Casual Games Holiday Guide

This has been an interesting year for Casual Games. Here is a selection of gifts for the casual gamer on your list. Facebook Credits – There has been a shift in Casual Gaming toward social gaming and just about every company has a representation of a game on Facebook. Most of these games are playable for free, but can be greatly enhanced with paid goods or services. Facebook credits are available in a variety of denominations from $10 to $50 and can be purchased at participating Target, WalMart, Gamestop, and Best Buy stores, and are available online through Target or WalMart. You can also use the store locator on Facebook.com to find the closest retailer near you and help spruce up your friend’s farm in Farmville, add some extra sparkle to your Mom’s Bejeweled Blitz, or add some blood to your boyfriend’s Vampire Wars bank account. Bejeweled 3 - PopCap

Read more →

Time Geeks: Find All! Released for iOS

Ivanovich Games has announced Time Geeks: Find all! for iOS. Time Geeks is a seek and find game featuring pixel art graphics and retro fun. The graphics and the original music are designed by the artist Markus Gmur.  The gameplay promises 6 game modes, with 7 mini-games, and more than 100 challenges.  Time Geeks also includes OpenFeint integration so player can share records and show off achievements. The Zoorgs have caused distortion in space-time moving people, animals and objects from their place of origin. Our friends the Time Geeks need to find them all to avoid a total collapse of space-time before it is too late! Time Geeks is currently available from the Apple Apps Store for $.99.

Read more →

Reflections on Casual Connect 2010

This year’s Casual Connect Seattle had a little bit of a different vibe for me. This is the first year I was able to attend Casual Connect on the opening day, so the energy was bound to be different from the start.It also snuck up on me a little, so there were a lot of last minute scheduling issues and preparations. But, I was geared up to see where everyone thought the industry was headed and hear about some great new games. When I got there and took a look around, however, I noticed that there were some things missing. Some of the bigger companies I was expecting to see weren’t there, and their presence was missed. It didn’t feel like there was a lot of news being released. I didn’t feel the excitement of new games and innovation that I had felt in the past. Some of the excitement

Read more →

BigFish Games and Woman’s Day Team Up

Today at Casual Connect in Seattle, Women’s Day and Big Fish games announced a partnership that will bring access to the 2500 game strong catalog from BigFish Games to Woman’s Day readers and visitors of WomansDay.com. “The breadth of our catalog offers Woman’s Day readers and website visitors a vast array of great games,” said Jeremy Lewis, chief executive of Big Fish Games. “Our games are a great fit for Woman’s Day readers, who seek to live well every day. Casual games are relaxing, mentally stimulating, and fun. “ The partnership also includes a special offer exclusively for Woman’s Day readers int he back-to-school September issue, which hits newsstands in the beginning of next month. There are also special offers every day here. “Woman’s Day Magazine speaks to the CEO of the household, the woman,” says Carlos Lamadrid, senior VP and chief brand officer of Woman’s Day Brand Group. “Our

Read more →

Casual Games Boost the Brain

. An ongoing study out of East Carolina University’s psychophysiology lab has released information regarding the relationship between playing casual games, such as PopCap’s Bejeweled and Peggle, and improvement in both cognitive response time and executive cognitive function (doing things faster and getting them right). The study group consists of adults over the age of 50 and focuses on the short term cognitive abilities measured by both electroencephalography (EEG) and parts A and B of the standardized Trail Making Test™, a timed neurological test that incorporates numbers and/or letters in a ‘connect the dots’ format. Compared to the control group, those who played 30 minute sessions of either Bejeweled or Peggle showed significant improvements in both areas (87% in cognitive response time and 215% in executive function). “The initial results of the study are very intriguing, in that they suggest that the ‘active participation’ required while playing a casual video

Read more →

Review – Nancy Drew Dossier: Resorting to Danger

*Contest Alert! See details at the end of this review about how to win your copy of this game!* Platform: PC ESRB: E 10 Number of Players: 1 Publisher: Her Interactive Release Date: September 2009 Official Website When I was offered the chance to review a game set in a luxurious resort, of course I jumped out of my seat to do so. Resorting to danger is the second installment of the Nancy Drew Dossier series (the first being Lights, Camera, Curses), the more casual of the Nancy Drew franchises. In Resorting to Danger, players play as the quick witted Nancy Drew as she attempts to expose and stop a bomber at a posh resort on the coast, while playing the role of “spa gopher” so as to not alarm the well to do clientele. This setting does prove to be a great way to introduce some very distinct personalities.

Read more →

Play and Win $500 This Week at PCH Games

PCH Games today has kicked off March Mayhem this week! From now through the end of the month, each time you play a different game at PCH Games, you will be entered into the grand prize drawing for $500. You can choose from any type of games from puzzle to card to word to strategy, and each one you try will automatically give you another entry. Check out Spider solitaire and Wheel of Fortune. Happy playing and Good Luck! . . .

Read more →

Featured Interview – Aletheia O’Neil, President of Gravity Bear

This month I would like to feature a new social games company, Gravity Bear, who has just announced their debut title, Battle Punks, which will open in Beta on Facebook coming up pretty soon here. I am pretty excited to see what comes from this company because social gaming is really emerging as a force in the casual games space and Gravity Bear seems to be heading in a great direction to both innovate and bring back some things that made a lot of us fall in love with gaming in the first place. On top of that, the president and passionate designer, Aletheia O’Neil, is a female gamer herself. And she seems incredibly cool and genuinely excited about her work, Gravity Bear, and the launch of Battle Punks. Plus, she’s a GamingAngels fan and encourages females to get their creative minds into the industry! Enjoy! GA – Let’s start

Read more →

Featured Interview – Her Interactive

Here is the first in what I hope will be a regular series of featured interviews with strong, successful, creative, interesting people and companies out there in the casual space today. Her Interactive is one of those companies which I believe has a strong, positive approach to creating games targeted toward females that challenge us to think critically, while still having a good time – without being all pink and frilly. I was able to ask a few questions of Amy McPoland, VP of Marketing at Her Interactive, a company which has always created and supported great games that challenge us and make us think to talk about the face of women in the industry, creating games for women, and what’s in store for Her Interactive. GA: First, please tell me a little bit about your role in Her Interactive. Amy: As the VP of Marketing, I’m responsible for the

Read more →

Kuros

Platform: PC ESRB: E Genre: Hidden Object Number of Players: 1 Publisher: Sandlot Games Release Date: 06/27/2009 Official Website Give it a Go Kuros Basic Idea as I See it: Kuros is a multifaceted hidden object game in which players play as Katya, who starts somewhat amnesiatic due to teleportation, to help restore the balance of the elements, heal the glyphstones that lend their power to the land, and save the world of Kuros. There are things to find everywhere, and multiple diverse mini games woven throughout. Graphics:: I was drawn to this game when I saw the artwork. It has a very mystical feel and holds true to the elemental magic theme throughout. Each realm looks unique and represents their respective elements extremely well. Though there isn’t character movement, there is some water and sky and air movement. Light and sheen and metal are well done, though occasionally the

Read more →