Casual Friday: Update for November 28 – December 4, 2009

This week’s casual game offerings are a tad sparse. Thankfully, the new games that are available aren’t all hidden object titles. Though there are only five new casual games debuting, they represent multiple game genres.

It’s a pretty good week for Mac owners who enjoy casual games. There were two good releases, Wildhollow and Christmas Clix, which both had Mac versions available at the same time as the Windows release. Christmas Clix is extraordinarily prolific, appear on PCs, Macs, the iPhone and iPod Touch and WiiWare all at the same time.

This week’s best bets are: Wildhollow (PC, Mac) and Christmas Clix (PC, Mac, iPhone, iPod Touch and WiiWare).

Wildhollow
Genre: Adventure / Simulation
Availability: Karjasoft
Retail Price: $19.99
Platform: Windows 2000 and better, Mac 10.3 or better
Premise: You must raise and breed animals at Wildhollow Ranch so you can take quests and find out what happened to your missing parents. Gamertell reviewed it earlier this week.
Demo Available: Yes

Echoes of the Past: Royal House of Stone
Genre: Puzzle (Hidden Object)
Availability: Big Fish Games, Harmonic Flow, Amaranth Games
Retail Price: $6.99
Platform: Windows XP and Vista
Premise: You are sent back in time to the kingdom of Orion to save a prince from a curse and find the truth behind an unsolved mystery.
Demo Available: Yes

Christmas Clix
Genre: Puzzle
Availability: Munsie Games
Retail Price: $9.95
Platform: Windows, Mac, iPhone/iPod Touch and WiiWare
Premise: A Christmas themed matching game where you aid Santa and unlock 10 mini games by matching and removing items that appear on-screen.
Demo Available: Yes

Find Your Own Way Home
Genre: Puzzle (Hidden Object)
Availability: Big Fish Games, Harmonic Flow
Retail Price: $6.99
Platform: Windows XP and Vista
Premise: An REO Speedwagon themed hidden object game. Ruby’s a reporter who’s been following REO Speedwagon and writing stories about their recording sessions and tour. She’s going to be on Entertainment Now, discussing the stories before a new album release party, but learns that lead singer Kevin Cronin has disappeared. Now Ruby must find him before the Entertainment Now show and release party.
Demo Available: Yes

King’s Smith
Genre: Simulation (Time Management)
Availability: Harmonic Flow
Retail Price: $9.99
Platform: Windows 2000, XP, Vista and 7
Premise: As a medieval blacksmith, go around the kingdom forging weapons and armor in an attempt to become the best blacksmith in the land, worthy of creating things for the king and his army.
Demo Available: Yes

Editor’s Note: Due to so many casual games sites offering game plans or preferred member prices, which can cause a game to have multiple price-points, the games’ average retail prices is mentioned in Casual Friday.

Site [Big Fish Games] Site [PlayFirst] Site [GameHouse] Site [eGames] Site [Alawar Games] Site [Amazon] Site [Reflexive Arcade] Site [Harmonic Flow]