The game comes with 40 creatures including robots. Animals also have the ability to charm other animals to get them to give up an egg, recipes or items.

Characters also have likes, dislikes and unique interests and personality quirks. Art Gunderson loves to wear fuzzy costumes and ballgowns. Two roommates live in a tent refuse to eat anything that isn’t organic — or rather one does while the other complains.

You also meet twins, a professor, a captain and more. Just when you think you’ve met all of the characters, you discover more. That’s what makes the game special — it surprises you throughout the game.

Your new found friends have a friendship meter. They start as strangers and as you complete tasks for them or treat them to something they like, the number climbs as you work to become everyone’s best friend. You might not be all of their best friends by the time you build your balloon, but don’t rush to do it either. This game and its journey need savoring and enjoying.

You pick up recipes, items, clothing and collar patterns and much more along the way. In total, the game contains 162 tasks, 200 recipes and 150 patterns for making different types of clothing including swords, helmets and capes.

I never care for wardrobes and dressing up characters … until now. This comes with more than just shirts and pants. With sunglasses and funny hats, the characters (and you) wear your creations until you change them. The collars give the animals added powers or abilities. But power of the collars don’t look obvious.

The wondrous land has three stores: cooking, sewing and gardening. You can buy some supplies while others you need to make yourself. You can also sell items in these stores so you can get more Willowbees aka cash, moolah, currency and bucks. You can carry 100 mushrooms, but you may not be able to carry 20 different objects depending on the size of your backpack. I love that about this game — it lets you carry all you want of individual items, but limits the different types of items.

Wandering Willows lasts a long time. Even after you fix your balloon, you can keep on playing and you most likely want to. Some of the simulation types of games encourage you to continue interacting with the game, but you feel like the fun is gone. Not so with Wandering Willows. I only have three uncompleted tasks by the time I repair the balloon. I’d like to see a few more than that, but at least I have plenty of trophies to earn to compel me to trek on.

During the entire game play, I worried about the game crashing. Its colorful and calming scenes constantly jerked as if I didn’t have enough screen power. It only crashed once, but continued to flake even though I closed all other applications.

Another feature I’d like to see is a list or chart of all the animals that travel with me and things I make. With many animals and recipes, you lose track and I’d like to meet each creature once and make each item. Although the character eventually finds a way to move from place to place a little faster, it gets tiring waiting for her to get where she needs to go. Speed up!

It won’t surprise me if this one wins awards and accolades. I wish we could see novel games like this more often. Not only does Wandering Willows contain charming and adorable scenes and characters, but also humor and the freedom to do things in no particular order. It’ll make my top 10 games for 2009 and it’s only March.

New: The Serpent of Isis

The casual games industry is giving The Serpent of Isis high accolades. I haven’t checked it myself as I’m swamped with client projects. Here are the details:

Someone stole the legendary artwork, The Serpent of Isis, from the grand opening of the Egypt Museum in Cairo. Your character’s grandfather originally discovered the artifact that has been missing for years. An anonymous letter arrives saying that the person who has the artwork is on board the Mont Palu Express. Catch the train to find the artwork and solve the ancient mystery.

Although the artifact comes the very popular hidden object game setting of Egypt, the action doesn’t all take place in Cairo. In fact, it ends in London — one of the first places I want to visit outside of North America.

PC Game Review: Fabulous Finds

Fabulous Finds, a hidden object game, has a few hidden gems to offer something a little different. Rather than being one big game with several mini-games, Fabulous Finds offers three-in-one as no one component dominates.

Great Aunt Beatrice left you her home in Carmel, California. The home needs a makeover, so you dig through the house for stuff to sell in the yard sale to collect the needed funds for redecorating. The three-in-one components include collecting items for the yard sale (hidden object), selling them in the yard (connecting customers with what they want), and decorating rooms (puzzle).

The hidden object portion contains no list of things to find. Instead, you read the newspaper to identify a trend and then search rooms for items fitting that trend. One trend is gardening. Click all items that have some association with gardening. This offers a creative twist, but it has flaws. I see a garden hose and click it. Nope. It’s not acceptable. This sort of thing happens at times.

Since you’re weeding through junk, some items have missing parts or need repairs. These have helper items, but those won’t show up on the list until you’ve picked up the original item. A high heel shoe, for example, has a missing heel. After you find the shoe, the missing heel appears on the helper list. Find the broken heel to reunite the two items.

After collecting everything for the theme from several rooms in the house, time to hold the yard sale. Items appear spread around the yard, on tables, on the porch, on the corners of the yard. The customers enter and notes show up describing the customer and what he/she needs. “The librarian wants to cook.” So you look for the stereotypical librarian who dresses impeccably and has her hair up. Then you need to find something that has to do with cooking — pots and pans, perhaps. Drag the librarian to the pots and pans.

Sometimes the clues can be obscure. It makes the game more challenging. Each customer has a happiness bar. The longer it takes you to find what they need, the shorter their happiness bar. So not only do you need to find the right customer, but also the item he/she needs. Kind of a mix between hidden objects and a puzzle (using content to figure out what you need).

When the sale ends (after all customers receive what they want), you can proceed to redecorate a room. Or you can start looking for items for the next yard sale. The game doesn’t care which order you take. The only thing that matters is that the yard sale can never come before finding the items for it — obviously.

In decorating a room, Fabulous Finds gives you clues as to how to decorate the room. The closer you match the clues, the higher score your room earns. Most of the time, this is too easy. At least, after you finish the game, you can decorate the rooms in any way you’d like.

The fabulous part about the game is its colorful and sharp graphics and creative approach to finding items. Fabulous Finds, however, needs to last longer and provide a little more challenge in room decorating. Or maybe turn it into a SIM environment where you can play in the room with characters. It also needs to avoid not accepting objects that fit in with the yard sale theme. Despite the few nigglings, Fabulous Finds deserves its name.

Download the game from your favorite site:

• Big Fish Games
• PlayFirst