Mind Games Pro by Mindware Consulting

I love this sort of apps, and this one as well.

The brain exercises in the exercises are great, as they mix a series of games to develop different areas of your brain, and favour flexibility, creativity, memory retention, alertness, spatial, verbal, cognitive and numerical skills among other things. The games are not too difficult, but doing them at the correct speed is the biggest challenge many of the times. You will find more difficult those that involve an area of your brain that you need to develop or do not use enough.

I love the scoring system, with your today's results and your best results ever, which helps you to improve and beat yourself; it is great that the final scores always tell you if you are doing normal, below normal, or above normal and in which degree, and also if you are doing better (and percentage) with regards to the people in your age group.

I have a complaint. This is a paid app. This is an app for everybody out there, humans on Planet Earth who speak English, not just Americans. OK, who was the brilliant mind who decided that including questions about American Football was a great way to test MY knowledge skills?

Re the design, the welcome page of the game is very simple but very colourful and pleasant to the eye, and I love the colour scheme used in each game and the big size font used in the descriptions of what the game requires from you.

Beyond that, the visual design of the game looks amateurish. For example, most of the images and shapes you find in the visual games are Google-search-like images and shapes, not neat enough not nice enough not original ones. There are plenty of photo stock websites where to get royalty free images... The list of games page is just visually poor and crowded. And the settings of the game do not allow you to change the size or type of font. This is a paid app. A bit of more care in the design would have been great. I have mind-solving games with amazing graphics and design for 0.99 bucks. Hello Hello Mr designer!

The PRO (paid) version does NOT have adds.

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The Silent Age by House on Fire

I love solving puzzles. I love mazes. I love everything time-travel. If you mix these three things I am going to be buying that "thing".

Joe is a Janitor in a corporation. He becomes the world saviour against his own will when he meets a dying scientist, Dr Lambert, who gives him a solar-powered time machine to go to the future and bend the course of history on Planet Earth.

The game is short and not difficult, except for a few points in which I found myself stuck. So I looked for a cheat online :O. But the story, the dialogues, the character and the mood of the game are really absorbing. The time travel factor is what makes the game unique, switching between present and future to collect objects and access places that otherwise you (Joe) can't.

The game has just five actions, walk, run, take and use, and dialogues, which are all done by tapping your screen. So there is no difficulty in learning how to do that, unless you don't have fingers in your hands. Ha! Moreover, the game was fully responsive to touch in my table, so the whole experience was very smooth.

One the things that I enjoyed the most in the game was... the dialogues. Truly hilarious, as well as some of the comments you get when you touch or tap any of the objects on the screen. I also fancy our hero Joe, who looks like a thinned out version of Tom Sellecks. Rescue me, my man.

The first part is free, totally free, then you have to pay for the second episode if you want it. Nobody forces you, but you will want it, guaranteed. You don't want to end the game half way the story, right? I paid 6+ bucks for some hours of entertainment. That is cheaper than a movie or my daily coffees.

The main downsides of the game are, to me, the lack of voice speech, the fact that you just see the character moving (when he uses tools, they are not seen in his hands; when he goes down a rope, you don't see him climbing down, etc.). Besides, my tablet got totally frozen a couple of times and I had to reboot it.

One of those games to do in a lazy weekend, sickie day or during your lunch break. 
 

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The Moron Test by DistinctDev

It is official, I am not a moron.

The Moron Test is not only a very cheap puzzle game, it is a great brain teaser and a very cute and engaging game. When you start playing you think that it is too easy, a child game, thinking that is your knowledge what is being tested. It is not your knowledge, it is you way of thinking and reacting!

The good thing is that, no matter how much you FAIL!, you can always restart the game and try again, with the advantage of knowing already the answers to the different pages you have already passed. You will see yourself learning from your mistakes, realising that even though you know the correct answer your reflex act is faster than your discernment, you will see that your brain will read something and be tricked by the contradictory images on the page, you will see that despite you being told to pay attention your will still be distracted, you will see yourself feeling like a moron and saying damn-it, I am "moronesque". This is also enhanced by the fact that part of the replies to some of the queries require you to realise that you have to move physically your device, and think out of the square.

The second phase was the one I found more difficult to pass. I would not say that phase 6 is more difficult than phase 2, it is just that I found this one the most challenging personally. The others could be as difficult, but somewhat after no 2 one figures out what the game is asking you to do, what not to do, and what things we should be focusing on.

The game is also very humorous and cute, with all the characters being drawn in a very small children book sort of way. Some of the sounds are very funny, as well.

I found that when doing the test for second time to get to the place I was stuck, knowing already the answers to the exercises previously passed, the game would say FAIL! repeatedly. This is OK when you know the answer, and you might think it is your device's responsiveness to touch. But if you are doing the exercise for the first time, you will think that you are missing something that you are not. I think that I know why this is happening :)) I think it is not the game being badly designed, it is a wish on the part of the producers to cash in on your mistakes, as a key answer is offered for purchase many times after you fail. If you are not a moron don't buy it. Ha! If you feel stuck any time, you can go and search the Internet. Most of the exercises can be passing by you "thinking" on solving, not focusing on your frustration at not having figured out the answer yet. 

