The third and final game whose attractive elements I will review here is Empire a free-to-play online multiplayer strategy game developed by Goodgame Studios. It is a multiplatform game available principally on desktop computers and laptops. Tablet computers that support Adobe Flash can also be used to play the game and an App version is also available for tablets and smart phone handsets.
The game is essentially a blend of a war game and a Construction and Management Simulation game, in which players build, develop or manage fictional communities or projects with limited resources. In Empire, users begin with a small castle and protective wall. Their goal is to grow their fledgling empire by expanding this main castle through the acquisition of wood and stone resources, the taxation of their subjects and the management of their subject’s happiness whilst building satellite castles to expand their sphere of influence. The war element comes from the need to both protect one’s castle from raids designed to steal resources and damage a player’s buildings, and to make aggressive attacks against rival castle lords. Upgrades to your castles and troops are initially fast and with a low resource cost, as the game develops there are increasingly steep time and resource costs associated with expanding ones empire. The central gameplay follows a very similar structure to games such as Clash of Clans and Age of Empires. Once more I have been drawn into this game and have played for much longer than needed in order to gain an understanding of why it is one of the most popular online games. From my starting point as a lowly level one knight overseeing a solitary farmer armed with a pitchfork, I'm slightly surprised to find myself to be a level 27 baronet in charge of 4 castles and a standing army of 450 spread across two continents. How did this happen? Why do I play this game, and more to the point why don’t I stop playing this game even though deep down I know it to be a distracting waste of my time?
Empire, just like Candy Crush and Asphalt 8 draws in a new user by allowing them to make fast progress with lots of positive reinforcement from the game about their early progress. The game then adds layers of complexity at a rate that keeps the game interesting without ever going through a jump in complexity that would leave some users behind. The game play has narratives running through it that encourage users to keep playing and an endless stream of achievable mini goals. Once again the first taste is a sweetener to get you hooked and its open to all, once you are in the game then works hard and in subtle ways to keep you playing.
Like Candy Crush the game the game can be played in a way that fits conveniently around your daily life. Starting the upgrades to a building, collect some taxes and quickly send an army on its way to fight a rival castle can all be done in less than two minutes. This means that it is, in theory possible to pop into your virtual world every few hours, do a quick bit of empire ruling and then return to your real life. This is what my mind tells me, in reality I find that the frequency with which I visit my castles is greater than it needs to be (is anyone attacking me?) and my visits inevitably involve tinkering that takes more than just a few minutes. Perhaps I'm just an inefficient Medieval ruler, but by viewing the online activity of those in my alliance I can tell I'm far from the only one who sometimes leaves the game running in the background and pops in every time they finish a paragraph...be right back.
Whilst it is theoretically possible to go it alone in Empire the reality is that, unless you have a strong alliance of fellow players to watch your back, you will very quickly find yourself identified as vulnerable and alone and picked on mercilessly by players with surrounding castles. Alliances of up to 30 players can share resources and troops between them, co-ordinate their activities and decide on complex tactical decisions via a live chat feature. In this way the game takes the multi-player component much further than Asphalt 8. In Empire, as well as competing with another user virtually, it is possible to communicate with them in real time. Users discuss the game and a wide range of topics from their offline lives. This merging of realities, and the feeling that you will be letting down others by not playing regularly or leaving the game, is yet another draw for users to keep playing. Whilst a complex social aspect like this that leads to friendships and feelings of responsibility might be one of the most persuasive reasons for a user to keep playing a game once involved, it is perhaps one of the most difficult to create as a game designer. Whilst an engaging idea and attractive graphics can be managed and budgeted for the complexities of human interactions are more difficult to plan for. Perhaps the best that a game designer can hope for is to create environment within which engagement can take place and then to offer incentives for doing so.
As the owners of MySpace will tell you, the collective decisions about which online spaces people choose to occupy can be ephemeral and unpredictable. Games can provide an additional incentive to continue occupying a space. This is perhaps something those who are looking to crowd source data, or disseminate research findings, would do well to consider in their quest for more than just a transitory period of popularity.
