Camp Magic is a Freemium “Build A Magic School” game and is released by Mogo Studios.
“The Camp Magic is a brand new online social game that let’s you be an up-and-coming Headmaster running your very own Camp Magic to educate young witches and wizards for a better tomorrow! In your academy, students will learn magic beyond their imagination. The game lets you build academic facilities, enroll students, collect-and-process resources, produce magical items, decorate with ornaments, and cooperate with other Headmasters to ultimately vanquish evil in the name of Justice.”
The idea of the game is to build a magic school. However, it is not just the school, but the grounds around and the resources it supplies like magic wood, magic water and several others. The game has you buidling classrooms for your students and for their training you set them to work in the woods and potion factories making resources for you.
During the tutorial you are shown the basics and allowed to build enough to get started. The tutorial is simple to follow with a green arrow pointing to the set items you to do.
At the end of the tutorial the game does something I hate. It asks you to register an account, or log in using GameCenter. GameCenter is fine, but then it asks for a valid email address to go will it. That is bad, I don’t need companies having my email address and Game Center name. The tutorial will not complete until you have registered in some way.
As you progress through the game you advance in level and with that unlock more buildings and items.
There is also a social element to the game allowing you to add friends, viewing their schools and even making items on there map.
On the Freemium side, I found it heavily wanting. As soon as the tutorial was complete I played for about ten minutes and ran out of resources (coins) so I was unable to progress. The only way to get coins was by the students work (5 coins for 4 hours work) or the potion factory (25 coins for the five minutes to build a Magic Cauldron). After fifteen minutes it was clear this was going to be slow going as I needed over 200 more coins. You cannot queue building, so had to do in game or come back regularly to start building again. You can buy 100 coins in the market for 3 magic crystals.
There are in-app purchases for magic crystals that can speed up time (2 crystals = instant Magic Cauldron). These offered 40 for 69p, with some extra for bigger purchases. Again this may help to buy one or two buildings, but would not get you far. The developers did not even bother putting the £ value into the in-app so you see the dollar value.
The game is controlled by selecting items from the menu and placing them on the map. Things on the map can be clicked and a menu will appear to move etc.
The graphics are fairly good and nicely drawn (especially when zoomed in). The music is just a bouncy tune.
On the upside:
- Nice resource management game.
- Lots to do and unlock.
- Some social aspects.
- Universal.
On the downside:
- Resources run out almost as soon as the tutorial is over.
- Turn off Notifications, else you will find out why I suggest turning them off.
- Slow and dull.
- Asking for email when you can log in with my Game Center account is a no-no.
- Memory hungry, reset the device before playing.
Overall, this is another Freemium title that starts off well and then you hit a brick wall were nothing happens. You have to sit there building an item every few minutes to get the next item built and when that is done, all the resources are gone and it is off doing it again. You can wait for several weeks to do anything or spend money in the in-app to push things forward. You can tell which option the developers want you to take. Could have been good, but best avoided due to the poor Freemium design.
Rating: 60%
Size: 19.3 MB
Price (at time of review): Freemium
Link: Camp Magic – Moga Studios
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