Enjoy your Holiiday!

Introduction

Cake Mania: Lights, Camera, Action! is the latest in the series of Cake Mania cake baking games. The Cake Mania games have come a long way from the original Cake Mania time management game. Game play in the original title was simple: bake cakes, add toppings, quickly serve customers before time runs out to advance to the next level. At the end of each level you could shop for a few upgrades to your equipment. Several different customers came to your shop, but for the most part they lacked depth. This is not to say that the original game was not enjoyable, it was and still is today!

One of the great things about the Cake Mania series is that each successive sequel has evolved and polished the game play. As in the previous version, Cake Mania Main Street, Cake Mania: Lights, Camera, Action! is not just a cake baking game. It actually is three game in one! It combines the original style baking game, a fast paced seek and find game set in a clothing store and a cooking game set in a pizza shop. The player can move freely between the different businesses once they are unlocked.

The Bakery

You start the game in the bakery as the owner of the shop, newly wedded Jill. You quickly learn that Jill has something in her oven besides cakes! It is very busy in the bakery as they are filming a movie in town. The production has brought a bunch of special “high maintenance” customers into town! This is the storyline of the game. Your goal is to help Jill and her husband Jack run the cake shop during this busy time.

The first bakery level serves as a mini tutorial to introduce new players to the mechanics and play of the cake making game. Short mini tutorials appear when needed throughout all stages of the game and introduce the new businesses, new equipment and special new characters. The tutorials are excellent and for the most part do not interrupt game flow and play.

One minor annoyance with the tutorials is found between levels when you shop for equipment. Sometimes it can be hard to tell if you are in a tutorial or not. It seems that the game is asking you to click items, when in reality it is just explaining how to purchase items. You can easily tell if this is the case. If you see a next button on the bottom of the screen, the tutorial is explaining a process and not asking you to do it. To easily resolve this situation read the instructions and just click the next button.

In order to succeed in the bakery levels and indeed the whole game you must keep your customers happy! You do this by serving them as quickly as possible. Each customer has a “heart” meter displayed next to them that shows how happy they are. If the meter gets to zero they will leave your store in a huff without paying!

As you earn money you are able to buy new and upgraded equipment. This equipment will allow you to make more expensive cakes with toppings and such. It also will allow you to make cakes faster and even keep your impatient customers occupied and happy while they wait for their cakes.

The most important piece of equipment in Cake Mania: Lights, Camera, Action! is the television. The television has four channels that can be switched to. Each customer has a preference for a channel. It is up to you to determine which customer prefers which channel. If the TV breaks it will only play a couple channels. It is important to keep the TV operational! If it breaks get it repaired ASAP.

Players who have played the previous Cake Mania games will immediately recognize the extra effort the developers have put into the baking levels. Character art and animation is at it’s best for the series. Character personalities and special character traits have much more effect on the game. Characters just don’t look different, they also behave differently.

The number of upgrades has also increased and upgrades can be sold back for cash for future upgrades as well. Equipment can be moved around to a few different locations in the kitchen, allowing the player to optimize the layout for his or her play style.

All the above changes lead to much more complex and rewarding baking game levels. This version of Cake Mania does not require just speed in the bakery but also requires strategy, more so than any of the previous games. The improvements to the baking levels will keep old time Cake Mania players involved, without overwhelming newcomers!

The Boutique

After three “game days” of play the second business becomes available for play. Players can choose to continue playing levels in the bakery or try running Risha’s Boutique, a trendy clothing store. As a game Risha’s Boutique is really a fast paced hidden object game. If you have followed our blog over the years most likely know we are not fond of the Hidden Object genre. Surprisingly, it really works in Cake Mania: Lights, Camera, Action!

Shoppers enter Risha’s shop at the top of the screen and ask for the items they want. It is your job to retrieve the items from the racks and shelves and deliver them to the customer. What makes this game mode different from the typical hidden object games is that the items are somewhat organized in the store. Clothes hang on racks in groups of outfits. Accessories and jewelery are found on tables and shelves. All items are in clear sight, they are not obscured in anyway. They are only “hidden” by the clutter in the store! You never spend hours looking for a small, partially obscured, poorly drawn item, as you would in a typical hidden object game.

The player is introduced to several new characters in the boutique. Most notably are the Psychic who can predict the orders of customers before they are placed, and the Shopaholic who will steal your payments and tips left by other characters.

The boutique is a fun place to rack up cash to spend on upgrades in any of the businesses. The rules in the boutique are a bit relaxed and game play is less nerve wracking than in the other businesses. The boutique levels are a welcome edition to the latest version of Cake Mania!

The Pizza Shop

The third business is unlocked after three “game days” of boutique play. It is Gordo’s Pizza Shop. This business adds cooking simulation levels similar to the sushi bar levels or burger shop levels found in Cake Mania Main Street. In the pizza shop, you are the pizza chef who makes pizzas according to your customers orders. You heat the dough, add the cheese and then add on toppings from over 30 ingredients found in the kitchen. You also are able to cook pasta and grill chicken and eggplant for your customers.

A host of new characters may show up in the pizza shop game levels. Each of the characters have their own personalities and quirks! As in the rest of the game you have to learn how to handle each one to minimize the impact on other characters ordering food and maximize the character’s happiness.

Conclusion

Each of the three businesses once unlocked, may be entered and played at anytime during the game. There are around 60 bakery levels and around 20 levels in the boutique and 20 in the pizza shop. Cake Mania: Lights, Camera, Action! maybe played in timed mode or in relaxed mode. The best way to play is timed. In this mode you really feel the pressures of working in a small business. In timed mode you only have a few minutes to make enough money to advance to the next level. If you are slow, make mistakes, or make too many customers angry you will make little cash and fail the level. If you fail you will have to do the level over again. In relaxed mode there is no time limit the level ends when you reach the sales goal.

