A Kingdom for Keflings

I often rummage through the Arcade Live games to see what little gems are about and yesterday I was confronted with 'A King don for Keflings'.
I loaded the game up and some ten hours later turned it off!!!

Well how do you describe this fighting games... it's a cross between age of empires civilisation and well just about any other resource finding and management game but with out the violence.

You are a giant in a world of small people called Keflings. A nice touch here is that you can play as your nxe avatar and stomp about in all your fancy dressed up self glory, or use the standard giant models that come with the game.


So basically you have the usual trees, rocks, gems and sheep. With these basic components you harvest mine and build up enough stock to build a building for more little keflings to be born and come lend a hand... you then start construct buildings that use your raw materials and convert them into other materials... IE. stone to brick and lumber to planks etc... and eventually these components are in turn used in other buildings to make other things... a multi layered use and demand for your resources.
With a limited amount of Keflings to order about it can become quite interesting the way you manage your limited resources. The Kefling people are a simple breed with perhaps one of two braincells between the lot of them... except the mayor who is a real greedy piece of work and will wave at you to attract your attention to 'request' a few side quests which he/she will reward you for.
These rewards come in boosts for yourself so you dig faster walk faster etc etc. also sometimes you get a heart (LOVE). These are important as without them you cannot populate a house for Keflings to live in. You see Keflings are a sensitive race that cannot live in a house without love. So shove a heart in a new house and two new Keflings appear... now grab the littel people and set them to work for the rest of their lives bwahahahahahaha

You have a maximum number of Keflings (30) so managing them and utilizing them the most economical way is a great brain teaser.
Around the place you will find hidden a few little bonus's which just like the rewards will help you and your Keflings.
Some of the building do nothing but allow you to pretty up your growing city... new paint, sculpture, trees etc. while others allow your Keflings to wear shoes and walk faster or learn at schools etc.
Some building are not complete until you drop a Kefling into it... this is a pain as you get the whole crew working as a team and blam you have to loose one for a building.

When I said that they were stupid earlier I meant it... before they will work for you it is important that you show them what to do otherwise they follow you around like two legged dumb sheep waving at you.
So you want this little kefling to mine some rock... cool pick he little one up and listen to them scream and struggle... now find some stone to mine... drop them on the stone and they put on there rock diggers hat and start digging for all their worth... now pick them up and move them to where you want then to dump the rock... perhaps in a hand collection pile or in the stone mason shop for processing into bricks or just into the numerous building facilities that use raw rock... anyway you just drop him where you want the rock to go and he then trundles back to his rocks and once he has dug one up away he carries it to where you showed him to take it... simple really... just like him hehehehe
If you just left him to dig he would just make a nice pile of rock very close by.
Now this is where your methods come in.... have the digger carry dig and carry them to the processing plants or concentrate on digging and have others do the carrying... thats one Kefling labor to dig and carry or two Kefling labor to dig more and stock pile while still filling the processing plants.... you, as the giant, can jump in any ware and carry and dig and sheer sheep too... you are the ultimate floater (Manufacturing phrase) and can make a huge difference in your production scheme.

Also you can kick Keflings and sheep too... just give a few hefty boots up the bums of these little guys and you punt them a few feet.. and get achievements for it too.

Graphically this game is really sweet and very very soft on the eyes... nice little features like zooming in for more detail is cool as well as the more you shave the sheep the skinnier they become until their fleeces grow back.
Also in your world of Kefling the seasons change... bright and lush green grass for summer and snow in winter.. and all between are covered in the game with rain and wind... it is a true loverly game to look at.

Sound wise you get very little actually sound from the keflings or their world you are helping to build... one can turn the music down and action up but that helps not a lot.
The music is a collection (small) of catchy tunes that loop over and over again... I must admit that I would have put money on me wanting to kill the warped and twisted fiend who decided to put these tunes on a never ending loop but I found myself enjoying the tracks over and over again... in fact they are playing in the background now.... so this is either that the tracks are really good and i like them or the fact that the shooting games to play is so good that I didn't notice them in the background or possible I am just warped and twisted myself.

The game play is gentle with no stress and I was hooked within a few mins.... i must admit that I found the game VERY therapeutic and the management of resources and people is what I used to do for a living so that is of interest to me as well.

This is a 800 ms points game and is really worth it... no killing, no being scared shirtless, no mashing of buttons in this or that order just a mellow game.

There is some sort on on line multi player as well... not sure what that is about but will give it a go at some point.

As for replayability (completed my city and castle you see) I have every intention of making my city a more thought out structure with trade centerers and manufacturing quarters and residential sectors.... just call em power crazy BWAHAHAHA... now where did I kick that last Kefling to... ahh there he is... oiu you... yeah you... get sheering that flock of sheep and pronto otherwise it's anorther 'tip toe down the Fratton End and get yer head kicked in' for you mate.