Doodle God Review

If you’re not familiar with the Bible, let me get you up to speed on a little chapter called Genesis. According to the good book, God created everything you see – the earth, the sky, the moon, the sun – in only 6 days. Now it’s your turn. Can you start with the building blocks of creation and create everything we know? Doodle God is a wonderfully unique little game that’s all about creating the basic elements of our world, and it’s nothing like anything we’ve ever played before.

By
Share this
  • Share this on Facebook
  • Share this on Twitter

Doodle God Review

If you’re not familiar with the Bible, let me get you up to speed on a little chapter called Genesis. According to the good book, God created everything you see – the earth, the sky, the moon, the sun – in only 6 days. Now it’s your turn. Can you start with the building blocks of creation and create everything we know? Doodle God is a wonderfully unique little game that’s all about creating the basic elements of our world, and it’s nothing like anything we’ve ever played before.

As the game begins players are presented with the four basic elements. The object of the game is to combine these elements in such a way that they create new elements. Combining air and water, for example, makes steam. Combining fire and earth makes lava. Each of these new elements can then be combined with existing elements to (you guessed it) create more elements. There are 115 in total. By the end of the game, you’ll have created everything from vodka to dinosaurs.

Doodle God Doodle God

The elements themselves are broken up into 14 groups like fire, animals, bacteria. Discovering new groups proves to be just as satisfying as discovering new elements. The whole process is incredibly simple – just select two groups to list all of the available elements, and then select two to see if they combine. If they do, fantastic! If not, start searching for another possible combination.

Doodle God was great fun, but it could also be incredibly frustrating. There were moments in the later half of the game where it would feel like every conceivable combination had been made, and the 3 minute wait for the hint timer to recharge seemed to take forever. We were also a little disappointed that we couldn’t simply “play god.” When I combine a fish and a bird, it’s because I’m trying to strike gold with the next platypus here. Instead I’d be met with a buzzer sound letting me know they didn’t make anything. Not to argue, but I’m pretty sure they’d create a fishbird.

115 is a lot of combinations, but it’s also a finite number. This means that some combos you’d expect to make something simply don’t because the end result wasn’t included in the 115. Inversely, some of the combinations don’t make the least bit of sense. I understand how fire and oil make energy, and I love that combining life and corpse creates a zombie, but how on earth does combining life and stone make an egg? Or bacteria and swamp to make sulphur?

Regardless of some late in the game frustration, the unique mechanic of simply combining items to discover new items was incredibly addictive. If anything, the frustration came as a result of how much fun it was. Getting stumped happened like clockwork, and we were having so much fun when we weren’t stumped that we didn’t want that excitement to stop.

Doodle God Doodle God

The presentation here was surprisingly top notch as well. Whenever I hear the word “doodle” in a title I do a little cringe. Most of the time “doodle” is associated with low budget high school notebook visuals, but in Doodle God that’s simply not the case. Every element has its own small, yet perfectly recognizable, icon. The element groups have much larger icons, and a great deal of artistry went into making these stand out. Add some famous quotes every time a new element is discovered into the mix, sometimes silly and sometimes poignant, and you’ve got yourself a game with a good deal of charm.

Doodle God is simple, accessible, and fun. Things can get a little frustrating from time to time, but if you’re looking for a unique iPhone title with a surprising amount of charm and polish, you’re going to have a great time here. Combining Doodle God and your iPhone is a sure fire way to create the element fun.

The good

    The bad

      80 out of 100
      Jim Squires is the Editor-in-Chief of Gamezebo. Everything you see passes his eyes first, so we like to think of him as "the gatekeeper of cool stuff." He likes good games, great writing, and just can't say no to a hamburger. Also, he is not a bear.
      Comments are closed.