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Tag: Puzzle

  • Disco Zoo Review
    Reviews
    • iOS
    Disco Zoo Review

    By

    In the world of free-to-play, popular game styles seem to come in waves. After FarmVille, every Facebook developer went through their farming phase. After Social City, every social gamemaker thought they could make the next SimCity-lite. And back in those early days - wedged somewhere between virtual pets and restaurant simulations, the social scene had a brief but noteworthy obsession with treasure hunts.In a nutshell, games like Treasure Isle and Ruby Skies had players "exploring" a piece of land by clicking on different squares in an attempt to find all sorts of goodies. It was simple to the point of silliness, but it also managed to have that "just one more time" hook that only the most popular free-to-play games can muster.Disco Zoo, the latest game from Tiny Tower creator Nimblebit and Milkbag Games - the new pairing of Owen Goss (Finger Tied) and Matt Rix (Trainyard) - feels a lot like those early free-to-play treasure hunts. And regardless of how that might read at first glance, I promise you - this is a very good thing.
  • Perloo Review
    Reviews
    • iOS
    Perloo Review

    By

    Perloo is the first game offering from design studio Perceptor, whose past work includes such creations as Crowdpilot, an app that allows you to crowdfund dates and other social interactions, and Your Name in Gum, a collaborative art site that provides exactly what it promises: your name in chewed up gum.  With these and other playful, admittedly odd creations under their belt, it's little surprise that Perloo is a mysterious, lofty, and conflicting experience that borders more on art project than pastime distraction.As a game, Perloo is the epitome of the abstract puzzler.  Its logical, geometric challenges are bookended by a live action narrative that provides no guidance or rules, but a serene, contemplative atmosphere.  A man finds a black triangle buried in the desert as a voice ponders, "Where do we find ourselves?" and other poetic musings.  Then you are suddenly starting at the title screen, the two "o"s of "Perloo" made of a black dot and white dot which drop off the word and are now floating alone in front of you.  The game has begun.This is the first of Perloo's eight separate puzzles, and as with every challenge in the game, you are given no direction or obvious goal.  You might try to tap the dots at first, drag them—nothing happens.  As your touch shakes the device and it moves slightly, you see the white dot also slide.  You've learned something, and now you can begin to move forward.Every interaction with Perloo progresses this way, and each puzzle forces you to start anew.  Your first task on any puzzle is to figure out its mechanics: the white circle moves, but the next puzzle has multiple moving parts.  Another features a partially vanishing grid of squares.  Yet another contains two triangles, one of which rotates slowly to stimulus but appears to do little else.  Nothing is obvious at first or even third glance, and deducing how the onscreen objects work creates the same furrowed brow warmth as an obtuse math puzzle or brain teaser.
  • Tengami Review
    Reviews
    • iOS
    • PC
    Tengami Review

    By

    I am excited about Tengami. Not because it's a particularly great game, but because it's a remarkable multimedia experience. At its core, it's a point-and-click adventure set in ancient Japan. But it's the rendering of the game world as a gloriously detailed virtual pop-up book, with scene transitions presented as turning pages that reveal a delicate, brilliantly beautiful two-dimensional realm, which makes it both unique and memorable.Everything in Tengami is rendered in 2D, even your avatar - a characteristic that becomes evident when he moves and reveals that he has no physical depth. There's no inventory, no attributes or skills, and no equipment or upgrades to make him more powerful; he simply walks and sails from place to place at your direction, and occasionally picks up a single item or interacts with a puzzle. It's a slow-paced journey through changing seasons, designed to give you time to really take in and appreciate the artistry of the environments. The music is every bit as good, and while the sound effects are relatively sparse, the first time I heard a wolf howling in the twilight my skin positively tingled.The controls are simple and intuitive, requiring only that you double-tap to walk to a spot on the screen and drag left or right to turn a page or pull a tab. Hotspots and area exits are well-marked, so there's never any question of where you need to go or what you can interact with.There are sometimes questions about what exactly you need to do, however. Tengami has relatively few puzzle areas, but when you encounter one it gives no indication of how to proceed. Midway through the game I spent a considerable amount of time struggling with a group of bells on a pagoda, only to discover that I was stuck because I hadn't gone to another area first and collected a particular item. The puzzle itself was actually quite simple, but it was a frustrating moment because I had no idea why I was unable to make progress. (In fact, it was only with the aid of another reviewer that I figured out where I'd gone wrong.)
  • Puzzle Defense: Dragons Review
    Reviews
    • Android
    Puzzle Defense: Dragons Review

