Action & Arcade Games | Casualicious

Jessica’s Cupcake Café

Posted by Ruff on June 14th, 2009

(7 votes, average: 4.86 out of 5)

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When there are already too many cafés being made into casual time management games, it’s now time to go into specifics on what kind of a café is to be depicted next. Jessica’s Cupcake Café is just what the name suggests. It’s a time management game with a cupcake café in mind, and since I don’t know whether actual real life cupcake cafés are in boom or anything but let’s just see if this one lives up to being a great casual game.

Since her name is on the game, our heroine would be girl named Jessica after she just got back home for a relaxing break from the hustles of city life. Chance came too when she met her Aunt who shares her story of closing down their boring bakeries for something more hip and fun. Jessica suggested selling cupcakes, and with little more convincing the Cupcake Café is now born.

As far as time management game mechanics go, Jessica’s Cupcake Café still introduced a new twist during the first few seconds of gameplay. Instead of the usual immediate grind after pressing the start button, each level will give you a few seconds to prepare initial cupcakes for all your starving customers. Try to make as more as possible so that when the customers come rolling in, you’ll have enough cupcakes to keep their patience at bay.

Preparing cupcakes is simple since you’re provided with such smart push-button machines to help you do an easy job. Prepare batter, frosting and decorations simultaneously then bake the batter once available. Put the right ingredients together and put the cupcakes on the appropriate display case. Each run makes you 12 cupcakes and each display case holds 48. Try not to go over these numbers or make recipe mistakes; else it’s in the recycling bin where waste cupcakes go.

To earn more money and hopefully reach Expert Score in Jessica’s Cupcake Café, you also have a variety of options and tactics you can implement. Of course, there’s the combo service bonus wherein you earn more money for each service you make in succession. You can also design your own cupcakes before each level starts, earning you more tips for the effort. And lastly, you can also earn and use power-ups when available after serving customers that hold them.

Aside from Expert Score achievements, you also have a chance to earn medals by reaching milestones set by the game. We’ve seen features like these on other casual games but it still adds a little bit of challenge and replay factor for this game too. A chance to play a mini-game after finishing each stage adds a bit of fun while you sell excess cupcakes at the fair and earn a little bit more money.

The greatest bonuses that I know Jessica’s Cupcake Café is very much proud of are the free recipes you can get whenever you take part in playing another level. Recipes are unlocked as you go along the game complete with exact ingredient measurements and procedures on how to prepare each cupcake. As a matter of fact, you can even save each recipe on a text file and print for your own convenience and use to delight your own family and friends.

The downside to the game though is its lack of visual flare in design. Not that the game is bad to look at or anything, but I guess with all the time management games I’ve played in the past, it’s just that I’ve seen better designed games. I guess that’s a matter of personal preference, but in the case of upgrades you get to buy before each level starts, the game could use more options other than the usual tools and trinkets available during the upgrade mode.

Overall though, Jessica’s Cupcake Café is a must buy game. Why? Well, even with just the bonus recipes included, you already get your money’s worth of fun and enjoyment. Treat yourself with the game and treat your family and friends with a perfectly made cupcake. Sounds a ton of fun, right?

Jessica’s Cupcake Café Download

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Wedding Dash: Ready, Aim, Love!

Posted by Ruff on June 6th, 2009

(6 votes, average: 4.83 out of 5)

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Love is in the air again and again as the next sequel to Playfirst’s Wedding Dash got released early last week. Wedding Dash: Ready, Aim, Love features the original time management gameplay of Wedding Dash with a whole new Cupid mini-game in-line with a fun new storyline as well. Helping Quinn had never been this fun too as each leg of your journey puts you a step further into making her realize her own wedding dreams.

