Sally's Spa

Sally's Spa has to be the best 99 cents I've ever spent in the iPhone app store. I have literally spent hours and hours (with Lulu perched on my shoulder, hehe) on this game. I completed all of the levels within the first few days of downloading the game but now I'm taking my time going through each stage and replaying it for a perfect score.



I'm trying to figure out why it is I like this game so much. It's a time management game so I guess it naturally piques the interest of my "project manager" side. Or maybe there is something soothing about looking at a spa for so long, makes me feel like I'm in the spa? Or is it the cute, bubbly graphics?

Whatever it is, my left wrist is starting to hurt from resting my head on it as I play for up to an hour before bed every night.

Maximum Level Reached

I've spent countless hours the last several weeks playing Restaurant City on Facebook. During work, while watching TV, before dinner, after dinner, during dinner, at night... all hours of the day spent monitoring and managing my restaurant.





Finally, I've reached Level 27 -- the maximum level possible in this game. Not sure all that time spent was worth the miniscule wave of achievement felt as I earned my last $300 cash bonus for leveling up.

But what makes a game addicting? What makes it so powerfully engaging you remember to play 2-3 times a day? That's exactly what I'm trying to figure out as I design a Facebook game for one of our unsaid clients. Hint: it's for a product that just launched into the marketplace and by product I mean car. :P

This is the first time I've ever designed or strategically planned for a game, especially one that will have so much exposure. It took us several rounds of presentations to get the idea sold to the clients and so far I've built experience maps, prototypes, content plans and design specs for it. We are scheduled to release the design assets over to the developers next week and the game will hopefully launch sometime next month. Eek!