I have had my try at many puzzle games and one thing I find with most of them is that after a while they begin to feel like a chore, and eventually you get to the point where you fail a level and become really aggravated (well I do anyway). That has yet to happen in ‘Blyss’.
‘Blyss’ takes all the elements of what makes a good puzzle game adds some relaxing music and environments and combines them to make a charming, relaxing and most importantly, enjoyable puzzle game that I have found myself going back to quite regularly over the last few days.
The gameplay in ‘Blyss’ requires the player to think logically before making a move. You are presented with a game board which you have to clear, to do so you can only clear three or four tiles at a time and must do that in either a I, L, O or Z shape. An added challenge is then presented to you with the addition of double tiles which require you to clear them twice, and eventually when you get to the further levels triple tiles.
You have to play the levels very carefully as I discovered, rushing levels can often leave you with isolated tiles which you then are unable to clear, shapes that you can’t make a letter out of, and even five tiles which you obviously can’t divide by three or four and therefore can’t clear. If you do fail in the games main mode ‘endless’ you have the luxury of using points. You get points at the end of the round. These can then be used to go back moves, or wipe a level in later rounds. You only have a small amount of them though, and as you use more in a run it becomes more expensive later on.
That’s when you have to learn to slow down, and use the games music and backgrounds to set a relaxing pace. Doing this and thinking through my moves I was able to progress much further than previously, helping me set some impressive scores in the games endless mode (You keep clearing levels until you run out of rescue points) and playground mode (Clear levels until you fail). There is however the addition of a timed mode where you are forced to clear at a rapid rate. This mode has the same music and background and I would love for it to instead have a more paced music and urgent background.
Currently there are four different themes each with different backgrounds and music. There is the default theme ‘Crimson Summer’ which you might have guessed is based around summer with mountains and air balloons in the orange background. There’s ‘Mountain Dreams’ a grey/blue theme with a night sky and my favourite music score out of the four. ‘Spring Vibes’ has a faster paced soundtrack and a pink background with trees. Finally my favourite overall the ‘Dry Days’ with a desert background and matching guitar string music.
‘Blyss’ is a very addicting and enjoyable puzzle game that with the right advertising and if aimed at the right audience can easily make a hit on the App Store. Developer ‘Dropout Games’ are aiming for an April 2016 release date.
This article was originally written for Pockefullofapps.com