There are 2 character predicaments presented in the game’s story. The first is Cupid’s problem after he failed to meet his monthly quota of successful love matches and the second is Quinn’s after she booked a resort for her own wedding, even though Joe hasn’t proposed to her yet. The two characters can help each other since with her wedding expertise, Quinn can help Cupid meet his quota and Cupid can help as well in making Joe propose to Quinn. And of course, it won’t be a walk in the park since the difficulty of handling perfect wedding receptions will make itself known soon.

Frankly, don’t expect much from the gameplay mechanics of Wedding Dash: Ready, Aim, Love since when you’ve already played a time management “Dash” game, it seems that you’ve already played them all. The same idea of seating guests at the perfect table presented in previous Wedding Dash games is still very important just as serving them promptly and effectively. As a bonus, you now have Flo of Diner Dash doing most of the running work, so expect this to be a very fast-paced game, a signature feature whenever this character is present.

Of course, Quinn helps too in averting predicaments that constantly happen during the wedding receptions. Some examples of these would be stopping Cupid from ruining the wedding gifts and finding lost puppies for old ladies that cannot seem to handle them well. This is all part of the proven and effective Wedding Dash challenge that keeps player clicking fingers as busy as ever.

Love tokens play an important role in Wedding Dash: Ready, Aim, Love since you will need them to buy upgrades for the upcoming wedding receptions for each stage. In order to earn love tokens, you need to do well during the planning part of each level. Basically, buying cheap and appropriate items requested by the newlyweds lands you the most love tokens. Aside from this, you can also try to play for Expert score or do well during the Cupid mini-games for more bonus tokens.

Like I said earlier, aside from the storyline, the game also features a whole new Cupid mini-game giving limelight to the 3rd character of the story. In this mini-game, you try to help Cupid aim for the perfect couple to match. Use the lower left targets as reference, find them from the number of face clouds and plan enough power and trajectory to hit them with a cupid arrow.

If you’re aching for more challenge than what’s presented in the actual game, you can always opt in to play Endless Reception available from the main menu. And since Wedding Dash: Ready, Aim, Love also features a fun storyline starring Quinn and her own wedding plan woes, the game lets you review its exciting development through the Comics section seen also in the main menu.

All in all, even with the game’s traditional gameplay, it still provides certain enjoyment and challenge for all time management game fans. As a matter of fact, starting from the Barn stage, which is only the 2nd stage of the game, you’ll already feel so much pressure coming from the seemingly endless stream of wedding visitors aching for your constant attention. Still, the knowledge of the vast variety in visitor types will greatly help you achieve Expert score if you plan Flo’s and Quinn’s actions well.

Definitely, the game is a must for those who love the Wedding Dash series and of course, those who love time management games in general. With it’s fun animation and storyline as well as its challenging gameplay, Wedding Dash: Ready, Aim, Love will be a great addition to any casual gamer’s time management library.

Wedding Dash: Ready, Aim, Love Download

Huru Beach Party

Posted by Ruff on May 30th, 2009

(1 votes, average: 4.00 out of 5)

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“Who are you? Who am I?” This has been the coined phrase of the popular children’s toy of late, Huru Humi. So popular that today, we get to review a casual game revolving around the character designs of these toys. Huru Beach Party is a time management game featuring a Huru Humi girl named Lindsey and her part time work in the beach.

Lindsey plays good volleyball but her best friend Chloe is her only fan. Blame it all on the absence of a proper volleyball team in Huruville High that the volleyball team can’t even compete in the championships. Another hindrance to the progress of the sport is Jake, the sports committee head, using all of the committee’s money on the football team. So now, Lindsey starts to work for Chloe’s father at the beach, as she tries to earn money into starting their very own volleyball club.

Each level of Huru Beach Party gives you a goal you need to fulfill before the level ends. After the level ends, you’ll earn stars used to buy upgrades for the beach. There’s really no time limit set on each level, but if you aim to earn more stars than possible, then you can either aim for Master time or Expert time if you yearn for more challenge.

