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Plant Tycoon
- Palm OS 5 game
Reviewed
by: Lianne
Reitter, February 2004, send
e-mail
Published
by: LDW
Software, go
to the web site
Requires: Color
Palm PDA or Sony Clie running Palm OS 5.x or later, 700KB
available RAM
MSRP: $14.95
($7.45 as of January 2004)
Ahhh
winter. The joy of skiers, snowboarders and tobogganers
alike; the bane of every gardener I know. Oh the gardeners
say they enjoy the winter, planning for next season (and
winterizing their little treasures is a pleasure all in
itself). They don’t fool me. They hate winter. All
they really want to do is get their hands dirty and grow
something, but the cold and the snow won’t allow
it. Here though, is a little game for their PDA that will
keep them and every gardener and non-gardener (like me),
hip deep in the joys of planting, watering and caring for
a digital greenhouse.
The main
premise of the game is simple. You start with 15 empty
pots, a supply of soil, water and a little seed money (pun
intended). Plant the seeds, water the soil, watch them
grow to maturity and then pollinate the little beauties
and harvest the seeds. Once the new seeds are collected,
put the fully grown plants up for sale in your digital
garden center. The sale of a plant means money in the kitty
and an empty pot in the greenhouse to start the process
all over again. The whole cycle takes a while and progresses
in real time even with the PDA turned off so you have to
check back on them from time to time (does anybody remember
the Tomagochi?). Water when needed or go to the virtual
store and purchase some plant food to encourage growth
or buy insecticide if a plant becomes infested.
This
alone would be enough if the game was meant only for the
bored gardener. There is however, a lot more to it because
your seeds aren’t from just anywhere - they are from
the mythical Island of Isola. There, four magical plants
were known to grow and flourish and it is your goal, through
cross pollination, to recreate these magical plants and
become a wealthy Plant Tycoon in the process.
I don’t know if it matters, but I’m a lousy
gardener; I don’t have the patience. Even so, I found
myself constantly checking on my plants to see how they
were growing, if they were in bloom and ready to pollinate
or if there were any seeds ready to harvest. Then, when
it was time to part with my hard work and put them up for
sale it was really fun watching the little people running
around my virtual garden centre and buying up my creations.
I really had a great time with Plant Tycoon and I intend
to continue my virtual green house and garden centre for
a long time to come.
Unfortunately,
if I ever do find those magical plants it will be by
pure coincidence. A true Tycoon keeps records
of which plant was crossed with which in order to keep
recreating a particularly lucrative plant. I didn’t
want to keep a separate paper record lying around, or leave
the game to make use of the Palm's Note Pad and without
a record keeping feature in the game itself, my new plant
creations are just a hit and miss sort of thing. However,
that’s a lot of fun too, seeing what I get once I
put on my mad scientist hat and start mixing up the DNA.
I’ll leave you with a little hint - pause the game
before you go to bed. I don’t want to get too graphic,
but I woke up to a disgusting mess - bugs, dead or dying
plants. Terrible. It set me back and cost me dearly. Did
I mention that I also killed my Tomagochi? Plant Tycoon
is really great fun. It will keep the winter blahs away
from the greenest of thumbs and will also give hope to
those of you who can't even get a potato to root. Great
idea, highly playable. Highly recommended.
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