Inside Social Games

With the recent boom in virtual aquarium games, now’s a good chance to share some cheats, tips and tricks. The focus today is on one of the more realistically designed ones, Fish World from Tall Tree Games. In our endeavors to further create the most beautifully designed aquarium, we actually discovered a few dirty tricks that might just help you get a step ahead of your friends.

Trick #1: The Black Market Thief – Stealing Fish

Okay, so it has nothing to do with the black market, but it sounds cooler, no? As many players of Fish World are aware, players were recently allowed to steal fish from their friends’ aquariums. First off, shame on you! They work hard for their fishes! Okay, maybe not. Anyway, every 12 hours, you are capable of stealing any one fish from another aquarium (unless they have what is called, a “guardian crustacean” to protect them). The victim then has four hours to claim it back, before it can be sold.

Here’s the catch though, you cannot sell your stolen fish except in bulk (four or more). Obviously, this makes disposing of the evidence a little time consuming, and if you don’t have that bulk, there is extra time in which they can be taken back. Luckily, we accidentally discovered that once that four hour grace period is up, you can actually sell the fish individually, making for a quick profit. Ethical… no, but raising fish is serious business.

Trick #2: The Fish Farmer – Faster Leveling

This one might seem obvious after the fact, but evidently many people don’t realize it right away. When players start up the game, they generally focus on making their tank look great. Of course they do. It’s the point of the game. However, this includes more than just decoration, but nice looking fish as well. The thing is that nicer looking fish take longer to grow. Here’s the deal: In order to get better, more profitable fish as well as better decorations and gifts, one has to be a higher level, and to gain experience, players must clean their tanks, drop treats in friends’ tanks, and of course, sell their own fish.

In order to not go bankrupt, you want to wait until a fish is fully mature (as it is worth more than when you bought the egg). As such, it is best to purchase fish such as the Green Snapper (10 coins) or the Clown Fish (20 coins) that mature in four hours and 24 hours respectively. This will allow you to pack your tank(s) full of more fish and level up faster. Take care though, as too many fish will significantly slow down most computers.

As a side note: Investing into extra tanks of your own to clean helps raise level faster too (as well as gold).

Trick $3: The Chronic Cleaner – “Infinite” Money

If you need a little extra coin, you actually don’t have to wait hours to sell more fish, clean your tank, or express love to your fish (that was a little creepy to say). In Fish World, players are able to visit other friends’ aquariums and clean up all the algae that has built up. Each patch of algae that is cleaned is worth one coin. Not a lot in small numbers, but a completely neglected tank is worth 10.

Rather than simply saying, “invite more friends,” it is better to invite at least one that doesn’t really play. Actually, they don’t have to do anything more than create their tank. They don’t have to even put anything in it (frankly, this is better because it loads quicker). After a few hours, the tank will have reached that dirtied value of 10 coins. Clean it. Now, click on that tank again from the friends ranking at the bottom of the screen. It will reload, and look: It’s dirty again. It will remain that dirty until the owner comes and cleans it themselves, thus making for a great way to earn some extra coin (assuming you have some patience).

These are only a few of the possible tricks and tips that probably exist within Fish World. Likely, there are many more that we haven’t discovered yet, and as a game becomes more popular, you can bet that the number of new tricks will surface as well. That said, however, many “tricks” may not be intended by the developers and are merely an oversight in design. Nonetheless, it is not technically cheating as it does not use any specific game mechanics in a way they were unintended. “Sell Fish” sells a selected fish, selling fish earns experiences regardless of type, level, or quantity, and visiting a friend’s tank and cleaning it is still visiting a friend and cleaning it… it just doesn’t stay clean. That said, these are still little tricks that may not stay around forever and could very well be “fixed” in the future, so make use of them while you can.

Zynga’s FarmVille has over 67.8 million monthly active users. So we decided to look into what works for all the country tycoons out there. Keep in mind, however, that this is an online game and everything is subject to change, but thus far, the following tips and tricks have proven most useful.

