REVIEW: Domino Master (Xbox 360)

Scribbled on October 11th, 2008 by casualgamerchick
Filed in Casual Gaming, Microsoft Xbox 360, Reviews, Xbox Live Arcade

Domino Master is a great Domino game available from Xbox Live Arcade. The player has a choice to play against up to three other computer players or against human players on Xbox Live. There are five different types of domino games to choose from.

The different types of domino games are Straight, All 5s, Mexican Train, All 3s and Bergen. Each game is played differently and has different rules. The closest games are the All 5s and All 3s. Each of those games give the player points when the ends of the dominos add up to a multiple of 5 or 3 respectively. The game will keep track of the board score, but you will need to do a little math on your own by knowing if the domino you are about to play will get you to a multiple of 5 or 3 depending on which game you are playing. Players can still play a domino without having the domino be a multiple, but they get points by playing multiples. The round ends when one of the players have played all of their dominoes. The first player to reach the allotted points wins the game.

The Straight mode is just straight dominoes. Players play the dominoes they have in their hands and the first person to use all their dominoes wins that round. The remaining dominoes in your opponents hand are added up and then added to the winners score. Players can control the number of points that ends the game, but they can not play lower than 100. The points score does not go lower than 100. The game continues on until someone hits 100, or the score configured, and wins.

The Mexican Train game is very different way of playing dominoes. There are four players and each player has their own train track to build up and only that player can add to their train track, unless they have to pass on their turn and then their track opens up to the public. There is a fifth track known as the Mexican Train and any player can play on that track. The first person to play all of their dominoes wins the round and accrues no points. Everyone else gets the amount of points equal to the dominoes left in their hands. The dominoes are added together. The person with the lowest score wins, much like the card game Hearts.

The last type of game is Bergen and players get points by matching the ends of the dominoes on the board. In other words, each ending domino piece on the board needs to match to score a point. Again, players can play dominoes that don’t match a number on the board, but they don’t get points for the play. The first person to play all of their dominoes wins the round. The first person to reach the allotted points, configured on the begining game screen, wins the game.

The game play in Domino Master seems simple at first, but it is not that simple. The game will tell you which dominoes in your hand can be played and where they can be played, but if you blindly play what the computer tells you, you may not win. There are times when there are multiple dominoes that can be played and if you just take the first one and don’t plan ahead you may end up trapping yourself with no moves and having to draw from the domino pile.

There are three different AI settings to challenge players, beginner, master and guru. The beginner setting is still challenging and you don’t always beat the computer. The master level beat me most of the time and the guru level takes some strategizing to beat.

The graphics in the game are simple, but fit an Xbox Live Arcade game. The avatar picture is used as your player’s icon in the game. The dominoes themselves are clear graphics and easily readable. The Mexican Train board is the brightest and most colorful board. The other boards just have a colored background.

Over all, Domino Master is really fun to play and offers enough game play for any domino fanatic. Even the begining domino player will still find the game fun because of the begining modes where the computer takes it easy on you. If the computer opponents get boring, you can move on and challenge real, live, thinking humans on Xbox Live. Head over to Xbox Live on the Xbox 360 and try out Domino Master. Players can download the full version of the game for 800 Microsoft Points.

(Note: You can purchase the original PC game here. Review originally posted at CGC.)

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