One of the drawbacks of games on touch screen devices is they are often extremely simple. As such, a real-time strategy title - where you'll manage many units at the same time - is often out of the question. RTS purists might insist that the games play best with a mouse and keyboard and shouldn't be shrunk down. But Grab Games Games couldn't have made their RTS Amoebattle any smaller - it's about amoebas. And you know what? It works.
There are all kinds of tabletop games nowadays, and all kinds of gamers who play them. You've got your deck-builders who pour over their Magic cards, constantly trying to build the perfect deck. You've got your D&D groups spending hours on backstory and building dungeons that might get completely passed over. Then you've got your folks who are into the painted miniature scene.
Facebook gaming is going a little more hardcore. Earlier today, Ubisoft announced that a new tactical combat title in the Tom Clancy's Ghost Recon series will hit the social platform and mobile devices later this spring.
Dojos are peaceful, quiet structures wherein anyone from any race or culture can listen to the wisdom of a sensei and reflect on the Old Ways. Unless you're a zombie, of course. All members of the undead are barred from dojos, but once they invade, they're probably not going to leave quietly. In Dojo Danger for iOS, you employ physics and strategy to purge your ninja dojo of those vile, unclean zombies. On the flipside, you can also play as part of a zombie team that has to hustle ninja invaders out the dojo's door. Hey, the living dead needs peace and tranquility, too.
Zombie animals make terrible pets. Sure, they might not poop on the carpet, but sometimes their rotting bellies just unzip of their own accord and slop their extremities from one end of the kitchen to the next. It makes a hellish mess. Take a cue from Zombinis and put zombie animals where they belong: on the battlefield, fighting for your amusement.
Rune Raiders takes the turn based strategy dungeon crawler formula and boils it down to the bare minimum essence of the genre. It's light on story, graphics, music and seemingly every other metric for judging a game. For instance, the on-screen representation of your heroes are just pictures of their faces moving around a grid. Yet for a weirdly stripped down game it's compelling enough to be worth a look, though it might take some explaining.
If you watched the Blade Trilogy and found yourself rooting for the vampires, I will never forgive you for betraying Wesley Snipes. But also, there is a game on Google+ waiting for you. Thirst of Night asks "what would happen if bloodsuckers took over the world?" and provides the answer with a strategy game that puts you in charge of a vampiric kingdom. But does the game have the lifeblood to survive, or does it just suck?
Over the last couple of years I've fallen deep into the world of tabletop gaming. After first discovering that there was a world beyond Monopoly and Connect Four, I quickly fell down a slippery slope while trying to grab onto everything I could. Ticket To Ride! Carcassonne! Catan! If you haven't made the leap yet, DO IT. But the one sub-genre of tabletop gaming that has yet gotten its claws in me is collectible miniature games. That's where Confrontation comes in.