Tuesday 9 December 2014

Would you play Browser Games?

In recent years, with the development of web technology, type of game has been varied again. There are quite a lot of browser games online, such as Shifu, Nightfalls, Dragon Atlas and Dawn of King. Instead of having to download the application or client of game, we merely need to open a web browser and install a plug-in maybe and then we can start playing straight away.

Indeed, compared to many massive games like PC, console and massively multiplayer online games, browser games provide a much easier way to play and they are usually free to play. However, in terms of the quality of game, browser games might still have a long way to go.

I don't play much browser games but I'm actually playing one now. It's a Japanese web game called SD Gundam Operation and it's on Yahoo JP. It's a card game that you keep playing everyday to try to get better cards which improve your combat capacity in total. The reason why I play this game everyday it's because it doesn't cost me much time. I can play when working in office. The manipulation is simple: just some clicks on the interface and you finish the things you want to do then all you need to do is to wait. After finishing each activity in game, such as quests, battling with other players and killing bosses, there will be a CD that you have to wait before the next same things you want to do. Well this looks boring as it doesn't even require you to think. Of course I play this because I love Gundam. Honestly the design of cards is good and if this game is not about Gundam, I wouldn't even sign up for it I think. But objectively speaking, the quality of the game isn't too good and it's more likely that you just keep doing something everyday rather than playing a game.


I am not a professional browser gamer but I would say there are also other issues of browser games, which is the content. Let's take Nightfall as an example, when I firstly knew this game, I found it is a copied version of Diablo III. The characters, the images, the bosses and the skills are very close to what I have seen in Diablo III. I can't say it's a bad game but this reveals a lack of creativity and I would play directly Diablo III rather than this game. I would spend money on what is really qualitative rather than spending time on those that I don't feel enjoying. On the other hand, the control is just too simple that you follow all the time the guidance and just give it a click to finish everything. You don't even need to pay attention or to think but do things step by step.



I wouldn't say browser games are 100% not qualitative because I don't play much. I might be wrong to make such comment above and I also know people who spend quite a lot of money on web games. I think that they are at least happy with the game but for me, most web games don't feel entertaining during the playing. I might be focus on stats and number of games while I was still adolescent, especially at the time when I firstly start playing online games. I used to be satisfied by having rare items and powerful characters. However, it didn't last for too long. Now I prefer having more interesting experiences in game, such as visual pleasure, original story and degree of freedom. Browser games can't really provide much of these features. Finally I can only say that browser games might to designed for certain specific gamers. 

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