Zorg Empire, a new space online browser strategy game, was launched on 25 Januaray, 2009. I was excited to give a new try to this game, and surprisingly found that it has exactly the same interface with the famous online browser space game OGame, with a little bit improvement.
I had stopped playing OGame for a while, and I was surprise when I go to what is the previously the URL of OGame - http://www.ogame.com - that the domain name no longer belongs to the famous space game. Looks like the domain name is bought by some domain name selling business.
The new incarnation of OGame - Zorg Empire - now appear as a brand new game, with restarted players and new community. I will play it a while too, and will update you all with new experience and news of this game. Stay tuned!
Thursday, February 12, 2009
Friday, October 17, 2008
Legacy of Holy Castle: Disaster...
On the 15th October, Wednesday, The Legacy of Holy Castle had made major change to the game during the maintenance period. Here are the changes as announced by the admin:
The adjustments of The Legacy of Holy Castle:
The adjustments of The Legacy of Holy Castle:
- Occupancy. Currently the winner of the attack will get 75% gold and 25% food within 24 hours from the loser instead of 50% gold and 50% food.
- Units. The price decreases greatly for level 3 units.
- Hero's quest. The experience from adventure will increase greatly.The gold and wood from adventure will be canceled.
- Battle experience. The experience from battle will be adjusted to avoid some improper behavior.
Most of these changes had made this once nice game impossible to play, especially the occupancy rule.
Once your castle is occupied, your gold production drop to 25% for a whole 24 hour period. You lose the ability to rebuild yourself and is not able to attack others to gain back what you lost. This had made the game a boring game during these 24 hours, and easily make the player lose interest. After 24 hours, it is quite probably you will be occupied again due to the inability to rebuild. A player being occupied the first time would sooner or later quit the game.
The Hero's quest rule had made the occupancy rule worse. As before the patch, you can gain gold by adventuring which compensate a bit on your lost in battle and occupancy. Now you had lose your another ability to gain resources.
The battle experience had dropped a lot, which make your hero even more difficult to grow. This would make late comers even harder to catch up with the already top player, which separate the strong and the weak apart more. Weaker players will always be a farm and has no chance to survive.
I am deeply disappointed with the change in this once great game. If these changes are not reverted for a week, I would probably say goodbye to Legacy of Holy Castle as well.
Monday, September 22, 2008
The Legacy of Holy Castle Guide: The Importance of Formation
Never under-estimate the importance of formation in The Legacy of Holy Castle. For the same number of units that can handled by your hero and the same number of defensive building you have, how you place your buildings and your units is the only factor that you win or lose a battle.
My castle was attacked everyday recently and it is a very good chance for me to experiment with several defensive formation.
I tend to rely quite a bit on the usage of defensive buildings, especially the self-detonating towers, as they can deal quite some amount of damage to enemy units. Putting the line of self-detonating towers right at the front has the advantage that they can destroy quite an amount of enemy units right at the beginner, weaken them so that they can deal less damage to our units. The disadvantage is that if the enemy knows your formation, he can produce weak units with amount 1 at the frontline to take the damage from the self-detonating tower, which can waste your self-detonating towers.
That's the reason why I put a line of elite hoplites the front to take down weak units first, and allow stronger units next taken down by the line of self-detonating towsers.
Next are the ramparts and the arrow towers. Putting arrow towers right behind the rampart as the ramparts are extra strong in defense. When the enemy units take several rounds to destroy your ramparts, they had already taken up quite an amount of damage from the arrow towers and the archers.
Putting hoplites and self-detonating towers around your hero is important, as whether your hero survives determine the win or lose of the battle. These are the last line of defense, so that any enemy units approaching your hero should be taken down by the body guards.
This formation has proven effective for some time. It had an disadvantage though, is if your enemy is patient enough to give you consecutive attacks, your defense building will finally all broken down, and he can finally occupy your castle...
Do you have any good formation to suggest? If so, feel free to leave a comment.
My castle was attacked everyday recently and it is a very good chance for me to experiment with several defensive formation.
I tend to rely quite a bit on the usage of defensive buildings, especially the self-detonating towers, as they can deal quite some amount of damage to enemy units. Putting the line of self-detonating towers right at the front has the advantage that they can destroy quite an amount of enemy units right at the beginner, weaken them so that they can deal less damage to our units. The disadvantage is that if the enemy knows your formation, he can produce weak units with amount 1 at the frontline to take the damage from the self-detonating tower, which can waste your self-detonating towers.That's the reason why I put a line of elite hoplites the front to take down weak units first, and allow stronger units next taken down by the line of self-detonating towsers.
