XG Mobile Backgammon Reviews

Great Teaching Tool but...

HannonRL

I have the PC version and its by far the best teaching tool for backgammon out there. The iPhone version is almost as good. I would rate this five stars but it crashes. The crashes mostly occur when the app provides warnings about your move or when you ask for a hint. Usually just launching the program will bring the app right back to where you left off but sometimes you have to close it completely and then launch it again.

Fixed dice. Pathetic.

Zedd700

If you don't mind playing a game that is totally fixed to cheat then this is the game for you! The programmers clearly have no concept of "random" dice. The software generates exactly what it needs. Beyond idiotic.

Unusable

Dona keeton

Crashes constantly. About 15 times because I even got through a game. Two stars because it would be a great app if it didn't crash.

Good but unstable

Hdsfjt3479:!gffj

Good play, but crashes a lot lately. Something about memory access violations and the hint/undo functions.

Fatal flaws

bethel95

2/20/17 Update: I finally gave up, and started doing manual rolls, which addressed all of my gameplay issues (the tutorial mode is still frequently an idiot, however, and I am amazed by the number of "world class" games I lose compared to the number of "intermediate" games I win). At least now I'm actually learning how to play better, rather than being continually beaten down by "perfect" rolls and learning nothing. This pretty much proves that this game either (1) has a terrible random-number generator to produce the rolls, or (2) is deliberately programmed to give the AI better rolls at the highest playing level (which would be amazing, given that the AI claims to be able to calculate the probability of winning for every possible move) or (3) both of the above. Pretty shameful, really. Original review: This is an attractive-enough app, but it has some fatal flaws that seriously diminish the enjoyment of the gameplay. In addition to the previously-noted practice of making the higher levels more difficult simply by giving the AI better dice rolls, the AI also will demonstrate at those higher levels egregiously bad play, at times--it will make terrible moves that no moderately-experienced player would ever make. Yes, I'm usually able to take advantage of those bad moves to win games, but that's not really helping me become a better player, now is it? In tutorial mode, if you follow everyone of its move recommendations, you'll probably find that you actually lose more often than you would if you just ignored the recommendations and play a tactically-conservative game. The most annoying fault, however, is the way that the ARI will suddenly turn on automatic rolls at times, sometimes preventing you from following the moves, and even denying you the opportunity to legally double. Over the course of many hundreds of games, I have lost doubling opportunities many dozens of times, taking away the tactical advantage of possibly forcing a resignation. Despite my multiple reports of this fault to the developers, and pointing out to the developers that simply adding a settings option to disable automatic rolls would be an easy stop-gap fix, they continue to release new versions that do not correct this problem. While it is true that many of these issues could be addressed by manually rolling dice, that sort of misses the point of having a computerized backgammon game, doesn't it? All in all, this is disappointingly mediocre for a paid app that asks for a premium price.

Premuim randomness

Vedderhedd

Perhaps random dice at higher levels for the premium version? The main problem with non-random dice from a computer is that you eventually alter your tactics in order to compensate for the computer's perfect good throws, which can skew your own game and your learning of it.

Great when it works

Pfaithm

I have a iPad mini4 and the program continually shuts down.

Strong ai but crashes often on iPad Air 2

El Twister

Please fix.

So biased towards the app

Crazy south bob

Deleted this as it's damaging my normal game as I have now started playing to defend myself from the obvious bias towards the app. It will hit you off 90% of the time and gives itself tons of doubles - if you're off the board it'll take forever to get back on while it gets on almost immediately and then wipes you out straight away.

Best BG app, but...

A2Greg

Needs more stability, crashes every now and then; easy enough to start again from where it crashes by closing and opening app (remember to close by swiping up the app in the double-clicked home button view). I bought pro version a while ago and have deleted it and updated it several times since then; always easy to restore purchase.

XG Mobile Backgammon Reviews – Page 9