Pixel People – Itty Bitty Fun

Edit on Feb 4th: Do you spend time looking for the correct genetic material at the Arrival Center because you habitually forget what category it’s under? Do you want to easily find job titles and their combinations? Well, I might have something for you~! I’m currently putting together a spreadsheet of recipes for the jobs here: https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/lv?key=0ApJcOk7MQHDMdHVmS09kMXJQTjVoemNTQlJGR2RMS3c&rm=full#gid=0

Edit on Feb 5th: Wrote up a really small FAQ that address some common questions: https://koukoupuffs.net/2013/02/05/pixel-people-faq/

Since I’m lazy to write up something new, here’s a little post I did over at AdeptGamer last night:

http://www.chillingo.com/games/pixel-people/ (There’s a link on the page that’ll bring you to your country’s App Store.)

Kind of surprised no one’s posted about this yet. I came across while randomly checking TouchArcade and started playing about an hour ago. It’s a superbly adorable freemium title that feels like a cross between Tiny Tower, Kairosoft-building-sims, and Doodle God; you need to provide residences for your pixel people to live in and each work site has about 3 – 4 jobs to fill. There’s a bit of city building but nothing like needing combos and such. In fact, I’m not all that sure things like placement and roads really matter. ^^ Finally, the citizens in this game are clones that start off with no skills whatsoever. You begin with 2 people that already have skills/jobs though. Simply mix them together to produce a new one~! The clone, armed with a brand spankin’ new profession, may unlock new buildings which will generate income. 😀

Lookit all them adorable pixel people!

I spent some time at the TA forum thread for the game as research to see if any nickel and diming occurs but after about 10 pages, no one seems to have brought up anything much about needing in-app purchases. However, there’s mention that new residences and/or buildings or expansions end up being quite expensive later on.

So far, from my brief experience with PP, coins are generated at a fair pace albeit in small denominations. I take it it’ll start adding up once I get more business and services up. I haven’t felt the need to use the premium currency, Utopium, since everything can be built within minutes. I’m certain, as the city expands, the ETA for construction to be completed will end up as several hours. I’m just hoping that this doesn’t happen very quickly like in Tiny Tower.

….. Sim City???

Regarding the generation of money, there’s a wee bit of maintenance required on the player’s part. It’s somewhat akin to restocking in Tiny Tower but it doesn’t seem to cost anything. A little lightning bolt icon will appear above a building which indicates that production has stopped. Simply tap on it and money will start churning out again. The frequency of performing this action seems kind of high at the moment but I wonder if it has anything to do with the fact that none of my business and services are fully manned?

Edit: Herp derp. Each building has something called “Working Time” which indicates how long they can run for until the next recharge.

I have to say that it’s HARD to put this game down since it’s so fun trying to find new recipes to create new jobs. ^^ I honestly don’t care about the other parts of the game. XD

Edit #2: Feeling a bit of the wait time after every expansion since I have to wait for funds to build up again. It’s way too easy to max out the land limit. Currently have my land limit up to 60. ^^

There’s quite a bit of stuff to unlock in this game. @_@; For example, there’s a Nursery which lets you plant trees. Trees give you coins but only if you happen to catch the little symbol that pops up above them. There’s also the Farm which lets you plant fields + build stuff which reduces construction time and grants some other bonuses.

And there’s this too~

I did but once you get enough Utopium and coins, the game becomes even MORE fun because you no longer have to put it down and wait for funds to replenish or buildings to be constructed. It’s like, SUDDENLY, it’s an ACTUAL GAME, not some real game wannabe which is what most pay-or-wait types are. [This was in response to a comment about how I got annoyed with the wait times and IAP model of the game shortly after the write-up above.]

