The Big Cookie debate

BFVG is in disarray. A huge divide has been created. And what’s at the centre of this disagreement? The simple act of clicking a computerised image of a cookie.

The delicious crunchy chocolatey center of this debate

Before we start with the main crux of this debate I want to make my opinions public. I LIKE playing this game and I see nothing wrong with it WHATSOEVER. If you believe there are any biased opinions or false claims, please shout your complaint to the sky as I do not care.

The Story (details of this story may have been altered for comedic effect)

This story begins on a very late Saturday night after a couple of losing games of LOL online, three Best Friends were aimlessly meandering through the haze of the internet trying to understand why the cat wanted the cheezburger. After a few minutes of finding nothing but women with cups and socially awkward penguins, Kingofallcosmos remembers earlier in the day about a concept of online cookie production.

“Hey guys! Have you heard of this cookie clicking game?” Kingofallcosmos pipes up to his online friends, Arjybarjy, Fingers333 and Yoglaiiiii. “No, what’s it about? Nothing faff related I hope?” Replied the online buddies, concerned that it might be another web-link to Gurdeeps public obsession. “No Dudes, it’s awesome! Try it!” He replies as he pings the link over the skype chat box.

As soon as this link is transferred between the friends online, Hairwire (the mean girlfriend of the cosmos King) overheard the conversation and tries to dispel the notion that this cookie clicker game is enjoyable. “Don’t play it, its shit!” scowled the old lady as she readied herself for bed. Already dismissing the cookie clicker game as nothing more than just “browser game tosh”. She would go to bed unaware of the games moral resonance and deeper meaning of more than just clicking the image of a cookie.

As the next day went into full swing and more of the members knew about this amazing life changing event, the battle lines were drawn. There are three groups in this fight now, the great defenders of the cookie clicker race game, the underclass of cookie deniers and Laurie (SeaKing61).

The Game

All hail the cookie creators!

The game is simple but contains a lot of detail (Here is a wiki for more in-depth detail). Click on the cookie to produce a cookie. After a certain amount of cookies are produced you are then able to purchase items (using your currently baked cookies) described as “buildings” which will automatically produce cookies for you. These will increase your rate of cookie production, measured in ‘cookies per second’ or cps for short. The most interesting production “building” however is the grandma. The grandmas give the game a story which progresses throughout the whole game.

Then there are the upgrades. Upgrades are another purchase you could make using your delicious discs which helps:

• Your cookie “buildings” become more efficient
• Add more cookies to your current stock
• Add cps increasing kittens (YES! That’s right KITTENS! Who could hate a game that gives you kittens?!! That helps you create more cookies!!!) . This is based on how many achievements you have (Described and illustrated as milk!! Yep, kittens and milk. What’s not to like people?!!).

The tactical edge to this game is simple but tough. Do you keep buying the smaller production “buildings” which are initially cheap but produce smaller amounts of cps? Or do you wait; keep creating cookies, so you can buy the more expensive but more prolific cookie producing “buildings”? OR do you wait even longer?! So you can buy an item upgrade and increase the efficiency of your current “buildings”?! (See! More important than life or death!). ANOTHER added extra (Yes this game still has more!) Are the randomly appearing golden cookies, which could either give you an extra amount of cookies, cookie frenzy, which multiplies your cps for a short period, or the rare chain cookie event. (Note: Beware of the Red Cookie!)

The general end game involves the grandmas. I don’t want to spoil it too much but as you progress and upgrade the old memaws they create some unintended consequences. As of this moment I am yet to complete the game but I believe things are nearing their course. (Although today they have updated the game to version 1.034 which now includes 3 more achievements. FFFUUUUUUUUUU!!)

The Debate

The reason for this article is I have never seen such instant revulsion and love for this game before (I do class this as a game as I believe there are games out there with far less depth and game play. E.G. Mc pixel (Mc Pixel is a great game however, not much depth and gameplay is there?). Over the last few days I have had great conversations about this game with various BFVG members, talking about what upgrade stage they are at, what their current cps rate is, finding out what tactic they used and how it is faring for them. But at the same time I have heard some instant hate for this game just from showing and explaining the game to them. This game has caused more debate between the BFVG members than any other topic.

The game also has little nuances which are really cool. The news statuses describing the effects of your cookie production are funny (I never knew that cookies could cure arthritis in penguins!), the ever changing background, the golden cookie frenzy, the changing faces of the grandmas, EVERYTHING!

The tactics, though simple, give the player a lot to think about whether it comes to either purchasing the next upgrade or buying the item building instead, that will help increase your cps. Also the aims of the game are not fully clear. This allows the users to create their own goals for the game. The cookie clickers of BFVG, including myself, have tended to concentrate on increasing their cps but you could quite easily plan to create the most cookies possible or concentrate on making milk (The last part of that sentence does sounds weird until you have played the game).

Also the game is not completely all consuming. You can quite happily run the game in the background while focusing on other tasks. (E.G. the less important chores like work, eating or cleaning)

Naysayers will call this game stupid, silly or even pointless. But if that’s so, isn’t the Saints Row series silly and stupid (dildo bat? apoca-fist? septic avenger activity?). You could say buying a League of Legends champion skin is pointless or Tetris has no story and ending? Yes, this game only has one action the player can use, yes this game eventually plays itself for you but the satisfaction of being able to buy your first portal is worth it. Being able to achieve an output of over 1,000,000 cookies per second is worth it. And yes dipping the cookie into the milk is worth it!!! People may spend time making something of themselves. But why bother when you can make cookies!! The BFVG members who say no to the cookie all have one thing in common, THEY HAVE NEVER PLAYED THE GAME! I say to them take the Lipton ice tea approach, “Don’t knock it until you’ve tried it!”