Category: Solo play

The other day, I was on my phone playing a game called Crossy Road when my mother looked over my shoulder and said, “Wait… you’ve downloaded Frogger?” I was naturally confused, as to me, Frogger is the game where you all sit in a circle with the “Detective” in the center, and the “Frogger” sticks their tongue out at the other individuals in the circle, causing the others to “die” while trying not to get caught by the detective.

So, as I have found to be wise when I am utterly confused, I asked her what she meant and then showed her how the game I was playing worked. She has since downloaded the game, which I take to be a good sign.

In Crossy Road, you pilot your avatar (the starter is a chicken) across roads and rivers, avoiding many different obstacles, such as various speeds of cars and trucks, getting run over by speedy trains and jumping into an icy river in an attempt to cross it.

You play daily challenges, which can be anything from frightening three birds (background scenery; I barely noticed them until I got one of these challenges) to hopping four hundred times (every time you move is counted as a “hop”). To move forwards, you can just tap the screen, and if you want to move sideways or backwards you swipe in that direction.

Challenges and daily prizes give you “gifts”, which you open to receive a randomized quantity of coins. You can also get coins by jumping on them during the game. Once you get one hundred coins, you can “win a prize”, which is where you win a randomized avatar.

The avatars are grouped by category. I’ve been mainly using the Arctic setting since near the very beginning, when I won an Arctic fox, then later on an Arctic hare, and I believe my default right now is a puffin.

Every map has it’s quirks. the Savanna has ridiculously breakneck fast tourist buses, Australia has alligators in place of some logs that can snap up and eat you if you jump too close to their head, and Pac-Man has ghosts to avoid instead of cars, but don’t be fooled by the little pellets that Pac-Man eats in standard Pac-Man: they’re just for show.

Each avatar has it’s quirks, too. The pumpkin leaves a trail of candy that falls out of its top every time it jumps, the vampire spontaneously turns into a bat and then turns back, and if you have your volume on, you can hear that the piper really does play bagpipes!

Some of the avatars are awesome, some are strange, some are adorable, and some are downright impossible! There’s 3.1, the computer; the African termite, which is kind of freaky due to the blocky animations; the baby animals category, which has fawns and iguana hatchlings and baby bunnies… so downright cute; and somehow the plate of kimchi is able to move independently?

Woah, look at me… I haven’t even told you the goal of the game! It’s a game against yourself, so your goal is to beat your highscore, and possibly those on the leaderboard, if you’re more ambitious than I am.

You can also play multiplayer if the other players are using the same router as you are, in which case the goal is to see how far you can make it as a team.

Max is a cooperative kids board game where you are trying to get the little critters (Chipmunk, Mouse and Bird) to the tree before Max (the cat) catches up to them. It was one of my first games and my first cooperative board game.

I like the aspect of choice. A lot of kids’ games, you just pick up the card and hope it goes in your favor. In Max, you get to choose which critter to move on a given turn.

I think, if you put your mind to it, it’s pretty hard to lose. I wouldn’t know, because recently my goal has been to make the cat win. Meanwhile the other player (my cousin) has been trying to get the animals to the tree. Thus, it can also be a competitive game. In the picture above, my cousin had successfully gotten the chipmunk to safety when I rolled double black, so Max ate the other two.

I think the treats and trails are cute. There are four cat treats, so if Max gets too close to the critters for your comfort, you can call him back to his starting point. There are also trails, one for each critter. When they land on their trail, they take the trail to wherever it ends. They’re effectively shortcuts. Unfortunately, Max, if he lands on it, will also take the trails.