Procrastination...

A mere 2+ months after I'd planned to start this blog, I've finally gotten around to it. Mind you, I have doctors notes (plural, and for real) that can account for several weeks of excuses as to what took so long, but the rest of the time is sheer procrastination, and minor bit of terror getting this off the ground.

Getting what "off the ground" you may ask - well, a bit of back of back story. As gamer (both personally and usually professionally), I play lots of games. As a parent, I've found mobile gaming to be the easiest way to get my gaming fix, as I don't have the time, and often, energy, anymore to plop down on the couch for multi-hour gaming sessions. 5 minutes chunks of games is often all I get. So I've migrated to the iPhone for my gaming fix. But despite the short bursts of fun it offers, I find many of  the game experiences still just an in-depth as say Civ 4. There are still important choices to make in app games. But the choices, particularly with the rise of so-called freemium or free-to-play games, makes these choices more critical, as often enough, you need to either wait out a time-clock barrier to continue playing, or cough up real money to bypass the barrier and continue on with your gaming addiction. And thus, the purpose of this blog.

 My goal here is to enlighten and guide players into how to maximize their Free2Play (F2P) games without spending tons of their hard-earned money in the process. I don't begrudge game developers of F2P in trying to find ways to make us part with our cash, and indeed I've spent more than my share of money on in-game purchases (hello Smurfberries !). But lacking even the basic rudiments of instruction into how to best play a F2P game, I find it a challenge thrown down by developers in how to maximize my game experience cheaply. Steven Tolito described it best in a review of Farmville2 in today's New York Times in beating the arbitrary gameplay constraints as "meta-game" in itself. Hopefully, what will follow on this blog will be specific information on some of the more popular mobile and casual games that provides some additional hints and tips, so you don't break the bank.