ADDICTIVE CLASH OF CLANS: WHY WE PLAY IT?

CLASH OF CLANS LOOKS CUTE

Yet is is a game of war... In my previous piece on MEGAPOLIS (just looks more mega when bolded and on caps) I listed friendliness as one of the gateways into player interest retention. Those first few minutes are pretty important when using hand held gear be it a smart phone or a fleshlight. If it is smooth, soft and rounded there is big chances of being a cross-over game ranging from young to old and from gamers to squares. Clash of Clans doesn't fall short in cuteness instead it is all over the board starting from the loading screen.

This is how it starts an onslaught of friendly yet determined
looking creatures flooding from your screen.

SIMPLICITY SUITS FOR SHORT BURSTS OF PLAYING

Smart phones are especially nice for ruining our eyes with those small ass screens. It has to be a super narc game to keep people playing. Clash of Clans revolves around long term base building and short term battle sequences. What a wonderful game for the masses. Most of the time you can stay idle and when you come back to visit your home village there is always something little to do, maybe upgrade that piece of wall or cut down some trees and yes, rearm traps and fix damages done by evil attacker...

Lovely creatures minding their own business.

IT COMES IN SLOW AND FAST MOTION

Game tempo is very slow on the village side of the game and you don't get lots of action. However the tempo picks up when you jump to the battle side of the game. This dynamics will keep on attracting wide mix of players. Some will enjoy the farming side of the game and some will be attracted to the blood and mayhem. Too bad they don't have real clan warfare implemented yet.

What a serene view, suddenly there is a crack in the sky
 and the enemy village is in sights. Let's see what
kind of and adversary we'll be served this time. 

DO THE WAR CHAP

Then it is time to do WAR (yeah, this also looks more commanding this way). You choose single player campaign or multiplayer free for all. Once again nice set up for different types of players. I believe that quite a chunk of gamers will quit the game soon after they have played through the single player campaign. On the other hand majority will dive in and enjoy battling against other players.

A battle coming to an end. I the attacker have not been
successful in totally demolishing the resistance.
The victory is mine though as I have
inflicted over 50% damage
to the village.

TACTICAL FIGHTING

The most fantastic part of the fighting is that player doesn't have complete control over the troops. One can choose the place outside enemy village as well as the type of troops and the sequence together with number of troops. After that the attack takes its own path and all hell breaks loose. Defending village does the same just according those diabolical defense lines, which defender in turn has developed.

So I won but at what cost. Very little loot and lots of
expenditure on troops. This was a bad attack in the end.
Next time I'll do better so... one more game and then I'll stop.

REPEAT REPEAT REPEAT

Simple formula but so narc that you go and play some more and then some more. As your village slugs on and produces some raw materials it is easy to take few days breaks from the game and then swing on like nothing happened. I believe Clash of Clans is being played by occasional gamers and heavy users.