Battle Camp Officially Global! BEST NEW GAME!

Alright, so today Battle Camp is officially available for Global Download! Not only that but it seems like the Apple App Store has jumped on the bandwagon and featured Battle Camp as a BEST NEW GAME.

Now, for those unfamiliar, Apple is pretty picky about who makes their BEST NEW GAME list, so this is pretty insane for an unheard of company to make the list.

The reasons it probably made the list:

1) Full virtual world with avatars + monsters that follow you around
2) Raiding
3) Global Chat/Troop Chat/Messaging
4) Troop Halls
5) Troop Pets
6) Mosaic (This is an easter egg that I am completely addicted to, it's a board game I play with people while my energy recharges)
7) Match 3 Combat
8) Synchronous PvP (Yes, this is INSANELY fun)
9) Huge story and progression
10) Or in other words, it's a freakin MMO.

Overall, the game is insanely fun and the company behind it has really raised the bar on what should be expected.

The downsides:

1) Graphics. Personally I've said it again and again, Gameplay > Graphics. But the art style lacks the sex appeal of other games.

2) Paying players have an advantage. Sorry, but I think we're in a world where that's just a case in games. You can watch videos or do 'Tapjoy' functions to earn gold though like F2P MMOs did. Also they are adding daily logins + trading in the next patch so that should help. Overall, where other games are taking away ways for players to earn things, they add ways.

I really can't say I've had more fun playing a mobile game than I have playing Battle Camp, and their constant updates/changes keeps it really interesting to me. That and the fact I get to wander around showing off my awesome pets + costumes and can solo carry newbies through easy raids.

The game is still VERY new, but honestly it reminds me a lot of Warcraft, it's always adding content.

Download it at: http://bit.ly/BattleCampApp

Battle Camp Update

Ok, so the previous date of the 14th got changed. It will be released the 18th of this month atm.

Apparently the push back was so they could add a bunch of languages for the Global Release rather than add the languages in future patches :(

So, there have been a few questions posed on some different sites.

1) Will you get your ass handed to you by people who have been playing?

- Absolutely. There's a huge advantage to being part of a BETA. I've BETA'd a lot of games and it always gives me an edge, it's one of the only perks they get. The upside though is that improving your team can be done pretty rapidly to the point where you can compete. If you're good the edge they gained can be caught up in about a month of normal play.

2) Is it P2W like Rage/Marvel

- Yes and no. Obviously all games have a pay process, they have to make money and expecting them not to is just silly. The real question is are they greedy about it? The answer to that is no. Players earn rare spins in events just by earning trophies/participating. Players also can ask friends to send them a recharge for their energy. Finally, they do have stuff where you can watch ads to earn coins. 

Do paying players have an advantage? Yep. Not going to avoid that anywhere really, but the nice part is that you can catch up and they are regularly adding ways for players to earn stuff rather than take away those opportunities.

3) Are you going to make a fan site for it?

- Maybe. I've been busy (14+ hour days) constantly lately.

4) Any tips for newbies?

- Stay in Camp until you have a full team of Rares. Camp Rares only require 2 pieces to make vs 4-6 as you go through. Although they're weaker than other rares they will help you farm the other rares faster.

- Special monsters give way more XP than other monsters. Use your normal monsters to level a special and then feed that one to a Rare. You'll level much faster and spend a lot less stone leveling.
 
- Find a Troop that Raids regularly. The Beginner Raids aren't super hard (my player can solo the entire first raid in a day). You get a piece of a Super Rare monster for winning raids so it's the best way to power up fast.
 
- Participate heavily in events. Pretty much all players win something, but also you gain rewards by earning trophies. You can also find Event Tokens that carry over to other events and can be used to be traded for event monsters/costumes/trophies/stone.
- Play through the entire story. You get experience boosts/stone/monster grabs.

- Be active. A lot of troops are willing to take friendly active members even if they are weak because they know that they can carry them through raids and power them up quickly.

Finally, here's a piece of Battle Camp art I put together:

Where has Lucarda Been?

After four months of being MIA I'm back, unfortunately I just don't have time to keep up on Rage of Bahamut and all the best strats anymore. The truth is I found a game that has pretty much everything I could ask for in a mobile game.

While Rage of Bahamut was fun for a while, the game I'm currently playing is a hell of a lot more fun. The game is called Battle Camp! I've been in the beta and helping with the game for the last several months.

I haven't been writing about it while I was playing because I didn't want to get in trouble but now that it's about to launch I figured I'd let my readers know about it first.

So, what makes Battle Camp so much better than Rage of Bahamut?

