In this hectic world we live in, many times work and appointments must come before the fun and joys in our lives, including that of getting to play videogames whenever we want. Gone are the days when we could fire up a game of our choice and spend hours toiling away – now we seem to game in stolen moments here and there. With that in mind, perhaps it is no wonder that casual games have become such a popular gaming choice (especially with women who make up the vast majority of casual game players), as casual games allow us to either jump in and get those quick fixes of gaming bliss or either play them for as long as we want when we do have the time. In honor of the casual game, we'll be bringing you a new Casual Game of the Week every Monday to help you find that fix you might be needing in your life, and this week we have: The Great Tree

Whether you call them pixies or fairies, this is the story of their plight, as their Great Tree, a tree which will provide them life forever and help them transcend, is slowly dying, and with its death comes too the death of the fairies. Once upon a time a bee like creature once gathered the pollen needed to sustain the tree, and they did so gratefully and without being slaves to the fairies. However, the creatures have all but disappeared, and it’s up to the fairies themselves to step-up to the plate and take on the role of pollen gatherers, or else the Great Tree and the fairies will die together. As one of the young children tasked with gathering the pollen, will you be able to help be the savior of your people?

The story is actually quite well-done and surprising deep and involving for a casual game. The story is done through a mixture of hand drawn and very lovely pictures, and complete voiceover work detailing the Star Wars like scrolling text that details the story. Though the story isn’t as present as it is in more console oriented games, you still get a good amount of story every two worlds or so, with the story slowly getting you more and more invested and wondering what will happen next.

The purpose of each level is to gather enough pollen to fill up your meter, letting you complete the level and then move on to the next, and so on and so on. The controls are completely controlled with the mouse, as the game is centered mostly around the mouse movements themselves, with the only button being used is the left mouse button to activate exactly one power; so basically you couldn’t ask for an easier to control game. The speed at which your character travels on the screen is directly proportional to your mouse settings, so a high DPI will have you skating quickly around the levels, which can be a good thing if you adjust and know how to handle things properly, while others will find themselves zipping from one area to the next too quickly, crashing into an enemy and either losing the pollen you built up or losing some life.

As you fly about the level, your mission is to gather the pollen floating around the screen, which comes in the form of various colored sparkles of light (depending on the level the colors change). As you gather the pollen you create a ponytail chain, which when fully filled you can use to unleash a magical blast, which when let loose can destroy enemies, giving you more points, and dropping powerups too from time to time. The ponytail plays an even more important part in that if you take it to the pollen receptacle at full strength, you’ll be essentially giving more pollen than usual, helping to fill up your meter even quicker. You can still deposit pollen to the source whenever you want, but the more you get rid of at once the more your meter will fill up; fill your meter up and it’s off to the next level.

The enemies provide a nice challenge to the game, as they are never so easy that there doesn’t feel like a challenge, and yet it’s never too hard where you become frustrated with the game. The enemies mostly come in the form of various insect like creatures, ranging from small flies to bees to mosquitoes and wasps (though these creatures don’t look like your average insects, but instead fantasy based representations of them). The enemies all follow an AI pattern tailored to their creature type, so the challenge comes from realizing those patterns and being able to maneuver between them so that you don’t get hit. As we mentioned, there are powerups you can gather by destroying enemies, which come in the way of mega-pollen (ponytail chain instantly becomes full); multi-directional firing powerups; a powerup that freezes enemies for a short time; powerups that shoot lightning out and destroy all enemies on the screen; powerups to make all the pollen be instantly drawn to you; health hearts and healing shields as well.

As you gather pollen you’ll also be able to rescue the bees that used to do the job you’ve been requested to do, and after you gather enough bees you’ll earn a star, which will give you the ability to actually level up your character in a very RPG like manner. You’ll be able to make it so that your character can fly faster around the level, have increased health, be able to have a higher percentage chance to get powerups from kills, etc. As you progress you’ll also earn new wings, which will do things like give you increased stats or kill enemies that do damage to you.

The background images are beautiful, featuring simple but well done images, which feature some background animation and gameplay interaction from time to time, like a frog whose tongue will dart out and hurt you or an ant that spits on you when you get too close. The character you control and the other enemies look good too, as they are also very well animated and look nice as they float across the screen. The voiceover work is good when it comes to telling the story, but the little shouts of your character when you take damage are a bit cheesy. Though the shouts are cheesy, the rest of the sound effect work is good, and the music is very lovely and soothing as you play, putting you in a peaceful trance as you play the game.

The game probably won’t take you more than two to four hours to complete, but it’s a pleasing game for as long as it lasts, featuring easy to grasp controls, a nice story, and some good visuals and audio as well.

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