Next are the ramparts and the arrow towers. Putting arrow towers right behind the rampart as the ramparts are extra strong in defense. When the enemy units take several rounds to destroy your ramparts, they had already taken up quite an amount of damage from the arrow towers and the archers.
Putting hoplites and self-detonating towers around your hero is important, as whether your hero survives determine the win or lose of the battle. These are the last line of defense, so that any enemy units approaching your hero should be taken down by the body guards.
This formation has proven effective for some time. It had an disadvantage though, is if your enemy is patient enough to give you consecutive attacks, your defense building will finally all broken down, and he can finally occupy your castle...
Do you have any good formation to suggest? If so, feel free to leave a comment.
Thursday, September 4, 2008
Nation States
Nations States is quite an interesting and special game, which can't find other games with the same genre on the market.
Nations States is a nation simulation game created by Max Barry and based loosely on his novel Jennifer Government. The game play is simple, you are the ruler of a country. Everyday there will be a political issue come up at your nation, and your prime ministers and advisors would have several argument over the issue. As a ruler, you need to make decision on the issue, based on your ideal and political standpoints. Your country will gradually evolves based on your political direction. There are several attributes that will evolves: ecomonics, civil right and political freedom.
There is no competition in this game, the country will never war against each other. It is only simulation. This game is quite relax and you need only login once per day for choosing your solution towards the political issue.
Here is my nation, if anyone of you is interested:
http://www.nationstates.net/riviatin
And here is the URL to the game:
http://www.nationstates.net/
Nations States is a nation simulation game created by Max Barry and based loosely on his novel Jennifer Government. The game play is simple, you are the ruler of a country. Everyday there will be a political issue come up at your nation, and your prime ministers and advisors would have several argument over the issue. As a ruler, you need to make decision on the issue, based on your ideal and political standpoints. Your country will gradually evolves based on your political direction. There are several attributes that will evolves: ecomonics, civil right and political freedom.
There is no competition in this game, the country will never war against each other. It is only simulation. This game is quite relax and you need only login once per day for choosing your solution towards the political issue.
Here is my nation, if anyone of you is interested:
http://www.nationstates.net/riviatin
And here is the URL to the game:
http://www.nationstates.net/
FallenSword Beginner's Guide Part 6 - Killing the right monster
In FallenSword, if you want to optimize the experience gain, besides optimizing your usage of stamina, you need to make sure you are killing the right monsters.
For experience point gain by killing monsters, you get 120% experience point gain for killing a monster 1 level higher or above you; you get 100% experience point gain if you are killing a monster at the same level as you; you get 75% experience point gain for killing monster a level lower than you; and you get 50% experience point gain for killing monster 2 levels lower than you.
Therefore if you are at a map with several different monsters with different level, you need to always check the monster level by viewing them. If possible, always kill the monster at least the same level as you, and ignoring the monsters with level lower than you in the same space, unless the map is running out of monsters.
For experience point gain by killing monsters, you get 120% experience point gain for killing a monster 1 level higher or above you; you get 100% experience point gain if you are killing a monster at the same level as you; you get 75% experience point gain for killing monster a level lower than you; and you get 50% experience point gain for killing monster 2 levels lower than you.
Therefore if you are at a map with several different monsters with different level, you need to always check the monster level by viewing them. If possible, always kill the monster at least the same level as you, and ignoring the monsters with level lower than you in the same space, unless the map is running out of monsters.
Thursday, August 28, 2008
Browser-based games market becomes serious
A news from Forbes yesterday talks about several browser-based games are going to launch and funded by large business like Time Warner's and Dell. One of the famous title that was coming is the "Quake Life", which is a remake of the once top title "Quake III".
More and more development companies, even Google, is becoming aware that the browser-based game market is a flourishing one.
It looks like that we are going to have a bloom era of browser-based online gaming!
For a complete story, please visit the Forbes news here:
http://www.forbes.com/technology/2008/08/25/xbox-firefox-quake-tech-personal-cx_cm_0826firefox.html
More and more development companies, even Google, is becoming aware that the browser-based game market is a flourishing one.
It looks like that we are going to have a bloom era of browser-based online gaming!
For a complete story, please visit the Forbes news here:
http://www.forbes.com/technology/2008/08/25/xbox-firefox-quake-tech-personal-cx_cm_0826firefox.html
Sunday, August 24, 2008
FallenSword Beginner's Guide Part 5.3 - Gaining Stamina
Unfortunately, there is not many ways to increase your rate of stamina gain in FallenSword, and all of them involves FSP upgrades.