Tip #1 – Knowing What To Buy

Frankly, what you purchase is of crucial importance. Remember, that you do not have a lot of real estate on your farm, so it is wise to think conservatively in regards to what you place where. Granted, you do need decorations for certain Ribbons (achievements), but you can just as easily get them using smaller items such as rest tents or bales of hay. That said, however, these don’t make much money, so it may be wiser to use the space for items that can bring you income.

Discovered on myfivebest.com, here is a very useful break down of what trees and animals to buy. Now, trees don’t make you much money, but they provide steady income (as you only buy once and they produce indefinitely). Ideally, you want to only keep what produces over one coin an hour (though 0.5 coins per hour is okay). The Top 5 trees and animals are listed below:

Top Five Earning Trees Per Hour:
- Acai: 2.29 coins/hour
- Olive: 1.67 coins/hour
- Date: 0.95 coins/hour
- Pomegranate: 0.90 coins/hour
- Banana: 0.78 coins/hour

Top Five Earning Animals Per Hour:
- Horse: 1.17 coins/hour
- Goat: 1.13 coins/hour
- Duck: 0.94 coins/hour
- Sheep (Black): 0.78 coins/hour
- Pig: 0.63 coins/hour

Overall, these are the items to stick with, though the animals should only be kept to the horse and goat. The only exception to either of these lists is the Cherry Tree and Chicken. The former helps a great deal getting the Ribbon(s) “Knock on Wood” and the latter is extremely small, produces fast, and helps to get the “Zoologist” Ribbon(s).

Tip #2 – Top Crops
Now, the aforementioned items were generally passive. However, crops are the backbone of earning and experience gain in FarmVille. We looked around some more and found a website called The Modern Hippy Male. Disregarding the curious name, we did find a useful and recent break down of the best crops to buy for income and for experience. Here are the Top 5 for each:

Top 5 Income Earning Crops:
- Peas (23hr Harvest): Cost – 190 Coins ~ Sale – 381 Coins
- Asparagus (16hr Harvest): Cost – 220 Coins ~ Sale – 357 Coins
- Onion (12hr Harvest): Cost – 170 Coins ~ Sale – 275 Coins
- Grapes (24hr Harvest): Cost – 85 Coins ~ Sale – 270 Coins
- Sugar Cane (8hr Harvest): Cost – 165 Coins ~ Sale – 239 Coins

Top 5 Experience Gaining Crops:
- Black Berries, Blueberries, Strawberries, Raspberries
- Aloe Vera, Ghost Chili
- Pumpkin, Tomatoes, Sugar Cane
- Cranberries, Green Tea, Acorn Squash
- Asparagus

Trick #1 – Quick Leveling

Okay, so here’s another trick to help you. Be forewarned, it is expensive, but it will get you leveled quicker if you have the money. This one was found on Gameolosophy.com and did prove rather useful while funds lasted. Start by plowing 10 plots of land and planting them all with soybeans. Then… just delete them all and repeat. It costs 300 coins but earns three experience per plot. Expensive, yes, but very quick in the leveling department. Of course, you don’t have to use 10 plots either, any number will work; ten is just a nice round number.

Trick #2 – Super Gifts

Here’s an interesting one that seems to still be working. Evidently, it is possible to send multiple gifts to the same person in the same day. Using the Firefox browser, go to the “Free Gifts” tab. Then right-click and open “Free Gifts” in a new tab (we tried it with 10 total tabs). Select a gift in each tab, select a person to send them too, then when you have the “Send” prompt on every page, quickly cycle through and send them. If done correctly, they will receive them all, and guess what, they can sell them for coin, and if they send gifts back, so can you. Please note, however, that this may not always work and you will sometimes get errors. It also tends to work better during non-primetime hours.

Again, all of this is subject to change, but if you have any useful tips or tricks, by all means, let us know.

The game of the day comes from Apple themselves with their popular iPhone card game: Texas Hold’Em. Costing around $5 in the app store, this poker game is well worth the money as it not only sticks with the official rules but is also rather easy for anyone learn. Okay, so maybe you won’t become a master overnight, but in time you will be betting with the best of them.

For those that have played the game, they can probably attest to the sometimes brutal nature of the opponents. Rare is the tell that gives away their hands. Nonetheless, there is still hope.

