Rovio Soft-launches ‘Nibblers’ in Canada, a Game of Primordial Match-3 Fun

Evolutionary biologists have yet to piece together exactly what drove our fishy ancestors to hitch themselves up onshore for the first time and breathe in their earliest breaths. Nibblers, a new game from Rovio that has soft-launched on the Canadian …

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Evolutionary biologists have yet to piece together exactly what drove our fishy ancestors to hitch themselves up onshore for the first time and breathe in their earliest breaths. Nibblers, a new game from Rovio that has soft-launched on the Canadian App Store, may have an answer: Fruit.

Nibblers is a match-three game starring characters that are decidedly less feathery than Rovio’s better-known mascots, the Angry Birds. These fishy little dudes, the titular “Nibblers,” have wandered ashore to sample berries and melons. Terra Firma’s ancient landlords, the lizards, have something to say about the migration (namely, “No”).

Players match up three or more pieces of fruit as a means of defense. Matching three next to a lizard stuns it; matching up three more eliminates it. Matching up four or more pieces summons Nibblers (as well as octopi and other sea creatures) that can be used to attack lizards directly.

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The stage ends successfully when all the lizards are gone. However, there are additional challenges to take on, as you might expect from a match-three game. You’re sometimes required to clear away all the mud on a game board, or else dispose of slippery toads that evade match-ups and can only be dispatched by a Nibbler.

If all this primordial mucking about sounds like something you’d like to try out, grab yourself a Canadian iTunes account and download Nibblers, which is in soft-launch on the Canadian App Store.

In the early aughts, Nadia fell into writing with the grace of a brain-dead bison stumbling into a chasm. Over the years, she's written for Nerve, GamePro, 1UP.com, USGamer, Pocket Gamer, Just Labs Magazine, and many other sites and magazines of fine repute. She's currently About.com's Guide to the Nintendo 3DS at ds.about.com.