Well, let me tell you my experience with it.

I first entered the game and opened the game and began designing my character. At first I thought, wow I can choose from five looks, then I noticed the customize button. It was there I found out that I could make my character appear thousands of different ways. I wondered how much it cost for the various vanities and I was shocked to find out nothing. The amount of customization a player can do for their character is just absurd.

So, after completing my character I entered the game. The combat system is like Puzzles and Dragons (for any who have played it). This is just a grossly better system over the TCG model. All of the movement and gem matching was seamless and I found being able to determine my attacks with a combination of skill+monster stats really refreshing.

At this point the similarities to Puzzles and Dragons ended. My avatar was in a zone in the world and immediately story dialog came up and began sending me on various quests. The amount of story+quests in this game borders on full MMO status. The story is also funny with tons of puns if you read to catch them.

So, what next? Farm, farm, farm for monsters which I always find to be a fun part of a game. Farming in Battle Camp isn't nearly as brutal as it is in Rage. I spent about 5-10 minutes and hour playing trying to gather up pieces of rare monsters. As I gathered more and more rares I ended up joining a Troop (Battle Camps version of Guilds/Orders).

That's where the game started getting really addicting. The troops have built in chats, raids that players can do, and troop pets for the team to raise (plays an important role in one of the events). Ultimately through raiding with the rest of the troop I was able to accumulate a bunch of higher rarity monsters and evolve them. After that it's just fun to watch your damage cap rise and rise in raids.

Now, that's not all there is to do otherwise I would have been bored already. Much like Rage there are several events. There are Troop Wars which pit troops against each other (sort of like Holy Wars but different), there are Raid Events where the troop gathers items together to battle unique raid bosses, and also a dungeon event where players battle their way through waves of challenge mode caves to earn tokens and battle a boss. All of the events are extremely fun and each has their own unique story.

PvP deserves a special mention because it's real head to head. Players battle against other live players to see who is more skilled on the board as well as who has the better monsters. Obviously monsters give an edge (sometimes insurmountable, sorry commons don't beat epics unless the other guy forfeits), but the cool part is that I have on a regular basis crushed people with pets much rarer than mind. The reason? Because skill players a role.

Overall, I'm sure I'm forgetting about something but I figured any of my readers deserved to know why I haven't been commenting/playing Rage of Bahamut. I would love to see you all in Battle Camp though.

It is on iOS only right now with an android version scheduled later this year. It doesn't get released in the US until the 14th but if you want to get in early Canada is one of the beta countries so you can download it in the canadian app store.

If you do decide to join me in game please use my referral code! And as always, IGN Lucarda.

p8cgzp

Dragon's Awakening

Dragon's Awakening is a variation of two different events and I have to say it's pretty interesting. Rage of Bahamut combined the standard raid event with a grow your pet event. So, what to do?

Raid Aspect

The raiding is the core aspect of this event. This means that the best way to do well is to purchase raider cards. The additional damage they do just can't be understated. Ideally you will stack three of them and participate heavily. This will normally be enough to net a nice reward.

Donation Aspect

The secondary aspect of course is feeding your dragon for rewards. The items you feed the dragon can be anything from your normal rares/hr sitting around to the random event cards and berries that appear. The key though is you'll be actively donating.

The Cycle

The interesting part of this event and what I want to touch on most is the flow/cycle. This event is tailored to help get rid of some of excess cards on the market and help the economy (now it won't really work but I'm not going to spend time discussing it here) as well as allow people to feel like they are getting something while doing it.

A player will begin by going through quests which will lead to downing raid bosses. After these two tasks are done the player will figure out what to donate to their dragon and do so. Now the fun part here is the player will then have (hopefully) shards/rewards that give them the ability to go through another series of quests and raid bosses to get more stuff to donate to their dragon.

The reason I like this shift is that this extra stage not only helps newer players contribute but it also offers a longer period of entertainment per session. This may be annoying for some who just want to log on and get their stuff done before logging off (me) but it's really enjoyable for new players, and if there's one thing the game needs its a stream of new players.

Tips

• Don't waste HP buying cards to donate. I know it's the purpose of the event but realistically you're not likely to get ahead that way when you could do missions and battle raid bosses with that HP.
• Get Raider Cards ASAP. They may sell for a lot at the start but the time you spend using them and the HP you save is increased the longer you have one.
• Help by attacking your Order's bosses.
• Events like this are a great time to skill up cards.
• Events like this are a great way for newbies to stockpile rupies.
• Have fun and try not to play until you burn out.