I wanted to talk about something that not a lot of people are likely going to be super interested in, but it's something I've been thinking about for a while. Working in an office can be exceptionally boring, and work computers aren't exactly the best things to play games on (usually because they are trash computers, nevermind the whole "not allowed" thing). But there are browser based games and low resource games that you can play on just about everything and anything, that help move the hours along.
Idle games otherwise known by clicker games have an interesting reputation amonst gamers. Some dismiss them out right as game and feel like they aren't worth even a glance. Others get heavily invested into them (like me), while others might be interested but the reputation gained from the first group keeps them away. So with that I want to talk about a few idle games that I think are worthy of a look even if you just casually checked them out.
So first off, what is an Idle Game? Well as the name suggest it's a game that basically plays itself and grants the user progress even while that user is not directly interaction with the game, they progress idly. But the reason why they are also sometimes called Clicker games is in the fact that in order to get your idle production started, you have to click stuff, often a lot of stuff, before the game will take over for you. Generally all these games follow a theme of upgrades that increase the rate of your progress, buildings or employees or some sort of buildable unit that automates various levels of production, and finally a prestige mechanic which is typically a big reset button that drops your progress back to zero but grants you some boon of power that makes progressing further and faster much much easier.
Those are the foundations in which these games are typically based on. Now onto the games, starting with the most famous clicker game and arguably the clicker that started it all.
COOKIE CLICKER -
The game starts with a screen and a big cookie. At the top you see the number of cookies you can and how many cookies you gain per second, these begin at zero. So what do you do? Clicker the cookir of course. Clicking the cookie grants you a cookie to your cookie bank. Click again, get another cookie now you have two, and now another column of things is siloutted on the right side of the screen. The first shadow has the number 15 next to it. Ok so you click the cookie 13 more times and now that shadow lights up. It's a finger, you click it to buy the finger. Now a little finger floats next to the cookie and you counter now says you are making 0.1 cookies per second or CPS. A new item is blacked out under the finger, but it's 100 cookies, and you can buy more fingers the next one is only 21 cookies now, so you save up and buy another finger now you are getting 0.2 CPS and a new bar is available at the top of the screen. Upgrades, the first will double the power of your fingers AND your personal click.
It's a very simple concept, click the cookie, use cookies to buy buildings and upgrades to make more cookies. It's a video game equivalance of when you used to spam 1+1 on the calculators at school to see how high you could get the number before the teacher called on you or class ended. Basically it boils down to making the big number get bigger.
The thing is though, what starts as a very simple premise quickly evolves into a much more complex system. Between judging on whether to buy another building you already own, or save for the next more powerful building, or maybe an upgrade. Then you have the mini games within the games. Where certain building have mini games like a full blown working stock market where you invest cookies for long term returns. Or the wizard towers that can cast cookie spells, but they might backfire and fuck you up for a little while.
The you prestige and buy a galaxy worth of upgrades that do so many things to help you out it's impossible to count.
Cookie Clicker is one of the originaters of these idle/clicker games and it's no surprise that it is one of the best examples of what these games can really offer. What's even better is that the game is free and has no microtransactions to "help" progress. It is what it is and the developer makes money on people from Patreon. Though you can also buy the game from steam for like $4, but only if you don't want to play it in a browser and prefer and independant client.
Idle games otherwise known by clicker games have an interesting reputation amonst gamers. Some dismiss them out right as game and feel like they aren't worth even a glance. Others get heavily invested into them (like me), while others might be interested but the reputation gained from the first group keeps them away. So with that I want to talk about a few idle games that I think are worthy of a look even if you just casually checked them out.
So first off, what is an Idle Game? Well as the name suggest it's a game that basically plays itself and grants the user progress even while that user is not directly interaction with the game, they progress idly. But the reason why they are also sometimes called Clicker games is in the fact that in order to get your idle production started, you have to click stuff, often a lot of stuff, before the game will take over for you. Generally all these games follow a theme of upgrades that increase the rate of your progress, buildings or employees or some sort of buildable unit that automates various levels of production, and finally a prestige mechanic which is typically a big reset button that drops your progress back to zero but grants you some boon of power that makes progressing further and faster much much easier.
Those are the foundations in which these games are typically based on. Now onto the games, starting with the most famous clicker game and arguably the clicker that started it all.
COOKIE CLICKER -
The game starts with a screen and a big cookie. At the top you see the number of cookies you can and how many cookies you gain per second, these begin at zero. So what do you do? Clicker the cookir of course. Clicking the cookie grants you a cookie to your cookie bank. Click again, get another cookie now you have two, and now another column of things is siloutted on the right side of the screen. The first shadow has the number 15 next to it. Ok so you click the cookie 13 more times and now that shadow lights up. It's a finger, you click it to buy the finger. Now a little finger floats next to the cookie and you counter now says you are making 0.1 cookies per second or CPS. A new item is blacked out under the finger, but it's 100 cookies, and you can buy more fingers the next one is only 21 cookies now, so you save up and buy another finger now you are getting 0.2 CPS and a new bar is available at the top of the screen. Upgrades, the first will double the power of your fingers AND your personal click.
It's a very simple concept, click the cookie, use cookies to buy buildings and upgrades to make more cookies. It's a video game equivalance of when you used to spam 1+1 on the calculators at school to see how high you could get the number before the teacher called on you or class ended. Basically it boils down to making the big number get bigger.
The thing is though, what starts as a very simple premise quickly evolves into a much more complex system. Between judging on whether to buy another building you already own, or save for the next more powerful building, or maybe an upgrade. Then you have the mini games within the games. Where certain building have mini games like a full blown working stock market where you invest cookies for long term returns. Or the wizard towers that can cast cookie spells, but they might backfire and fuck you up for a little while.
The you prestige and buy a galaxy worth of upgrades that do so many things to help you out it's impossible to count.
Cookie Clicker is one of the originaters of these idle/clicker games and it's no surprise that it is one of the best examples of what these games can really offer. What's even better is that the game is free and has no microtransactions to "help" progress. It is what it is and the developer makes money on people from Patreon. Though you can also buy the game from steam for like $4, but only if you don't want to play it in a browser and prefer and independant client.