Days of Wonder Launches Small World on the iPad
Days of Wonder has released a two-player version of Philippe Keyaerts’ Small World for the iPad, which goes on sale April 3, 2010.
For those who don’t know the game, players in Small World control a race of fantasy creatures – giants, elves, skeletons, and so on, each with a special power – in order to dominate as much territory as possible. As the title suggests, though, there’s not enough room for both of you, so you’ll need to choose races and powers wisely in order to best your opponent. For a more detailed explanation of the game, head to my review of Small World from April 2009.
With the Small World app, players move their forces by touching the screen, with the program automatically enforcing movement rules, attack and defense bonuses, and other details.
As Days of Wonder CEO Eric Hautemont says in a press release accompanying the announcement, “The iPad is the first truly intimate interactive device we have ever seen. For the first time, two players can sit across a table from each other and share a magical moment of gaming with a face-to-face playing experience that has had no previous equivalent in the digital world. The world of board games and digital gaming will never be the same.” The press release also notes that 57,000 copies of Small World, along with 32,000 copies of the various expansions, have been sold worldwide in less than a year.
For more screenshots of the app, head to the Days of Wonder website. The Small World app sells for $5 and is currently available through the App Store on iTunes. Days onf Wonder notes that additional fantasy races and powers for the app will be sold separately.
Posted by W. Eric Martin on Apr 2, 2010 at 01:00 PM in Game News, From Cardboard to Digits / 4072
Want more posts like this one?
to Boardgame News to keep the game goodness flowing!Comments:
To comment, you must register with BGN.|
No surprise to see Days of Wonder leading the way on this. Aside from the game itself, I wonder how robust the feature set is. Can you can save/load games in progress? Does it support asynchronous play (i.e. play-by-email, etc)? How closely coupled is it with the games available on their website, etc.? Although I don’t plan on picking up an iPad anytime soon, I’m very interested to see how this pans out and I definitely wish them the best of luck. Posted by Rob Bartel on Apr 2, 2010 at 03:22 PM | #
|
|
It appears to be 2player only face to face realtime. Posted by Lee Fisher on Apr 2, 2010 at 04:14 PM | #
|
|
Correct. 2 player f2f exclusively, for now. And that’s by design. The experience we are looking to create is one that requires that. ;-) Posted by Eric Hautemont on Apr 2, 2010 at 04:23 PM | #
|
|
I got VERY excited when I saw this! I pre-ordered the iPad and I’m eagerly awaiting its arrival tomorrow. An app like this is right up my alley! However, I probably won’t be purchasing it. :(
Posted by JaredWilson on Apr 2, 2010 at 04:47 PM | #
|
|
Again, only TWO players? I can understand the face-to-face part, but only two? Maybe I’ll come back when it is up to 3 or 4. But two? There are so many better two player games than Small World. Posted by Stefan Lopuszanski on Apr 2, 2010 at 04:53 PM | #
|
|
Yes, there’s only so much we can code in a matter of weeks ;) Posted by Eric Hautemont on Apr 2, 2010 at 05:08 PM | #
|
|
After receiving the press release, I had asked DoW’s Mark Kaufmann about the limitation of the Small World app to two players; he replied, “The number of players we can comfortably ‘seat’ at the iPad is unknown yet. We need to spend more time studying people’s play patterns and interaction with the iPad in various settings.” Development of apps for the iPad has been a “blind man feeling in the dark” type of thing from my understanding. A developer friend of mine converted one of his existing iPhone apps for the iPad – but it’s not like he had access to an iPad in order to test the app. He had to work with the specs that Apple made available to developers and hope that the app worked well enough to be accepted. I’m sure that he’s eager to try the app for real tomorrow! Eric Posted by W. Eric Martin on Apr 2, 2010 at 06:13 PM | #
|
|
The potential for the iPad with board gaming is huge. I wish DoW best of luck with this first implementation and hope it can continue to evolve and become a viable option for the right games, right environment. Posted by Bob Bergeron on Apr 2, 2010 at 09:07 PM | #
|
|
Interesting idea my wife mentioned… You could even put a code into the physical game itself, as a bonus to the folks buying the full game. Or something along those lines. There are alot of cool possibilities that DoW can go with this. I was interested in an iPad before, now I see stuff like this and REALLY want one :). Posted by Ryan Olson on Apr 3, 2010 at 01:11 AM | #
|
|
Ryan’s idea seems like the way to go- leave it as 2 player in general, but if you purchase the physical game, you can input your DOW code from it to unlock the 3-5 player modes. Posted by Andy Van Zandt on Apr 4, 2010 at 09:16 PM | #
|
|
They did that whole “physical copy has a code for online things” a long time ago—it didn’t work that well. I’m pretty sure you could comfortably sit 3 and maybe 4 people around an iPad (it does have 4 sides, right? it is rectangular, right?). Maybe if they came out with an update for 4 players it might work—but I can’t imagine playing Small World with 2. That is like playing Tichu with a number other than 4—IT JUST DOESN’T WORK! Posted by Stefan Lopuszanski on Apr 5, 2010 at 01:10 AM | #
|
|
a long time ago… or right now, still, on every game i’ve bought by them in the past year? i think they’re pretty far from dismissing that concept. Small World works pretty well at 2 actually, it’s just extremely fast. Posted by Andy Van Zandt on Apr 5, 2010 at 04:29 AM | #
|
|
Two-player Small World is a different beast than the 3-5 player game, Stefan, but it still works fairly well. Every gain tends to take away from the opponent, so you need to pay more attention to the race/power combinations in the queue and figure out which might work best against the choices open to the opponent. Eric Posted by W. Eric Martin on Apr 5, 2010 at 08:40 AM | #
|
|
I love the potential of the iPad for crossover gaming, but I’m not yet convinced that it will have enough screen real-estate to seat four people for a face to face computer assisted game. Of course, nobody’s brought an iPad to my house either. Posted by Aaron Lawn on Apr 5, 2010 at 01:46 PM | #
|
|
I’ve played 4p once, and 2p exclusively the rest of the time, and it is a fun time my son and I have. It does make some race powers not so great tho… Posted by John Holder on Apr 5, 2010 at 06:24 PM | #
|
Next entry: Reiner Knizia's Money Also Available for the iPad
Previous entry: Media Watch: Man Loses Free Speech Challenge to Sell Game
