Lost Cities
| title: | Lost Cities |
| url: | link |
| download page: | No link! |
| license: | retail |
| genre: | Strategy Games |
| developer: | Code monkies |
| platform: | Ios |
| release: | 2011 |
| features: | text, sound, visuals |
| last edit by: | Dark |
Description
The lost cities is a very unique and strategical card game that can be played on the Iphone, either online against friends or against several computer opponents. Designed by the renowned game designer and mathematician Reiner Knizia, The game itself is simple to learn and play, but very difficult to master and will take carefull planning, skills at weighing up different alternatives and odds, and occasionally a bit of luck in order to win. .
Lost cities gets it's name from the fact that the theme of the game comprises sending and making money by outfitting expeditions to lost cities in five environments, the red ancient volcanos, the amazon rain forests in green, the white polar regions, yellow desert sands or the watery blue realm of Neptune. These five colours form the five sutes of the cards played in the game, ---- however don't let the theme fool you, you'll need more than just a whip and quick reflexes to get around this one, sinse despite it's theme, Lost cities is first and formost a game of intelligence and skill.
With some similarities to both Uno and Patience/Solitare, Lost cities is played by two players with a custom pack of cards in five coloured sutes comprising the numbers 2-10 and three coin cards. The aime is to place cards on the table in five coloured lanes to form runs. Each turn, you must either play a card from your hand to one of the lanes, or discard it to one of the discard piles then either pick up a card from the discard pile or from the draw stack. forming runs is complicated by the fact that you can only play a higher card ontop of a lower one, meaning that should you play a green six, you can no longer play a green 1-5, even if you are dealt them later. To further complicate matters, each lane starts at minus twenty points, meaning that you will need to build them up carefully. One helpfull asset with this are the coin cards which you can play to a lane before you play a number card, each of which will double the score, ---- however they will also double the negative! score as well, so take care with these. Of course, as your doing all this your opponent is trying to do the same, thus another skill in the game is keeping track of your opponent's choices and tactics, discarding carefully and trying to guess whether that all important last card you need for a run is in your opponent's hand or in the draw pile. Sinse you must! play or discard each turn, carefull decision making is distinctly needed sinse you can't just sit on your cards and wait to see if a good card may come along, or you might need to discard a card to the pile and risk your opponent getting it just to create space in your hand.
Despite requiring a good deal of thought to play, the rules for the game are really quite straight forward to learn. They can of course be read in the game, but also there is an option to have them spoken aloud. There is a fully interactive tutorial game as well which may be either read or spoken too, ---- though sinse the spoken version also comes with haughty comments from an upper class archaeologist as well as some treasurehunting music I'd recommend having a listen to it.
The game is completely accessible with voice over, indeed it can all be played with basic single flicks and double taps, (to play a card, double tap to select it and then hit play or discard, and similarly just doubletap a card to pick it up). Information about your hand, how many cards remain in the discard pile, what cards you or your opponent has in each lane can be found quickly and easily, you can for instance always find the drawstack on the bottom right hand corner of the screen with your hand along the bottom, and there is no time limit on taking turns giving you ample chances to review all the cards and make up your mind. With it's very logical layout and playability with even standard gestures, Lost cities is a great way to practice getting used to navigating screens and reviewing information using voice over. The only thing that you might need to remember is that even if you select a card and hit play or discard, nothing will actually happen until you pick up another card either from the draw stack or from the discard pile, so don't be surprised if you see a card you were planning on playing that turn still in your hand until you draw another.
Speaking of time, sinse this is a turn based game, you can have any number of long distance games running at once if you wish, and they will automatically save after each turn. The game center will track your progress, and also help you find an auto matchup with an opponent. If you can't find anyone you can also try and play one of four computer players of differing skill levels.
As well as online rankings and tracking of your statistics, Lost cities also has a fully featured achievement system with 98 achievements which go from comparatively easy ones such as winning a game with cards in all four lanes, to ones which will tax even the most hardened players, thus it contains plenty of replay value along with it's strategic game structure.
additional resources.
If you'd like an idea of the game, the spoken explanation of the audio rules can be Downloaded here and the Audio tutorial (which is worth a listen for it's ethos and soundtrack even if your already familiar with the game), can be Downloaded here
You can also find an entry for The lost cities on applevis a site which details accessibility for apple systems. There you can read people's comments about the game.
This is deffinately a game that comes recommended. GReat on the access front with hugely addictive gameplay an achievements system and some real opportunities for online challenges to your brain. Even if you aren't a card game fan usually, I'd recommend considdering an expeditions to the Lost cities, ---- though you might find once you get in, it is very difficult to leave!
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Updates: entry 2 Feb 22 and description 2 Feb 22