The game is essentially a blend of a war game and a Construction and Management Simulation game, in which players build, develop or manage fictional communities or projects with limited resources. In Empire, users begin with a small castle and protective wall. Their goal is to grow their fledgling empire by expanding this main castle through the acquisition of wood and stone resources, the taxation of their subjects and the management of their subject’s happiness whilst building satellite castles to expand their sphere of influence. The war element comes from the need to both protect one’s castle from raids designed to steal resources and damage a player’s buildings, and to make aggressive attacks against rival castle lords. Upgrades to your castles and troops are initially fast and with a low resource cost, as the game develops there are increasingly steep time and resource costs associated with expanding ones empire. The central gameplay follows a very similar structure to games such as Clash of Clans and Age of Empires. Once more I have been drawn into this game and have played for much longer than needed in order to gain an understanding of why it is one of the most popular online games. From my starting point as a lowly level one knight overseeing a solitary farmer armed with a pitchfork, I'm slightly surprised to find myself to be a level 27 baronet in charge of 4 castles and a standing army of 450 spread across two continents. How did this happen? Why do I play this game, and more to the point why don’t I stop playing this game even though deep down I know it to be a distracting waste of my time?
Empire, just like Candy Crush and Asphalt 8 draws in a new user by allowing them to make fast progress with lots of positive reinforcement from the game about their early progress. The game then adds layers of complexity at a rate that keeps the game interesting without ever going through a jump in complexity that would leave some users behind. The game play has narratives running through it that encourage users to keep playing and an endless stream of achievable mini goals. Once again the first taste is a sweetener to get you hooked and its open to all, once you are in the game then works hard and in subtle ways to keep you playing.
Like Candy Crush the game the game can be played in a way that fits conveniently around your daily life. Starting the upgrades to a building, collect some taxes and quickly send an army on its way to fight a rival castle can all be done in less than two minutes. This means that it is, in theory possible to pop into your virtual world every few hours, do a quick bit of empire ruling and then return to your real life. This is what my mind tells me, in reality I find that the frequency with which I visit my castles is greater than it needs to be (is anyone attacking me?) and my visits inevitably involve tinkering that takes more than just a few minutes. Perhaps I'm just an inefficient Medieval ruler, but by viewing the online activity of those in my alliance I can tell I'm far from the only one who sometimes leaves the game running in the background and pops in every time they finish a paragraph...be right back.
Whilst it is theoretically possible to go it alone in Empire the reality is that, unless you have a strong alliance of fellow players to watch your back, you will very quickly find yourself identified as vulnerable and alone and picked on mercilessly by players with surrounding castles. Alliances of up to 30 players can share resources and troops between them, co-ordinate their activities and decide on complex tactical decisions via a live chat feature. In this way the game takes the multi-player component much further than Asphalt 8. In Empire, as well as competing with another user virtually, it is possible to communicate with them in real time. Users discuss the game and a wide range of topics from their offline lives. This merging of realities, and the feeling that you will be letting down others by not playing regularly or leaving the game, is yet another draw for users to keep playing. Whilst a complex social aspect like this that leads to friendships and feelings of responsibility might be one of the most persuasive reasons for a user to keep playing a game once involved, it is perhaps one of the most difficult to create as a game designer. Whilst an engaging idea and attractive graphics can be managed and budgeted for the complexities of human interactions are more difficult to plan for. Perhaps the best that a game designer can hope for is to create environment within which engagement can take place and then to offer incentives for doing so.
As the owners of MySpace will tell you, the collective decisions about which online spaces people choose to occupy can be ephemeral and unpredictable. Games can provide an additional incentive to continue occupying a space. This is perhaps something those who are looking to crowd source data, or disseminate research findings, would do well to consider in their quest for more than just a transitory period of popularity.