Cake Mania: Lights, Camera, Action! is the most polished Cake Mania game yet. The graphics and character animation are far superior to those found in the previous versions. The addition of more complex character actions and new equipment and the ability to resell and move equipment in certain levels adds a strategy component which was lacking in earlier versions. All in all we highly recommend Cake Mania: Lights, Camera, Action! as a great time management game. Try out the free trial download or purchase the game at the links below:

Try Cake Mania: Lights, Camera, Action! for PC

Buy Cake Mania: Lights, Camera, Action! for Only $6.99

Play Playrix’s Royal Envoy city builder for Free Online. The online version provides a great introduction to the game, and in itself can provide hours of fun! The download version offers better graphics, sound and full game play.  If you find you like the game, you should take advantage of the Fourth of July weekend sale on slippergames.com. On Slipper Games you may purchase the PC version for just $4.89! ***Sorry Fourth of July Sale has Ended!***

Just Click the Screenshot Above to Launch the Game

It has been a while since we have posted here on our blog! We have been busy working on some exciting projects due to release in a couple of weeks (stay tuned)! But this weekend we are going to be celebrating the Fourth of July!!!! And to kick off the weekend we have a great offer on games for our loyal readers! All regular download and play PC & Mac games are going on sale for $4.89 at midnight tonight through Monday night on www.slippergames.com!

Enjoy the 4th!

*** Sorry This Promotion has Ended! Check Back Often for More Deals!!! ***

The mission of our blog has always been to identify the best free flash and casual games on the net. As we have previously discussed, it is getting harder and harder to find high quality free flash games. The quality is just not out there anymore. Several factors are to blame for this drop in quality. The fall in advertising revenues for one and the allure of closed platform game stores, not to mention the unending media war against flash has resulted in high quality developers moving to other platforms.

Traditional big studio casual games have also suffered in quality. Over the last year a vicious price war and the rise of Facebook as a platform has taken the money out of PC/Mac download and play games. Innovation in these games has all but ended, as budgets were slashed in response to the dropping price point. Instead of novel games, a never ending series of sequels and cookie cutter hidden object games flow daily onto the major portals.

In response to the drop in quality in flash and traditional casual games we have started to dig deeper to find high quality games, and have found many that we will review over the next coming weeks. Many of these games are from small independent “indie” studios. These studios differ from the larger commercial game studios and portals, as quality and art are valued in games over profit. Puppy Games is such an indie studio. We recently stumbled upon  their game Droid Assault and are featuring it here today.

Droid Assault is a fast moving action packed game for PC, Mac or Linux. The game brings elements of an arcade shooter with a bit of a strategy mix. You start the game as a single droid dropped into a hostile environment full of enemy droids programmed to destroy you. The object of the game is simple, destroy the enemies and advance through the levels to defeat massive bosses.

The great thing about Droid Assault is it offers more than just kill or be killed. Your droid is also equipped with a “transfer beam”. The beam allows you to take control and reprogram members of the enemy droid army to fight for and protect you. The more enemy droids you kill the more you can use the transfer beam to commandeer new droids with new powers. In order to succeed in the game a balance between the number of droids turned to your side and the number of enemy droids destroyed must be obtained. Kill too many droids and your own army will be small in numbers and weak, kill too few and you will lack the ability to use the transfer beam.

Besides the ability to build your own droid army, Droid Assault contains numerous power ups and a seemingly endless variation of droids. The graphics in the game are first rate, with great attention to detail for an arcade type game. Eye candy abounds from the neon glow of droid weapons and beams to the atmospheric particles of smoke fog and sparks. Many parts of the game environment from crates to computer panels are fully destructible and this adds a great deal to the fun of the game. Be sure to destroy all matter of items as many power ups and even droids are hidden within.

Droid Assault is not the newest game from Puppy Games. As most of our readers have surely overlooked their offerings, we thought we would feature the game we found to be most enjoyable. As this is most likely just a matter of taste we encourage you to also try all their other game titles as well. Free trials are available for all of the studios offerings.

Droid Assault Free Trial for PC

Droid Assault Free Trial Mac

Droid Assault Free Trial Linux

You know what? Flowers really suck as gifts! You know it, we know it, even Mom knows it!! Do you really want to shell out $50 on something that wilts and dies after a couple of days??? For that price you can get Mom 10 download and play games on slippergames.com this weekend and have cash left over! Get Mom a game that just keeps on playing like Plants vs. Zombies or a Dash Game. You and Mom can be killing Zombies for months, long after the flowers have rotten!

Sale Price is Good Mother’s Day Weekend Only on slippergames.com!

*** Sorry This Promotion has Ended! Check Back Often for More Deals!!! ***

In any case get the games! Give what you can! And no matter how hard they resist try to give some money to the developers for their work! And in the future, if you see one of their games on gamegiants.net help them out a little more and buy it!!!

This rollout of our new checkout coincides with an increased focus on unique independently developed games. We feel it is important to help the indie developers distribute their games, as this is where the innovation in casual gaming is coming from. We will still offer all your favorites, but help us help those developers who create truly unique games by purchasing their products!

During the next few weeks we are also closing out the few remaining items sold under our gaming accessory category.

*****Sorry this Promotion has Ended*****

This weekend is the time to grab that special download and play game for under $5.00! In fact starting at just after midnight tonight (12:01am Friday to be exact)  all games on slippergames.com will be available for just $4.89! Don’t know what to buy???? Try the best seller Plants vs Zombies for PC ! Hours and hours of endless fun for an amazing low price! Hurry! Sale ends Sunday night at 11:59pm!!!

*****Sorry this Promotion has Ended*****