When you can’t win straight up, it’s time to cheat, and in order to do so, you will need to select “New Player” from the “Options” menu. To input each code, you will have to use the letter selection tool to input each cheat as the player name, and once entered, the iPhone or iPod Touch will jump to the checkmark character (be sure to hold Center until the code activates).

With the logistics out of the way, it’s time to get down to business: Start by entering in the code “YOUCHEAT” to open a menu with options to all tournaments, start you with $100,000 in cash, show tells and/or down cards, and even let you adjust the AI to fold normally, often, or never.

Of course, not everyone might need this cheat, but even if you can play cards, do you know how to play them in style? Enter in any of the following codes and prepare to take a trip as you play your hand in some rather… curious locals:

• BIGROCKS: Stonehenge Tournament
• THREEAMI: Apple Conference Room Tournament.
• PLAYDOGS: Dog Tournament (yes, you play against dogs)
• SPACEACE: Futuristic Tournament (apparently aliens play too)
• BARTUNES: iTunes Bar Tournament
• ALLCHAR: See Secret Characters

That’s all there is for now, but as always, if more are found, more will be posted. Just remember to go big or go home. Good luck.

A while back we reviewd a new iPhone game by the name of Aurora Feint: The Arena. This puzzle game can be a bit difficult at times, so we did some digging around the web and found some tips and solutions for many the Tower puzzles. There’s a lot to cover in this guide, so let’s get too it!

Wind 1 – Eastern Breeze: 1 Move
- Swap the middle fire and wind marbles.

Wind 2 – Western Breeze: 3 Moves
- Tilt right.
- Swap the top row water and shadow marbles.
- Tilt left.

Wind 3 – Southern Breeze: 4 Moves
- Swap the bottom row’s earth and fire.
- Swap the bottom row’s earth and water.
- Swap the bottom row’s earth and wind.
- Move the right earth over to the other two.

Wind 4 – Northern Breeze: 2 Moves
- Move the top wind marble left.
- Move the water marble right.

Water 1 – Summer Rain: 1 Move
- Swap the middle fire and water marbles.

Water 2 – Winter Rain: 2 Moves
- Tilt right.
- Swap the middle fire and water marbles.

Water 3 – Spring Rain: 2 Moves
- Move the bottom left water marble one to the left.
- Swap the two top earth and wind marbles.

Water 4 – Fall Rain: 2 Moves
- Move the top water tile over to the right by two fields.

Earth 1 – Natural Growth: 1 Move
- Move the top shadow marble one field to the left.

Earth 2 – Sand Storm: 2 Moves
- Swap the bottom row earth and fire marbles.
- Move the remaining top wind marble to the right.

Earth 3 – Majestic Mountain: 2 Moves
- Tilt right.
- Swap the bottom earth and fire marbles.

Earth 4 – Rolling Hills: 4 Moves
- Swap the top middle earth and fire marbles.
- Tilt right.
- Tilt left.
- Swap the remaining earth and fire marbles.

Shadow 1 – Moon Shadow: 3 Moves
- Tilt right.
- Swap the wind and shadow marbles.
- Swap the fire and water marbles.

Shadow 2 – Shooting Star: 1 Move
- Swap the middle water and fire marble.

Shadow 3 – Black Nothingness: 3 Moves
- Move the bottom water marble left.
- Move the bottom earth marble left.
- Move the top fire marble right.

Shadow 4 – Silver Moon: 4 Moves
- Tilt up.
- Tilt left.
- Swap the middle water and shadow tiles.
- Move the remaining top water tile to the right.

Fire 1 – Wild Fire: 2 Moves
- Swap the first, left water with the fire tile.
- Swap the second, left water with the fire tile.

Fire 2 – Volcanic Ash: 4 Moves
- Tilt left.
- “Drop” the two fire marbles on the bottom one.
- Tilt right.

Fire 3 – Scorching Flame: 3 Moves
- Move the left-most water tile one field to the right.
- Swap the leftmost earth tile with the water tile next to it.
- Tilt right.

Fire 4 – Original Molten Lava: 2 Moves
- Tilt up.
- Tilt right.

