Wednesday 28 November 2007

puzzle quest

Apparently I am too stupid for this game, as I was thoroughly and beyond-all-comprehension slaughtered by the very first opponent in the tutorial.

(Of the sort where I've taken 52 damage and he's taken about 5. That sort of slaughtered.)

Since tutorials are supposed to be easy and work you in gently, I can only conclude that I'm totally stupid and that I will never be able to play this game, ever.

I am not a bejeweled expert. I can play - I can look at the board and eventually figure out what can be swapped to make 3-in-a-row. Planning ahead for chain reactions is something I have trouble with, and am always pleasantly surprised when one actually goes off in that sort of game. "I did that? Wow."

So playing a game where I meekly swap to collect 3 and the computer opponent immediately picks up four-in-a-row, extra turn, chain-reaction-with-skulls... Did the developers fail to consider that some people aren't good at this? Should they have perhaps included some helpful hints beyond 'match 3'? Or am I just too stupid to live?

2 comments:

Davzz said...

Puzzle Quest is all about planning around unknown information, such as pre-empting your opponent's moves and setting up your moves so that a lucky cascade from the top will benefit you.

You can't play this game by just matching 3, unless you pick a Knight and pump all his points into morale, in that case he'll have so much HP that only multiple disasters would make you lose the battle. It's a pretty boring way to play the game though.

Also, Murphy's Law is really strong in the game, so your experiences with the tutorial isn't uncommon. Once in a while, these sort of things happen and you'll be powerless as what was a winning game slowly slips away from you.

The only way to ALWAYS win the game is to pull off some kind of infinite turns combo, which is all the rage in the DS/PSP versions but have been fixed in the future ones, I've heard.

There's no penalty for losing though, except wasted time. I don't think anyone is going to play this game in a tournament for prizes either so eh.

Whiner said...

Well, the person the game was actually a gift for has a much higher tolerance for this sort of thing than I do (He also plays chess. I find chess to be a miserable experience.) and seems happy enough with the game.

He swears at it and calls it evil, but he keeps playing.

So, eh. Not a game for me but at least it's not going to waste.