You mention an important point that I feel is one of the greatest strengths of a web-based game, continual improvement. By running the game off a web server (or several, as the case may be) the game can receive updates, new features, and bug fixes that are all pretty much transparent to the player, nothing new to install etc.

I had wondered if TinyWarz was basically the work of one person. Even talking just about the development effort required, it’s no doubt very significant (I’m a programmer by day so it’s certainly something I can appreciate). Allowing the documentation and tutorial efforts to be picked up by the community is probably a necessary and smart move, even if it leaves some gaps for new players.

I do hope very much that TinyWarz, and similar web games, are met with continued success – it’s a category in which I’m quite interested, and one in which TinyWarz seems a good example.

One of the best features of Tinywarz is the simple fact that it is not a finished product. Every week or so we see a new update to the games mechanics, like for example, just the other day laser weaponry received some cool bonuses. Now there is a greater pull to use laser units which were looked over before.

Every year, Tinywarz also seems to see an “expansion” where new units, mods, buildings, and game mechanics are introduced. The newest introducing stealth technology. This is one of my favorite times in the game as it means I get to mess around with some new toys.

Another one of my favorite features is the planet system, like you said, everything happens here. That means that you don’t go to sleep wondering if all your hard earned work will make it through the night. If your a casual gamer, then you can play on and off and not get penalized. If your a more avid player, you can drop massive bases that give huge bonuses to your faction and yourself, but at a risk.

Now about the new player learning curve, this is a known problem, but believe it or not, Tinywarz has one developer. Just one person is responsible for the entire game, and where it is now. So he is frequently juggling updates and new features as he sees fit. So right now, players themselves are going out, making video tutorials and posting them to places like youtube. I myself am learning how to do flash and will soon start work on flash version of a tutorial of Tinywarz which will guide the player through their first “day” in the game.

Lastly, about the post of the validation code, Tinywarz is very much an economic game, with command points (you refered to them as CP but in game they are just called “cmd”) being the MOST valuable commodity, and the only way to earn them is through trade, or every night at midnight. So multi-accounts is a very big problem. The validation codes cut down on players trying to abuse this feature and in reality cheating through cash cow accounts. If that stops a player from joining, then it is a necessary evil we have to pay to cut down on cheaters.

Thanks for the review of our game!
-Batt

I haven’t play Tinywarz yet but I didn’t really like the distraction of needing a verification code. I’m a WoW player and a Magic Online player so they need to pull me away from those activities long enough to try their game.

I think you’re spot on, however, regarding the prevailing attitude of people surfing the web (potential players). No matter how cool the game gets in the advanced stages, if it doesn’t grab people at the start it stands to turn away a lot of users.

TinyWarz seems to me like an interesting model (hint), both for what it does right and areas it should improve. That’s what inspired me to write this, and I hope I remember and can look back at these observations down the road…