[via Pixelcoma]

Last month we took a look at the new iPhone rendition of the classic sandbox game, SimCity. Complete in its original form, the game is no mere shell of its former glory. Everything you know and remember is still there, but as was found out, very few of the original cheat codes still worked.

The last time the topic of SimCity was touched upon, there were two known cheats. If players shook the iPhone they would be prompted with an input prompt for said codes, and could enter the classic codes of “i am weak” and “pay tribute to your king.” Upon completion, players could enjoy construction costs at the bargain of $0 and access to all extra rewards, respectively.

Well, time has passed and thanks to a find on a little website called GameWinners, two new codes were discovered:

• Having some trouble with excess garbage in your city? No worries, because if you enter the code, “garbage in, garbage out”, you should be fixing that issue right away as you are granted the recycling plant, waste to energy incinerator, and the normal incinerator. Yum, burning garbage.
• Not enough you say? How about some clean high tech industries? Just put in the cheat, “nerdz rule” and the neat freaks will be built in your industrial zone.

Unfortunately, that’s all that’s new this time around, but we’ll keep looking. Of course, if anyone has found any new ones, then by all means share them.

Gamers are always looking for a challenge, and while some developers look to incorporate this directly into game play, it isn’t always enough. When a player gets their hands on a good game, they feel a sense of both accomplishment and sorrow when it is finished. It was so good, and yet it is over.

Many titles give users “achievements” or trophies as they level up or accomplish challenges in games. Large social game developer Playfish has made extensive use of achievements in their Facebook games. Some are coveted, some are funny, and some are just plain fun. So here, we present our Top 10 Playfish game achievements on Facebook.

10.) Lucky Star – Pet Society
Granted, it’s not an “achievement,” it’s a trophy, but the concept is the same. In Pet Society, there is a stadium in which you can place bets, and this guy is a pretty tough one to get (depending on your level of patience). The objective here is to bet on the winning pet 300 times. If only you could get some insider information….

9.) Need A Towel? – Minigolf Party
Okay, okay, this isn’t really an achievement in the literal definition of the world, but it is one in game. This one gets placed here because it is just funny… Obviously there are water hazards in golf, so this achievement should be relatively self-explanatory, but in essence it is an achievement based on how much you suck. All you have to do is hit the water hazards five times and the game grants you this nice little reward to commemorate your terribleness.

8.) Clown – Bowling Buddies
Apparently a popular goal for some people, and yet another one for the comical category. This award is for the truly bad (or intentionally bad) and involves not scoring a single point for an entire game of bowling. That’s right, all gutter balls is what you need. Though you probably won’t need help, here’s a video that demonstrates it (warning: it is rather dull).

7.) Mr. Right – Who Has The Biggest Brain?
You have to be good, and you have to be smart to be “Mr. Right.” As you may know, WHTBB is a quiz game that tests different parts of the brain on math, pattern recognition, etc. Well, in order to snag trophy, you have to be a pretty good test taker because it requires not only 2600 points, but you can’t get a single answer wrong. No pressure.

5.) Jet Jumper – Pet Society
Not a difficult achievement in the eyes of veterans, but for those new players this can be a bit tough until you get the hang of it. The objective is win the hurdles race 250 times at the stadium. Of course, once you get your mojo going, it’s more of a matter of patience before you get that shiny new trophy.

5.) Quick & Correct – Geo Challenge
Yeah, that’s not the name of the trophy, because well… it doesn’t seem to have a name, but it is a difficult one to say the least. Of all the trophies that players can earn in this glorified geography bee, this is certainly one to be proud of, because in order to attain it you must not only answer every question correctly, but quickly as well (meaning in a second or so). While this may not seem like a challenge to the veteran players, to the rest of the masses it is no easy task.

4.) Scoring 10,000… Correctly – Geo Challenge
No, it’s not just a matter of getting 10,000 points. Rather, it’s a matter of doing it without a single mistake. Until you become a big time expert at this game, it is very easy to get a little twitchy and misclick, which is what makes this puppy a nice accomplishment.

