You know those powdery candy heart things everybody gawks at during Valentine’s Day? The ones with the little messages on the front? Hairy Monster Studios went and made an entire game based around them! I Heart You Too is a …
You know those powdery candy heart things everybody gawks at during Valentine’s Day? The ones with the little messages on the front? Hairy Monster Studios went and made an entire game based around them! I Heart You Too is a casual tile swapping experience at its core, and it keeps things simple to make sure you’re taken in by its wholesome charm.
I Heart You Too is about as basic as a puzzle game can get. Each level has a target goal, asking you to earn a certain number of points without going over the move limit. Swap the candy hearts to make matches of three or more. When you do, they crumble and disappear, something we wish would happen here in the real world. Empty spaces are quickly filled with new tiles, and the matching madness marches on.
Things get really interesting when you make special matches with larger groups of candies. Four in a row or column creates a bomb, a nifty power-up that blows up a ton of hearts when matches. L-shaped group of five matches makes a cross bomb, which will eliminate all pieces in that row and column when igniting. Lightning bombs appear when you match five or more pieces in a single move. They blow up all hearts of the same color, which is a wonderful sight to behold.
Once you complete a level, I Heart You Too takes over and finishes the match, exhausting your moves and igniting all power-ups still left on the screen. This can take a few moments to pass, but it’s sort of like a bonus cinema for clearing the stage.
Later on, I Heart You Too spices things up with boosters and obstacles. Boosters are real strategy changers and can be purchased in the store in exchange for in-game currency. You can buy extra moves, for example, directly remove hearts from the board, or shake everything up when you don’t like the layout. Obstacles like blocks, weeds and vines prevent tile movement or force you to make strategic matches to free up space.
I Heart You Too doesn’t feature anything new or ground breaking in the puzzle genre. We’ve all swapped tiles before, we’ve all seen these sorts of power-ups and obstacles, too. The difference lies in the game’s presentation. This is a cute match-3 puzzler — almost too cute in some ways. Colorful scenes with soft background, simplistic gameplay and easy to understand mechanics. It’s the sort of title you sit down with at the end of the day for a few minutes of relaxation. No stress, no frustration, just lovey dovey tile swapping and satisfying heart matching.