The game follows a typical time management gameplay wherein you have to serve customers, profit from their requests and clean up after they leave all before they get impatient and you lose potential profit. Money earned will let you restock supplies, hire additional help and buy or upgrade shops to hold more products. Money is not to be confused with stars though. To put it simply, money is used during the actual time management game and stars are used during the map mode to make other upgrades available for use.

A fun feature of Huru Beach Party is how you get to play mini-game pop-ups whenever you try to serve your bustling customers. Serving juice, ice cream and the photo service are some examples of shops that toggle mini-game pop-ups. Try to serve more or serve their exact requests to earn more money. Other than this, you can also try to serve in combos of 2 or more, or pamper your customer with the beach umbrella for bonus points.

This gameplay routine makes Huru Beach Party more challenging than the typical time management game; however, it can also be pretty frustrating to play through the same mini-game over and over again as you serve more customers. Good thing that Lindsey works in the background even when you’re playing these pop-ups, so try to take advantage of the game’s wonderful queuing mechanics in order to serve more customers in the least amount of time possible.

Other bonuses include other mini-games you play between level transitions. While most of them are not unique, the purpose of these games is to unlock other upgrades you can buy with stars whenever available. The game also has a trophy system that tracks your progress and achievements as you play. This system adds a replay factor to the game, since some trophies can only be won faster if you backtrack on levels not finished within challenge time.

Huru Beach Party is very challenging that you’ll begin to feel the pressure even during the first few levels of the game. Good click management is a must that you might even find the Expert time impossible to achieve on later levels. Owe it to the game’s addictiveness that I didn’t mind it much as I played.

Overall, the game has tons of upgrades, great challenge and a fun theme. It’s definitely worth the try unless of course you hate the weird character designs of Huru Humi.

Huru Beach Party Download

Drugstore Mania

Posted by Ruff on May 25th, 2009

(1 votes, average: 3.00 out of 5)

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It’s pretty obvious that time management games will always delve into business themes and I’ve said it before a couple of times now that it’s going to be hard thinking of a new business to make a unique game revolve in. Drugstore Mania proves me wrong though because come to think about it, there’s no pharmacy-based casual game made yet until now. And it’s also a perfect theme as real life pharmacies are mostly packed with people anyway.

In this game, you play as Lisa, a newly graduated pharmacist trying to look for a job in the big city. Her big break came soon too after she’s been hired as a lone pharmacist in the apothecary located at Lakeside City. But Lisa’s adventure won’t stop there as you follow her journey jumping from one city to another until such time when she will work for the biggest drugstore of them all in Star City.

The objective of each level in Drugstore Mania is for you to reach either the ordinary or expert money goal within the set time limit. To do this, you’ll have to serve customers by giving them all the medicine they need, and when they are fulfilled, exchange your goods with money. You can carry 2 medicines at once, so make full use of this ability to serve your customers as fast as you can.

There are bonuses not mentioned during the tutorial part of the game wherein you earn more money when you deliver 2 same medicines at once. Do this for 5 consecutive times and you earn more tips. Before knowing this, the expert goal is an impossible task to fulfill, and afterwards, it just became pretty easy as you rack more money doing the trick.

All the money you earned during the previous levels will help you upgrade each pharmacy with decors and other useful stuff to help your customers. Drugstore Mania also lets you add in some other bonuses to boost your customers’ morale, like the candy machine wherein you can dispense sweets as bonus treats to your patrons, and the super useful radio that replenishes patience to all customers as you turn it on. Upgrades are pretty limited though, since mostly you find yourself having too much money before moving on to the next city.

One thing unique about this game though is how you get to monitor customer morale during the actual action game. Aside from the usual hearts shown in each customer, you will also have the thermometer to check if the temperature goes higher due to burning customer patience. The thermometer function is not very useful though, since mostly, I just check on each customer to service them faster.

Other functions unique in Drugstore Mania are the pharmacy book and the mixer. The pharmacy book is a single item sometimes requested by customers to help them choose the right medicine to buy. The mixer is a device used to handle prescriptions as you put in ingredients inside depending on what your customer’s prescription tells you. These 2 devices made the game more challenging since more management is involved to handle book and prescription customers.