3.) Treasure Hunter – Minigolf Party
While you can find videos all over the web, this was actually a pretty tough achievement to earn when the game first came out. In order to win it, one had to somehow figure out where in all the game’s golf courses this hidden treasure was hiding. Then once you pulled that off, you had to figure out how to actually get it. However, if you haven’t yet, here is some help.

2.) Perfection – Bowling Buddies
It’s just what it sounds like: Achieve a perfect score or 300 in this bowling game. However, since the game’s primary control is mouse movement itself, it can be a little tough. There are some tricks though to doing it. Here’s a hint, try using the mouse wheel in Firefox, or just check out this video.

1.) Metal Detector – Minigolf Party
This is a tough one. In Minigolf Party, each hole is littered with coins, and the object of this achievement is to collect them all. However, that isn’t quite as easy as it sounds, as some are hidden, some are attainable through some dirty tricks, and still others are just flat out hard. Here are some tips though that might help you out.

It’s time for another tips session, and this time, it’s off to the mafia. Mafia Wars seems like a simple game at first glance, but once you get into it, it actually begins to become somewhat complicated with hits, different jobs, adding members, equipping all of them, and so on. What do you buy? What quests do you do? How should you level? These are all questions that are posed by new players, and it can be a bit daunting. Well, we searched high and low for ways to help you out, and hopefully these tips and tricks will help those new players that simply feel overwhelmed.

So you’ve started Mafia Wars and you’re not sure where to start, well, the first choice is easy enough: Pick a “Maniac” class. While earning more cash or health might seem appealing, energy is what allows you to do quests and it is significantly better to earn both cash and experience instead of just one. That said, it’s time to get down to business.

DO NOT add to you mafia right away. Yes, you do want a large mafia to be stronger, but if you are ill-prepared, this is going to hurt more than help. Essentially, you want to have a “Mafia Mikes” and a “Bloody Chainsaw” (please note, that the bloody chainsaw is a special item bought from the home page and will periodically change. For all intents and purposes, the special item tends to have similar stats, and is often interchangable if the chainsaw is gone) for every two members. Here’s the thing though, the game bases the amount of members you need for another one of these items based on your current members. So say you bought a chainsaw with a mafia of 12, but then added 8 people, you’ll now need 22 members to buy another one, thus losing out the extra chainsaws you could have bought at 16, 18, and 20 members. Assuming that you are now equipping properly, it is time to spend some experience points.

Ideally, you want to put all of your points into energy so you can level faster. Since quests are going to be your primary source of experience and cash (hence why you used maniac), your limiting factor is how fast your energy recharges. Furthermore, energy resets every level, so having an high energy and a fast regeneration can get you to higher levels exponentially faster. Of course, you will want other stats eventually (when that is, is completely up to you), but this will give you a nice start.

Okay, so now you’re leveling at a nice pace and you’re getting those Mafia Mikes and Bloody Chainsaws when you should. What’s next? Why, equipping your mafia of course, and this can be done either via looting or buying. In general, it is better to loot in higher missions, but if you want to be safer, just buy, and if you’ve been doing what’s been said so far, money shouldn’t be a serious issue. The recommended equipment is as follows (once you can buy them of course):

• Weapons: Bloody Chainsaws should be available to half your mafia (since you’ve been buying them every two members right?), thus the other half should utilize the Chain Guns (.50 Caliber Rifle is better once you start looting).
• Armor: Body Armor all around – period. Yes, you can buy other stuff too, but this is a definite purchase.
• Cars: Secondary to armor and weapons, but if you must have one, the Towncar comes recommended.

This should be more than enough to get you started on the right track in Mafia Wars. However, before things get wrapped up, here are some other interesting tips found around the web that should work for both the MySpace and Facebook versions of the game.

• Avoid the Hitlist as best as possible. While it might be fun at higher levels, drawing attention to yourself at lower levels is just going to get you killed over and over again by high level players. Stay under the radar as long as you can.
• If you ever attack someone and get the maximum amount of cash ($70,000), bookmark them and attack them as often as possible.
• When you do start using other stats besides energy, it is best to keep attack and defense equal.
• (MySpace Version) More Energy – Send an energy pack to a friend along with the message, then go to your MySpace page and click on the link (the image) and you will send one to yourself.
• (MySpace Version) Beat the Bank 10% – Annoying, but if you deposit $9 at a time you will beat the system.
• Best Early Cash & Experience Jobs:
  o Level 1 – 4: Auto Theft
  o Level 5 – 8: Bank Heist
  o Level 9 – 12: Museum Break In
  o Level 13 – 17: Wiretap the Cops

Best of luck, and happy gaming.

