"Match three" games remain a classic genre for new gamers and old, from Bejeweled to Puzzle Craft, from Chuzzle to Pokemon Shuffle, from Candy Crush saga and more. There are many examples of the genre because it is one which is both popular and easily accessible.
Red Camel Studios has released its new contribution to the field in the form of '4 or More' for iOS devices. It is available for free on the Apple App Store with some non-essential in-game purchases.
The basic premise is simple: slide tokens across the board to match - in this case, four - tokens together. They can be in any shape whatsoever so long as pieces touch horizontally or vertically. You get points for matching colours with a chosen colour presented at the top of the screen - even more points if you combine four of that same colour. You don't score for the tokens which do not match that colour; therefore match four "wrong" colours and you do not score for that turn.
Of course, you can combine more than four to match, but this is where the strategy begins to come in. It's too easy to focus only on the colours you are aiming for, thinking you will slide a piece over and then another piece - only to find you've inadvertantly matched four already because a token of a different colour was attached to one of your pieces.
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By level 4 you hit some problems; a piece of the board is missing and you have a countdown ticking by with a maximum number of shapes you are allowed to make to reach your points goal. In higher levels parts of the board become blocked and you cannot slide tokens past them.
Commencing with level 5 boosters begin to unlock - brick booster, colour booster, pop booster. These allow you to manipulate the board to remove pieces that are in your way, however, these come at a cost and this is where your in-game currency kicks in, allowing you to buy more boosts as an in-app purchase.
The game is fun and engaging and comes with that "just one more level" replayability and challenge you want. It's free without any requirement to make in-app purchases, though if you enjoy the game I always advocate making a purchase to support the author.
It's not fully without glitches; I found it would trigger off messages about the boosts even when I was trying to slide a token on the board and not touching the boost. Twice the game seized up on me totally and required a restart. However, hopefully these will be soon ironed out by the author. Despite those, the game remains engaging and thought-provoking and is definitely worth looking at.
