Yes, it’s essentially FarmVille 2.0, but that game’s winning formula and bottomless timesucks of endless resource management and occasionally bugging their non-converted friends with their achievements, have all evolved flawlessly in this new offering. Say what you will about Facebook games and the “evils” of Zynga, but the numbers don’t lie: social city-building sim CityVille snagged 20 million users in its first 11 days since its Dec. There’s enough challenge here to satisfy more skilled players, but enough approachability for even newbies to get hooked. Another classic example of a simple design yielding the maximum results, in Chime you have to cover an entire grid with clusters of differently shaped blocky pieces, which are locked-in by the game once they’re highlighted by a perpetually moving beatline. Mashing up Tetris and Lumines might sound lazy or derivative, but Chime is neither. Savable checkpoints and allowing players to dictate the pace of the game (do you want to go for speed or distance?), along with the adorable look and feel, made this one of the harder ones to put down. You swim all around the world exploring the natural habitat of 300 different species of aquatic life, and though there is a plot (you discover a thought-to-be-lost castle), Endless Ocean more than lived up to its name in lowering heart rates and just being a great game to chill out and space out to.ĭrawing inspiration from the same source material as 2008’s sleeper-hit tower-defense game Ninjatown (ie, those adorable plush ninjas and poo-poo dolls), Trees Of Doom offers a refinement on the classic iPhone-game “go as far as you can” formula popularized by iPhone hit Doodle Jump. These are just three possible ways you can spend time in Endless Ocean: Blue World, which also functions as an interactive white-noise machine. Here are our picks for the 10 casual games that more than earned the hours we invested in them.Ĭo-op whale riding. If you we've overlooked one of your favorite casual titles-or if you agree or disagree with our selection-let us know in the comment section below.The notion of “hardcore” and “casual” gamers in 2010 still feels a bit like something PR lackeys invented to arbitrarily split consumers into two different markets, but there’s no denying that this year’s bounty of iOS, Android, and lucrative browser games-along with the fact that Nintendo’s handheld DS often surpassed its big brother the Wii-added legitimacy to titles catered to shorter play sessions. Some of the contemporary titles are updated versions of classic casual games, while others are entirely new games that keep the spirit of the older ones alive.Ĭheck out our slideshow to see the greatest casual games ever, both in their original version and in their latest incarnations (or, if there is no modern equivalent, the nearest approximation). We're taking a look at several of the casual gaming pillars-the games that define the category-as well as their modern equivalents. We're celebrating casual gaming by reflecting on both its past and present. Although the success of the Android, iOS, and Wii platforms have brought casual gaming to more people than ever before, the category isn't a recent phenomena casual gaming has been around as long as gaming itself. When we speak of casual games, we speak of simple, diversionary games that can be played for five minutes and put aside-think Angry Birds, Tetris, and other easy-to-play games. If you doubt the success of casual games, chew on this factoid: Zynga, the company behind Farmville, Mafia Wars, and a slew of other casual titles, is reportedly worth between $9 and 10 billion. They're far more accessible to the non-core gamer due to their simplified control schemes and pick-up-and-play gameplay that doesn't demand hours upon hours of your life. Casual games are all the rage, and it's easy to understand why. We all have friends who spend too many hours playing Angry Birds on their phones or polluting our Facebook streams with Farmville updates. How to Set Up Two-Factor Authentication.How to Record the Screen on Your Windows PC or Mac.How to Convert YouTube Videos to MP3 Files.How to Save Money on Your Cell Phone Bill.How to Free Up Space on Your iPhone or iPad. How to Block Robotexts and Spam Messages.
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