Seeing as it is a cult classic – and now part of the iPhone platform – it seemed only fitting to do a post around the recently released SimCity for iPhone. The game is virtually identical to the original, with the only major change being to the control scheme due to the obvious lack of a mouse.

That said, the game was always tough at first. Heck, even when you did get the hang of everything, you didn’t always feel like dealing with the management of a large city and all the costs that come with it. So what did most people do in this case? Why they used cheat codes of course. But the big question now is, do they still work?

Well good news to all of you SimCity fans, they do, in fact, still work. Well… some of them anyway. It’s a nifty little Easter egg in order to find them, but all you have to do is shake the iPhone and a prompt will appear saying “Enter Cheat Code.” Yup, who’d have thought that was the trick?

As it stands, there are two known cheats for the game that still work. The code, “i am weak” will allow you to build anything your heart desires with no cost, and if you enter the code, “pay tribute to your king” you will be given all of the reward buildings without having to earn them.

Some people might recognize these codes, as they were part of the early PC version of the game. Sadly, many of the other old school codes do not work anymore, including “llama,” “call cousin vinnie,” and “porntipsguzzardo.” Regardless, it is nice to have these codes at all since it is far more fun to cheat anyways.

Whether or not there are more cheats still out there is unknown, but if you discover any new ones, then by all means post your findings.

[via VentureBeat]

Okay, this week, its all about Playfish’s latest title, Minigolf Party. This stellar little game lets you play rounds of miniature golf with your friends in some rather exotic and worldly locals. As with other Playfish games, players vie for the high score – but more than that, they also strive to unlock all the achievements and trophies they can. However, this task can be a lot more daunting than one might think – but don’t worry, that’s what we’re here for.

So it seems that a number of people struggle in finding what all of the trophies actually are. Well, here is a nice neat list for you:

• Welcome Badge – First full round of golf
• Lifetime Achievement – play more than 50 games of golf
• Hole In One! – Making a hole in one shot
• Coin Collector – collect more than 100 coins
• Coins? What Coins? – Five Coins or less collected on a full course
• Metal Detector – Collect all coins in a course
• Party Hat – Par on all holes in a course
• Professional – Under par on all holes in a course
• Birds Nest – Birdies or better on all holes in a course
• Where Eagles dare – Eagle or better in one hole
• Party Player – Have 20 friends playing
• Giving Golfer – Gift more than 20 items to friends
• Challenge Champ – Win more than 20 challenges against your friends
• Need A Towel? – Hit the ball in a pond 5 times
• Treasure Hunter – Find the secret treasure chest
• Enthusiast – Play more than 10 rounds of golf in 1 hour

Okay, now that you know what to look for, it’s time to get some tips on how to get those tougher ones.

Quite possibly, the two most asked about trophies are “Metal Detector” and “Treasure Hunter.” When going for these achievements, score can be of no concern to you, because you’re definitely not getting par while searching for these. Nevertheless, the Treasure Hunter trophy can be acquired on the Egypt course. If you look closely, you should notice a small, square block to the right of the Great Pyramid that is surrounded by four, orange flowers. That is your target. Beneath it is a hole that leads to the basement of the pyramid in which the treasure is hidden.

In order to access the hole, you first have to move the block. Notice how the Sphinx has a nose? Well, the real Sphinx’s nose is actually broken, as such, you will need to correct this “oversight.” Carefully line your ball up with the left foot of the Sphinx and launch the ball into its nose. This will open up the hole to the right of the pyramid. Now all you need to do is get the ball close enough to its base so you can ramp it into the hole. It is a tricky shot, but here is a video that should help you out.

