Mystery Match

I have been playing this game for years. I am on level 2,237. I have played this game alone, with no friends or help for this entire time. I have never experienced the problems that I have read about. I have only ever experienced generosity from this game. For me every weekend they have unlimited play. Normally it is only 5 lives, which can be added to by sometimes watching an ad. I love the challenging levels, sometimes I have to play the same level quite a few times, but eventually I beat it, without help. To be honest, it has a back story I stopped following because I thought it was silly, but it is easy to bypass. I definitely don’t have trouble with any ads! I play without friends not by choice, but because no one else on my social media plays. I have friends listed but they don’t play. I have spent money on this game for extra help, but they are, in my opinion, very generous with giving play time. It is my go-to game. Today is a Wednesday and they have given unlimited lives for 24 hours! No complaints here, just fun!!

I’ve lowered my review from 3 stars to 2, due to the endless syncing and playback cancelled errors. I stand by my original complaint about the timed levels - too frustrating for players with limited dexterity, plus the animations chew up too much of the allotted time. So definitely do not believe the “6 and up” age range. I liked the way this game starts-the little story is nice, and the gameplay is reasonable. I particularly chose this game because it didn’t seem to impose impossible timed levels, which are intended to be difficult but are way too frustrating for some younger players or those with even mild dexterity issues. However, the nice start failed a little way in; those timed levels start appearing once you get a bit into the game, and some of them are not possible to solve without buying boosts and coins and extra lives (and you’d have to buy a lot of them). I understand completely and am in support of the need for developers to monetize their work, but just once I would like to find a game that does it without relying on egregious time limits that leave out the players with less than perfect reflexes.

The game is fun until level 65, which runs out of time while gems drop oh-so-slowly. I will do a one-time purchase of fun games (hello, Angry Birds!), and I will willingly watch a video to make progress in an app (hello, Smule!), but I won't, on principle, make in-app purchases. Please consider other ways to make a profit on your game while not hurting consumers. On another note, the storyline is way too silly. Update, three years later: The storyline eliminated many of the silly anachronisms that bothered me at first, and the app added video ads to aid progress, so now I like this game much better. I agree with the reviewer that having to scroll down each time to work on 1- or 2-star levels is annoying. Also, I have beaten some of the levels dozens of times without ever coming close to getting 3 stars and wonder if it is even possible to achieve my goal of 3-starring everything. Overall, it is a great game.