Tiny Diggers – An iPad Construction Truck Game for Kids Age 2-5

Oh-my-gosh. What a wonderful new addition to the AOE series. I had a go at the demo last night and was thoroughly impressed. AOE seems to only come out every decade or so, but when it does, there’s always a plethora of nice features that seem to take advantage of the technology available at the time. That is not to say that AOE 3 is a major change in gameplay, it still plays like the older versions, but it’s the overall package presented that makes you feel it’s so fresh. And it does in fact have a lot of new features.

I first noticed the graphics. Wow. So lush with detail. I love the animations and the way the characters reacted to the environment. For instance, when a cannon ball hit a wall I built, the ball seemed to only affect that one area where it hit. One of my men were hit by a cannon ball and actually bounced off a shack in the way one would naturally. I’d feel bad if someone actually did bounce of a shack from a cannonball. Nontheless, some Ragdoll physics were in there. I am running the game with a Geforce 6800GT, P4, 3.2, so I could crank up the detail, but it is my understanding that the game will still look pretty on a lower-end card and machine.

I hadn’t played AOE in many years. Probably 5, so I forgot the language it followed, but I easily picked up the intuitiveness that AOE is notorious for. One thing I couldn’t figure out, and maybe it’s not a feature, is that I wanted to rotate the screen. That I expected to just happen, but I loved how the detail remained the same even when you zoomed in. It was still easy to find and build what I wanted, when I wanted. I had fun training sheep and creating Indian chiefs. I couldn’t figure out how to save the game. Alas this was probably taken out in the demo. Multiplayer is there. That’s great, it just means more value. I quite liked the home city feature which allows you to visit it and replenish your supplies. And the state of your city depends on how well you do. I’m looking forward to exploring this more.

If I were to rate this game based on the demo alone, I’d give it a 4.8 out of 5 Aeropausanauts. I will definetley pick this one up!