Great fun!

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Monument Valley by Ustwo

Monument Valley is a gorgeous 3-D cartoon-like Escher-inspired puzzle game, with geometric architectural colourful settings, adorable characters, effective sound and animation effects, and a soothing magical music. This is a sleek game regarding design, and where colour, simplicity and fancifulness are perfectly combined.

I find the game good both for children and adults, as the level of difficulty is not high until you get to the last two levels (chapters 9 & 10) or the the last episode of the expansion. However, it is not that easy, either, as this is a 3D puzzle, so optical illusion and perspective play an important role in solving the puzzles. This makes the game very engaging. Eye candy. Mind candy. The level of difficulty steps up, literally, with each chapter and steps up with the new set extension, which is something I love. Episode 8 of the Forgotten Shores was really tricky!

The whole ensemble is mesmerising and absorbing, and unlike other puzzle games or games in general, even if you are stuck in some of the most difficult steps, you won't give up. Because it is kinda relaxing.

The game is based on touch and tap, so anybody, even a small child, can play it, to happily lead our little princess to destination. Most importantly, the game is fully responsive to touch and tap, at least in my tablet, something we cannot take for granted as many games really are not thought for or adapted for tablets and are a pain to play.

There are 10 chapters included in the game, plus 8 more if you want to expand it. You probably will do because, once you immerse yourself in the wondrous world of Monument Valley, you want to stay there for a long time. It is barely $3 AU, and, what the heck, your coffee will cost you more.

Big kudos to the whole team of Ustwo for making a virtue and an amazing game based on pure simplicity, care for the details, and charm. I am going to be buying anything these guys create!

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WTF Food Moment 7: Gluten Free Proskewto

(I am at the Deli section at my Coles, being served).

(A young tattooed hypster couple, late 20s or early 30s, arrive and stand next to me). 

>We are having "pros-kew-toh" (she says),  

(LOL, but it is sweet.)

< Pro-xu-tto (he corrects her)

--> The attendant approaches them.

> What are you having guys?

< Is the Salami gluten free?

--> The attendant looks at the labels.

> The label of the salami says it is!

< What about the prosciutto?

(Now, I am getting "queasy")

--> The attendant looks at the label of at piece of deboned plastic-sealed prosciutto.

(Noooo, He too!!!!! It can't be happening!) 

> It doesn't say anything, so I guess is not gluten free.

(WTF! I am smiling in disbelief.)

> OK, then we won't have the prosciutto, 

(WTF!)

(Would you ask, is smoked salmon gluten free? No, right? Well the same with prosciutto. Real Prosciutto or Jamón Serrano are not meat-made products. They are a piece of cured pork leg, cured by using salt and very cold temperatures. So no wheat derivative is added. The fact that pieces of prosciutto are deboned and plastic sealed in Australia contributes to the confusion. The "things" you see around the meat are actually pieces of dry salt, dry fat, and the dry skin of the animal. That is real prosciutto.)

(On the other hand, it made me think, is the prosciutto sold at Coles, real prosciutto? WTF, now I am getting into the WFT proskewto mood). 

WHERE? My suburban Coles. 

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WTF Foodie Moment 6: Tough guys

--> I am having my lunch break.

-->  A bunch of tough-looking long-bearded guys arrive. They look tough. They look like a new wave of breaded bikies with a sprinkle of poshness.
 
--> They order.
 
--> They go outside.
 
(I am sure they are going to order something tough, something macho or at least manly, a long macch, a black coffee without sugar, something acid and caustic, meaty.)

--> Their order arrives... A green coloured organic juice.
 
WTF!

(WHERE? Babooshka Cafe, Northbridge)

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WTF Foodie Moment 5: Morcilla Breaky

--> I am seating on a sunny Sunday, at one of my fav cafes. I have ordered the Morcilla Breaky.

--> A couple arrives and seats next table. Their table is separated five centimetres (literally) from mine.

--> My meal arrives. It looks Yum! I start eating. It tastes yummy.

--> He looks at me (meaning my morcilla breaky) mesmerized. Staring.

> (He tells her) it looks great, isn't it?

< (She tells him) Yes, you should order it.

--> (I keep munching)

--> (He keeps looking at me and/or my morcilla, or both. He does so several times).

--> (The friend they were waiting finally arrives and joins the party, and the waitress approaches their table)

> What are you having, guys?

< What is she having? ("she" is me! at barely 5 cms.)

--> (The whole table plus the confused waitress look at me. The waitress is lost for a moment as my breakfast is almost finished).

>> (I reply) The morcilla breaky....

--> (They ignore me. No Thank yous. They are too, how to put it... rude? obnoxious? What about the constant staring? What about talking about me and my morcilla as if we were mere projections on a screen and I was not there? What about learning to communicate using their vocal cords instead of their eyes and asking me directly from the very beginning?) 

--> What is wrong with you, WTF people?!

(WHERE? Cantina 663, Mt Lawley)

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