In the case of design, I can only say that the game is mostly targeted to young girls who like anime and cartoons in general. In a word, the game is “girly” as you see flowers and other cute ornamentations adorning the background of each level of the game. All the characters are in 3D with big heads on top of relatively little bodies, noticed even more by Lisa’s constantly turning head whenever she’s idle. All in all, it’s pretty funny but honestly, just too cute for my taste.

Other bonuses in Drugstore Mania include a mini-game you play before Lisa transfers to a new city and a trophy system to track your overall achievements. Other than these, expect also great queuing response whenever you click through the various items in the pharmacy and of course, a nice challenging gameplay you’ll enjoy beating as you play through the game’s many levels.

Drugstore Mania Download

Mystic Emporium

Posted by Ruff on May 17th, 2009

(2 votes, average: 5.00 out of 5)

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When almost all businesses have already been represented by time management games, developers resort to the imagination for a more unique casual game theme. The end result is Mystic Emporium, a time management game that doesn’t make you start a shop selling burgers or fashion, but rather magical stuff like potions and artifacts to satisfy your customers’ burning desire for power. And with all that magic, the game is just as fun (if not more fun) than your average time management installment.

Your alter ego in the game is a girl named Lilly. Lilly is a librarian at the Grand Magus Library but after earning enough money, decided to start a shop of their own. Her shop would be selling potions, artifacts and other magical stuff to the community and with the help of the former owner of the shop she’s paying in installment, she’s set to make a killing in profits and grow her business. But she won’t be able to do it alone, and that’s where you come in to help her manage her time and gain as much money as possible each and every day of the business.

Just like any other time management game, your objective in Mystic Emporium is to earn the goal money within the set amount of time available for you to run the business everyday. First, you must click each customer to know what they want to order. If they will be ordering potions, you need to cook them up in a cauldron and add ingredients depending on what the recipe book demands. And if they’ll be ordering artifacts, conjure one from the shelves and activate it with magic before delivery. Afterwards, you’ll just have to collect money and tips given to you and get ready for the next batch of creatures to appear at your shop.

As the levels go by, you’ll soon find yourself having more tasks to fulfill. Soon, you’ll be growing Hocus plants that bear Pocus berries by constantly giving it the ingredients it needs to grow. Later levels will also introduce potions that require ingredients coming from animal creatures, like the phoenix feather produced by your shop’s trusty phoenix friend. With all of the tasks at hand, try to reach for the expert goal in each level, for more points and money you get to earn after the level ends.

Between levels, Mystic Emporium also gives you a chance to buy upgrades for your shop and Lilly using the money you earned from the last level. Other than the upgrade feature, you can also have a chance to play a simple match-3 mini-game wherein you click on groups of 3 tiles or more on the game board. The mini-games give you a chance to win bonuses you can use during the actual game, like tip bonuses and faster Hocus plant growth, helping you achieve maximum profit whenever they are activated.

All of what’s said earlier is still typical among most time management games, so what makes Mystic Emporium so special compared to them? Well, in my opinion, it’s the amazing animation you get to experience throughout the whole game that makes it more fun and exciting to play. In fact, you can even watch Lilly dance and do a variety of actions whenever she’s idle, as well as watch even just the background elements of the game make actions just for the player’s pure entertainment.

Character designs are also well made. Customer types range from the typical old wizard to vampires, ghosts and even two headed ogres. Customer entrance and exit to the shop also varies, showing how much imagination ran this game during development. All in all, presentation is just outstanding, making the game stand out from the crowd even though the mechanics are still the same old time management gameplay.

The game is highly challenging too showing that even with magic, a little witch will still be as busy as any other business owner trying to run a shop on their own. Good thing that queuing comes easy for this game, making the controls as smooth as possible to plan all your activities ahead and as efficient as possible.

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