    By

    If two game genres ever deserved to be nominated for a "most over-used" designation, it's match-three and tower defense. Still, the shelf life of stale mechanics can often be extended a bit by creating unexpected combinations as new match-three/tower defense game Puzzle Defense: Dragons has managed to do. While this cute little game isn't exactly a paragon of innovation, it does offer a generous amount of free-to-play fun.Puzzle Defense: Dragons has two modes: Campaign and Battle. The significant difference between the two is that the first has combat happen in stages as you progress across a map, and the second has it go on indefinitely (or until you run out of reinforcements). Also, Campaign mode has a weensy bit of implied narrative (re: the dragon attack on your resident kingdom) and gives you five lives/chances to fulfill each level's objectives. Battle mode on the other hand, is continuous and does away with the story add-ons."Whichever the mode, the match-three element of Puzzle Defense: Dragons is clever, since rather than having you rearrange existing icons within a grid, it asks you to create matches by placing the icons yourself. In this case, the icons represent different types of military units starting with a basic swordsman (who's more or less useless) and continuing through more powerful units such as archers, snipers, king's archers, and heavy crossbowmen.The idea is to group three or more of the same unit next to one another. This combines the three and transforms them into a single, more powerful unit. The progression of this works in the order listed above—three swordsmen equal one archer, three archers equal one sniper, and so on. The strategic part comes in as you determine where to create these groupings, especially since once placed, units are immovable (in general).
  • Eliss Infinity Review
    Reviews
    • iOS
    Eliss Infinity Review

    By

    First released back in March 2009, which was literally like the prehistoric ages for the mobile gaming world, Steph Thirion's Eliss has often been considered by many to be the first truly great mobile game. After one playthrough of the newly refined and expanded rerelease, Eliss Infinity, it's hard not to see why. But what's so amazing about the experience is that not only was the original Eliss such an innovative game for 2009, but the challenging mix of arcade and puzzle gameplay has managed to stand the test of time and remain insanely relevant and accessible even today in 2014.For those new to the world of Eliss, the gameplay is deceptively simple: you'll be presented with a number of different colored planets that slowly materialize in the vastness of space. You can touch and drag any planet to move it around the screen, and combining any two like-colored planets will create a new larger one. Conversely, stretching two fingers apart on any one planet will split it up into two smaller ones. As time goes on, several color-coded portals will begin popping up around the screen, and it's your goal to maneuver your different planets in order to fill each one (keeping in mind that the portal and accompanying planet must be the same color and size)."Things start to get tricky early on, as you realize that different colored planets are not allowed to touch. If they do, a green health bar at the top of the screen will quickly start depleting, and if it empties all the way then you'll have to start over. It seems easy to keep the colors separate at first, but once new planets start spawning over already-existing ones of a different color, or when some planets get so big that it becomes hard to maneuver them to the portals without banging into the edges of others, you'll quickly understand the game's immense and rewarding sense of challenge. And that's without even mentioning the various hazards like moving red vortexes which only complicate things even further.
  • Threes! Review
    Reviews
    • Android
    • iOS
    Threes! Review

    By

    Over the past two years, the three-man team of Sirvo LLC has been narrowing in on mobile gaming gold.  Although their only title as a trio was the brilliant Tetris-meets-SpellTower mash-up Puzzlejuice, their Midas Touch spread through the App Store via individual roles on critically-acclaimed games such as Hundreds and Ridiculous Fishing.  After regrouping from their award-winning walkabouts, Sirvo's sophomore offering is another puzzler, and one that sets the bar even higher than it was already stratospherically placed.Threes! is the definition of deceptively simple.  Its one-touch gameplay requires seemingly nothing more from players than the ability to swipe up, down, left, or right.  Doing so will slide all tiles on its 4x4 game board in that same direction, with one of two results: either the tiles will simply move, or they will combine with other tiles.  This is all you have to do to play Threes!, but it's only the beginning of its strategy and depth."Your overarching goal in Threes! is to create larger and larger numbers by combining like-numbered tiles.  While Threes! appears mathematical at first glance, it's strictly a matching game.  When two tiles with the same number cross, they will merge into one new tile featuring their sum.  So, two "3" tiles become one "6" tile, two "12" tiles become one "24" tile, etc.  The only exception to this rule are "1" and "2" tiles, which must combine together to create a "3" tile.  The purpose of these numerical Voltrons is twofold: first, larger numbers are worth more points towards your final score and second, merging tiles clears space on the board.  Since the game ends when the board fills up (and no other matches are available), this is a key component to progress.These core aspects are vaguely similar to Triple Town, but Threes! is only lightly reminiscent of the anti-bear match-3 game.  Combos in Threes! can only be made within rows or columns that are butted up against the walls of the grid; otherwise, the tiles will simply shift to fill open spaces.  This allows freedom to rearrange the grid when needed, but while creating the added demand of filling a row before you can merge tiles.
  • Threes! Walkthrough
    Walkthroughs
    • Android
    • iOS
    Threes! Walkthrough

    By

    Threes! is a match-2 puzzle game developed by Sirvo LLC.  In this game, you'll slide numbered tiles around a grid in order to create ever-increasing multiples of three.  Gamezebo's quick start strategy guide will provide you with detailed images, tips, information, and hints on how to play your best game."
  • Doodle Kingdom Walkthrough
    Walkthroughs
    • Android
    • iOS
    Doodle Kingdom Walkthrough

    By

    Welcome to the Doodle Kingdom walkthrough on Gamezebo. Doodle Kingdom is the sequel to Doodle God and Doodle Devil, elemental puzzle games developed by JoyBits Ltd. This walkthrough includes tips and tricks, helpful hints, and a complete solution list for how to complete Doodle Kingdom's main game and numerous side quests."