Not only will finding this treasure get you the Treasure Hunter trophy, but it will put you one step closer to getting the Metal Detector trophy. That in mind, there are still a few hidden and tough coins to get. The most common ones that are missed come from Rome and France. In France, they aren’t hidden, just a pain to get because if you make one mistake, you will have to start over. The trouble spot is the last four coins by the Eiffel Tower. No real trick here except, play very soft positioning. If you hit the ball even the slightest bit too hard, the slope will slide the ball into the hole. This takes a very steady hand and patience as you will have to do it four times. Just gently nudge the ball to each coin and you will be fine.

Rome, on the other hand, requires less subtlety. In this course, the coins are hidden, so take a wild guess where. That’s right, they are in the Colosseum. If you notice, there are two collapsed columns in the middle of the course. The shorter one, is actually a ramp. Simply position the ball near it and give it a nice whack towards the roof of the Colosseum. Assuming you hit it hard enough, it should land right in the middle, collect the hidden coins and fly out onto the pizza at the end.

That should help you out in getting those trophies unlocked for yourself, but if you want to beat those high scores, you had better learn how to get coins in all the courses without sacrificing as many swings. It all comes down to practice and patience. Think about those shots, experiment with different methods, and slowly work your way up there. Good luck, and happy golfing.

Surprisingly enough, a lot of people are playing KickMania on Facebook to put the boot to their friends. One can only hope that this desire applies strictly to the game, and not some deep seeded roots within reality. How on Earth do people kick so far? Some of these coveted kicks are well over 200, even 300 meters.

Well, there are a few secrets to share that those “ass-assins” use that might help you in your quest to own your very own collection of…we’ll stop. Anyway, you have to start with the basics, which means the more obvious tips: Start owning your friends. That’s right, in order to better kick asses, you need to own more people. Here’s the deal, the more you own, the more expensive (and more powerful) kicks become available. Assuming that you have done this already and have owned enough people to unlock the $1000 kick, then it comes down to a little bit of finesse.

The trick is timing, positioning, and explosives. First off, make sure you’ve owned 500 people so that you have access to the maximum of five explosive charges. These charges will allow you to detonate an explosion near the crash dummy as he or she reaches the ground and allows you to get some extra distance, but before that can come into play the initial kick has to be perfect.

KickMania utilizes a very well built physics engine to simulate the rag doll effect. That means that momentum, trajectory, power, and mass all come into play. With that in mind, some players say that the male dummy is the better choice because it has more mass, and more mass equals more momentum. While this isn’t written in stone, it is worth considering. Despite whether or not you choose to use a male or female dummy, you still have to be both very quick in reacting to the power meter and incredibly precise on your position. Before you do anything, try to position your foot near the dummy’s waist, just where the shirt and pants meet at a 45 degree angle. Once you’re ready, be prepared to react quickly to the power meter and attempt to kick at its highest apex for the greatest potential.

$1000 Kick: Check. Position: Check. Power: Check. Okay, so now comes the use of explosives. For $50 you can detonate a charge, but you will need a kick of at least 30 meters to even see the first one. These charges activate when you get close to them, and once near, you can press “spacebar” to set them off. This, however, is where timing is critical. Remember, that this game is a simulated physics engine, thus both angle and distance from the explosion are going to affect trajectory and momentum. If you detonate too far away, you will get little to no result. If you go too soon, you might send your target backwards. What you want to try and do is trigger the explosion at the last possible second so that it goes off before the dummy’s center of mass hits the ground and is at about a 45 degree angle to the right of the charge. Each well timed charge should get you an extra 30 – 50 meters on your total kick distance.

Markus Weischselbaum of KickMania describes it in a technical sort of way on the KickMania forums: “The direction of the boost vector is an imaginary line from the explosive charge towards the center of mass of the body….the force applied to the body is inversely proportional to the square of its distance from the explosion.”

There you have it. Before you even start going for those distance records, you’re going to have to earn all five explosives and that $1000 kick. Once you’ve done that though, it all comes down to position, power, timing, and practice. Finding that sweet spot for all three major elements of the game is pretty tough, but now that you know what to look for, it should make your endeavors a little easier to pursue. Best of luck fellow ass kickers, and remember to wear padded jeans.