AIM Entertainment Pack
.: By: CornBread :: June 29, 2002 :.
With recent game releases like Argentum, Ranger X and Ultima, most Pocket PC game developer seems to be going on a trend as to release games with intense graphics and new concepts which tends to push the limits of the PPC. But AIM on the other hand has silently released an Entertainment Pack, which features classic games from days gone by.
AIM Entertainment Pack is made up of 3 games: CE-Checkers (Checkers), Rever-CE (Othello) and Full-4-CE (Connect 4). In CE-Checkers, you and your opponent try to capture or block each other’s pieces, movement is made diagonally and players move alternately. Capturing is done by moving your piece over your opponents piece once there is a vacant square behind it, game is finished once a player has captured all of his opponent’s pieces. Rever-CE is a game where you try to have more colored stones than your enemy by positioning your stones in the front end and the back end of a row, all of the opponent’s stones will be turned to your color once you have done this. Game ends when the board is filled up with stones and whoever has the most stones wins. Full-4-CE is a race between 2 players as to who will be the first to form a diagonal, horizontal or vertical row of 4 stones. Players take turns placing stones at the bottom of the board or on top of other stones.
As with every other board game translations that makes its way into the Pocket PC, the graphics here is quite plain and simple, but still, the game still manages to have an attractive interface and the colors used is very easy on the eyes. There is no music in the game (which isn’t a very big deal since this is a board game IMHO) but there is a few sound effects thrown in which is very nice and doesn’t distract your thinking while playing. AI of the computer-controlled opponent is very good. There are 3 levels of difficulty, but even on the easy level, the computer proves to be quite challenging. Undo command is available, but you can only make an “undo” command one level at a time, plus you are given an option to choose whether you want to make the first move or not on every game. A short but helpful rule guide is available for the 3 games, so you can easily dive into the game even if you haven’t played these games or if you have forgotten how to. The game plays smoothly and has never hanged on me.
Even though the computer AI is very good, there is nothing like playing with a human opponent, but unfortunately, AIM Entertainment doesn’t have IR support for 2 player games or even an option for 2 people to play on the same screen. Bummer! Another big let down for me is that the game doesn’t have any kind of rating or statistics that keeps track of my playing, a top 10 best time record would have been appreciated, but this is not the case. This game also sorely needs a pause or minimize feature as I find myself sometimes wanting to look for a contact while playing the game, I am forced to exit the game thus loosing my spot in the game. Maybe AIM can incorporate all of these in the next version.
Overall, AIM has produced one of the best playing board game translations, good looking interface and most importantly, the AI is smart enough to give even seasoned players a challenge. People who are looking a quick game to exercise their gray matter should seriously look into this game. Don’t expect to see something new though as these are faithful translations of the original board games.
AIM Entertainment Pack is available now for the price of $14.99, it is compatible with both PPC 2000 and PPC 2002 and can run on ARM, MIPS and SH3 processors. It can be installed in either the main RAM or expansion cards and requires 1.7MB of storage memory.
| Pros |
Cons |
- Simple yet attractive graphics and interface
- Nice sound effects
- Challenging AI
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No 2 player game option
Lacks game statistics/rating charts
No pause or game minimize command
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