I have an absolute weakness for physics games, and while Civiballs isn't the strongest physics-based game, what it lacks in the physics department it makes up for a few times over in style and fun.
In Civiballs, you are presented with a few colored balls, and your goal is to get those balls into the same-colored urn on the level. The "civi" part of Civiballs is that there are 3 sets of levels to play, each representing a different civilization. While the civilization doesn't affect gameplay, the artwork for each level is beautifully themed to it's appropriate era.
To play the game, you are given only one tool - a sword with which to cut the chains that are holding the balls. The puzzle part of the game is in figuring out what order, and with what timing to cut each chain. Do it right, and all the right balls end up in the right urns, with no stray balls entering an urn (a no-no). Do it wrong, and you get to start over again.
Civiballs is not terribly deep on gameplay; the entire game can be completed in about 15 minutes. But if you enjoy this type of game, it will be a very enjoyable 15 minutes.
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IBM has been out of the Consumer Electronic Show for ten years, and is now about to resurface again with an insurgence of new technologies to get their buzz going again. The last show they were at was in 1997, and now they have to prove again that they are heavy hitters in the industry. For the upcoming show, IBM is said to be planning to demonstrate how its technology, components, and top level business partnerships with the likes up Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo have been used in many leading edge electronics like gaming systems and mobile devices. IBM has been doing a lot of interesting things lately to get in people's minds that they aren't old school anymore, and that they can hang with the cool kids once again. This includes a $10 million investment in technologies that can help build Second Life style virtual worlds.