The first and most straight-forward way, is your +1 Stamina Gain (per hour) in the Upgrade section. Each of them costs 25 FSP, and there is a maximum of 25 upgrades.
The second way, is to have your guild building the Endurance Shrine structure. This would increase +5 stamina gain per hour every upgrade for every member in the guild, with a maximum of 3 upgrades.
With the above 2 upgrades, you can have an increase of 40 stamina gain per hour, added up with your basic 50 stamina gain per hour, you can get a maximum of 90 stamina gain per hour in total.
Another way to gain stamina, is with the +25 current stamina upgrade, which costs 1 FSP each. Therefore you can simply buy a lot of stamina using FSP after you had used up your pool during hunt.
The first and most straight-forward way, is your +1 Stamina Gain (per hour) in the Upgrade section. Each of them costs 25 FSP, and there is a maximum of 25 upgrades.
The second way, is to have your guild building the Endurance Shrine structure. This would increase +5 stamina gain per hour every upgrade for every member in the guild, with a maximum of 3 upgrades.
With the above 2 upgrades, you can have an increase of 40 stamina gain per hour, added up with your basic 50 stamina gain per hour, you can get a maximum of 90 stamina gain per hour in total.
Another way to gain stamina, is with the +25 current stamina upgrade, which costs 1 FSP each. Therefore you can simply buy a lot of stamina using FSP after you had used up your pool during hunt.
Tuesday, August 19, 2008
FallenSword Beginner's Guide Part 5.2 - Saving Stamina
In FallenSword, besides managing your stamina by controlling your hunting frequency, knowing how to save your stamina is also very important.
As we mentioned earlier, both walking the map and killing monsters require the use of stamina. Therefore, so as to save as much stamina as possible, you have to walk the map as little as possible and use as little as possible stamina to kill a monster as possible.
The minimum stamina needed to kill a monster is 1. Yes, therefore we always want to kill the monster in 1-hit, so as to save the stamina. As we have discussed earlier in The Combat, to kill a monster in 1-hit, we always need to calculate Attack vs Defense, Damage vs Armor. If your Attack score is always higher than the monster you are killing and your Damage score is higher than Armor + HP of the monster you are killing, you can maintain 1-hit kill. Actually this is quite easy to be accomplished in the early stage of the game, as long as you always keep having the best items for your level, which we will talk later. Offensive buffs like Fury, Berserk and Dark Curse are also very important at higher level to maintain 1-hit kill.
Besides minimizing the stamina to kill, you need to minimizing the steps you walk the map. It is not easy, especially at low level. Try walk the map systematically, in a way you can remember where did you walked already, so as to avoid stepping in the same square for duplicate times. If you found that the whole part of the map is having no monster, probably someone is just hunting in front of you. In this case, try to move to another end of the map, until you see at least 4-5 monsters in a square.
When you are at higher level, when you can hunt around 10-20k gold per hunting, I will highly recommend you to buy the Doubler skill from Lv 200+ players. Having a Doubler skill means you use double (or triple if it is x3, quaduple if it is x4) stamina to kill a monster, with a double (or triple or quaduple) experience point gain. This allows you killing less monsters with the same stamina and having the same XP gain; in order word, less walking on the map. Animal Magnetism is another useful one, which increase the probability that a monster is regenerated at your square, which will also decrease your walking.
Of course, Adept Learner (increase % XP gain) and Librarian (increase chance of double XP gain) is the two most important skills to maximize your speed of level up, which I will recommend you to buy from higher level players as soon as you can afford this; or get it from the guild.
As we mentioned earlier, both walking the map and killing monsters require the use of stamina. Therefore, so as to save as much stamina as possible, you have to walk the map as little as possible and use as little as possible stamina to kill a monster as possible.
The minimum stamina needed to kill a monster is 1. Yes, therefore we always want to kill the monster in 1-hit, so as to save the stamina. As we have discussed earlier in The Combat, to kill a monster in 1-hit, we always need to calculate Attack vs Defense, Damage vs Armor. If your Attack score is always higher than the monster you are killing and your Damage score is higher than Armor + HP of the monster you are killing, you can maintain 1-hit kill. Actually this is quite easy to be accomplished in the early stage of the game, as long as you always keep having the best items for your level, which we will talk later. Offensive buffs like Fury, Berserk and Dark Curse are also very important at higher level to maintain 1-hit kill.