Anyway, there’s SO much more LambdaMu Games (the developer) can do with this title. For example:

• all marine-type animals should be able to make use of the waterways or any bodies of water instead of swimming around on grass and land.
• add criminals (clones gone bad!) and stuff that can hide in the trees, behind buildings etc. Finding them will get you a reward. I suppose this could also be a part of a quest system. I bet they’ll add a quest system eventually too.
• recipes should be COLOUR-CODED for derps with severely short-term memory like me. I swear, I usually consult the menu with the list of all the jobs found, find the job I need to create, recite the hell out of the recipe while looking for the two primary jobs required in the cloning facility (forgot what it’s called) but end up having a hell of a time trying to FIND either one or both. Some are common sense like a Police Officer will fall under the Law category but for some reason, there are ones that I can never recall what they’re under like the fucking Botanist. 9__9 Edit: Okay, so the background colour of the characters are a clue and if you understand colour theory, you can probably figure out the combinations without too much trouble but still, it’d be easier if the job titles were coloured under the glossary and when you pay the 5u to unveil the hint of a vacant position.
• similar to the previous point, if you’ve already created a job in the past and need to re-create it to fill up some spots in a business or service, any jobs already discovered should show up when you’re doing the mix and match experimentations in the cloning facility. That way, users don’t need to keep referring back to the glossary of jobs. (Of course, this could be another short-term memory issue. XD)
• landscape orientation. Maybe I can’t find it or it can be unlocked with some building.
• same-sex couples. :3 It’s something I noticed very early during gameplay that every pair in a residence is male x female … which is kind of strange considering there are no babies to be produced (as far as I know). All the hearts do is cause coins, Utopium, or animals to appear anyway.
• an overview toggle that’ll let players see the quantities of outstanding jobs at buildings. I know it’s obvious with the little coin denominations popping up over them (where green ones = fully outfitted and white = some spots still need to be filled) but it’s something nice to have, I think~!
• reduction in expansion prices. Yeah, right. Like this will happen. The publisher and developer wants $$$ from players.

There are probably more but I’ll stop here. :3

Now here are some thoughts that are original for this blog. :E

I kind of wish Pixel People actually had some special bonuses for logically placing certain facilities in close proximity to others such as a Fire Station near a home/residential area. Maybe something like this could have a radius bonus such as constructing residences within x-amount of squares will grant you a price reduction of sorts. This will be on top of the passive bonuses already given by the decorations around the map. Coding something like this into the game will make things even more fun. *___*

Edit: It would also be nice if we could just hold and drag roadways or waterways when building them instead of touching each individual square.

Edit #2: There should be a faster way to get animals. I thought the Animal Shelter would affect the rate at which new animals are shipped in but all it does it show the numbers of animals rescued. It would be cool if the little people around the map would suddenly come across new animals (although I suppose that wouldn’t make too much sense given how they’re “delivered”).

Oh yeah! There should be travel animations of the little people going to work and such. I wonder if including these would destroy older devices though (in terms of memory usage)? ^^

Now, if you came here looking for guide information for jobs and/or buildings, check out Pocket Gamer’s spiffy post. But you know, discovering unlocks yourself is part of the fun. :3

I spammed some screenshots on Twitter and Instagram (http://web.stagram.com/n/koukoupuffs) yesterday and today so here they are. 😀 Each image has a caption. Click on the image to see~ (Yes, my city planning is terrible but since there’s no consequence to NOT building roadways, I don’t build them much or in a logical manner. 😛 It seems like all roads are good for are the achievements.)

I think these happen randomly. Got 3 of these events so far. Edit: Actually, I read that these occur after fulfilling special conditions like expanding land the land limit and unlocking more jobs. No one seems to have a concrete answer though. For certain, the Mutant unlocks once you get 149 jobs.

I love how Indiana Jones is pretty much THE blueprint for explorer or adventurer designs in many games. 😛 Parody, ahoy~~~!

I wonder if there’s an alpaca too? :3

You tend to get a lot of them through the Heart system.

It’s so cute!

Not entirely sure why they’re on land …… hanging around trees.

Suspiciously Mario-like~!

A greengrocer can work at a Ninja HQ too? ^^ (Ninja HQ seems so out of place. ^^;;;;;;;;;;)

I’m not sure why they limited couples to male x female. I mean, the love/Heart thing produces either animals, Utopium, or coins so it has nothing to do with making babies. 😛

There’s a giant hole there since I moved some residences to the south.

Kind of curious why the game doesn’t have landscape mode. Or maybe it does but it’s unlocked via a certain building?

Even with a 44.5% discount, getting to level 11 can mean many, many hours of waiting. Of course, you can exchange Utopium for coins or use Utopium to expand if you have a Law Firm. But chances are, unless you go the in-app purchase route, waiting for enought U or coins can take a while.