by David Dubrava

Created on: January 27, 2008   Last Updated: June 23, 2010

A chance of winning your choice of a Digital Camera, an Ipod, a Sony PSP, or a Visa $200 gift card is what suckered me in. Gamevance features 6 online games in which you are able to win a prize on a daily basis by holding the highest score in a 24 hour daily "tournament". The catch is, you have to sign up, submit a profile photo, and write a brief "about me" description on your home page. And that's the easy part. What they don't tell you, unless you read the fine print, is that in order to play the games, you have to agree to download a program that will collect and send information and purposely cause pop-ups and pop-unders. Plus, the website is illegal in some states! What?

This sent red flags off everywhere, not to mention there is a link on the home page to report cheaters. If there is a specific link just to report cheaters, it is a pretty good indication that the "games" are easily manipulated and can be "fixed". I went ahead, despite the agreement to willingly install spyware on my computer, and played each of the 6 games (The games change on a daily basis, so these may or may not be the ones you play in your experience):

Buzzy Bee - This game is on a 30 second timer and the object is to pop bubbles with your stinger. You control a bee with your arrow keys on the keyboard. No replay value, no skill, and no point in wasting your time. The graphics are horrible and there are ads all around the game that are distracting and flashing obnoxiously the whole time you play (this is true of all 6 games and doesn't need repeating).
Rating: 0/5

Spring Cannon - A knock off of a similar game called Phlinx. You control a cannon at the bottom of the screen that shoots different colored cannon balls. The object is to remove the cannon balls at the top of the screen by matching 3 or more of the same color together. The timer is set at 2 and a half minutes, but it doesn't take that long to be bored with the game. It is extremely difficult to wedge a cannon ball in between others and, unlike other games of this type, there is no "line of sight" to help you accurately see where you are going to shoot or ricochet off the wall.
Rating: 0.5/5

Spin the Wheel Game - This program couldn't have taken longer than five minutes to make. There is a wheel with different numbers displayed and a power bar that automatically moves back and forth indicating the strength of the spin when you click "Spin". You do this 3 times and the game adds up your total. That's it. No skill, no innovation,

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