Besides minimizing the stamina to kill, you need to minimizing the steps you walk the map. It is not easy, especially at low level. Try walk the map systematically, in a way you can remember where did you walked already, so as to avoid stepping in the same square for duplicate times. If you found that the whole part of the map is having no monster, probably someone is just hunting in front of you. In this case, try to move to another end of the map, until you see at least 4-5 monsters in a square.
When you are at higher level, when you can hunt around 10-20k gold per hunting, I will highly recommend you to buy the Doubler skill from Lv 200+ players. Having a Doubler skill means you use double (or triple if it is x3, quaduple if it is x4) stamina to kill a monster, with a double (or triple or quaduple) experience point gain. This allows you killing less monsters with the same stamina and having the same XP gain; in order word, less walking on the map. Animal Magnetism is another useful one, which increase the probability that a monster is regenerated at your square, which will also decrease your walking.
Of course, Adept Learner (increase % XP gain) and Librarian (increase chance of double XP gain) is the two most important skills to maximize your speed of level up, which I will recommend you to buy from higher level players as soon as you can afford this; or get it from the guild.
FallenSword Beginner's Guide Part 5.1 - Stamina Management
As we have blogged earlier, in FallenSword, managing your stamina is a key to success.
At the very beginning, when you did not have any special item and not in any guild, you got a maximum of 500 stamina. The stamina generation rate is 50/hour. That means in 10 hours your stamina will overflow. Therefore, in order not to waste any stamina, you need to hunt at least once per 10 hours, or 2.5 times a day.
After level 10, probably you are a member of a guild. If your guild has the Endurance Shrine, your maximum will increase, at a maximum of 620. If your guild got the Tranquil Retreat, your stamina regeneration rate will increase as well, to a maximum of 70/hour.
In order not to waste any stamina, you need to keep the frequency of hunting as (Maximum stamina) / (Stamina Generation Rate).
Therefore, in order to avoid being "labourous" in hunting, usually our first upgrade to our character using FSP would be increasing the maximum stamina.
At the very beginning, when you did not have any special item and not in any guild, you got a maximum of 500 stamina. The stamina generation rate is 50/hour. That means in 10 hours your stamina will overflow. Therefore, in order not to waste any stamina, you need to hunt at least once per 10 hours, or 2.5 times a day.
After level 10, probably you are a member of a guild. If your guild has the Endurance Shrine, your maximum will increase, at a maximum of 620. If your guild got the Tranquil Retreat, your stamina regeneration rate will increase as well, to a maximum of 70/hour.
In order not to waste any stamina, you need to keep the frequency of hunting as (Maximum stamina) / (Stamina Generation Rate).
Therefore, in order to avoid being "labourous" in hunting, usually our first upgrade to our character using FSP would be increasing the maximum stamina.
Thursday, August 14, 2008
Fallensword News: Potion Crafting and Item Creation Launched
The new potion crafting and item creation function in FallenSword are launched on 11 August. It is quite a big addition to the game indeed. It allows players from various level get access to the higher level skill with high buff levels.
There are a few steps to craft a potion.
First you need to obtain a recipe. Currently the recipes are available in the shops in certain area, mainly the low level areas. If you are lazy to go back to the low level areas or want to save the stamina for doing so, you can buy a recipe from other players in the auction house. I find it worth the price, as stamina is far more expensive.
Next you need to get a potion bottle. Current it is available in the Hugards Tent in Fire Chasm level 1, which is a very low level area. This potion bottle are available in the auction house under "quest items" as well.
Finally you need the resources to create the potion. This resources are mainly drops from killing monsters. Again you may get them from the auction, as many players had took the time to hunt them.
When you get everything, voila! You can go to the menu option Actions -> Inventing to create your potion. At first you only get an average chance of success. If you have the high level potion crafting buff, you can increase the chance of successfully create a potion.
Currently the potion can be sold with a good price in the auction house as well.
There are a few steps to craft a potion.
First you need to obtain a recipe. Currently the recipes are available in the shops in certain area, mainly the low level areas. If you are lazy to go back to the low level areas or want to save the stamina for doing so, you can buy a recipe from other players in the auction house. I find it worth the price, as stamina is far more expensive.
Next you need to get a potion bottle. Current it is available in the Hugards Tent in Fire Chasm level 1, which is a very low level area. This potion bottle are available in the auction house under "quest items" as well.
Finally you need the resources to create the potion. This resources are mainly drops from killing monsters. Again you may get them from the auction, as many players had took the time to hunt them.
When you get everything, voila! You can go to the menu option Actions -> Inventing to create your potion. At first you only get an average chance of success. If you have the high level potion crafting buff, you can increase the chance of successfully create a potion.
Currently the potion can be sold with a good price in the auction house as well.
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