I Won’t Say I’m in Love
Like most 90s kids, I was obsessed with the Disney movie Hercules. This fascination quickly evolved into a curiosity surrounding the lore of these fantastical gods. While I eventually moved on to the next childhood preoccupation, I’ll always have a fondness for the gods of antiquity. When I discovered there was a puzzle game themed around these heavenly characters, I was excited to play it. Unfortunately, Puzzle Gods proved to be less Disney classic and more Emoji movie.
Puzzle Gods is a match-three, free-to-play puzzle game from publisher Netflix Games and developer Boon Studios. The game’s antagonist, Little Hades, has captured and chained the Puzzle Gods to various points around the Land of Olympus. It’s up to you, Little Zu, to free the deities and defeat Little Hades once and for all. Along the way, players can unlock boosters and weapons from the Puzzle Gods to aid in solving the plethora of puzzles.
Trials of the Gods
Puzzle Gods does a great job of introducing players to its mechanics. Like most match-three puzzle games, the first dozen or so levels serve as partially-guided tutorials. Past these initial levels, the game ups the difficulty by introducing environmental obstacles. Fans of match-three puzzle games will be familiar with some of these wrinkles in gameplay, such as holes in the game board or Crystal Tiles. These tiles require players to match elements to shatter their crystalline casing. I found the shattering tile animations particularly satisfying and often looked forward to the levels that featured them.
In addition to these two mechanical genre staples, several unique gameplay mechanics were introduced. Similar to the Crystal Tiles, patches of dirt began to appear scattered through many of the levels. These patches hide keys beneath some of their tiled surfaces and require players to match elements to uncover hidden treasure. In later levels, some patches needed multiple matches to dig beneath their surfaces. Rocky facades delineated these spots. I had never encountered this type of find-the-object challenge tiles in a match-three puzzle game before, and I welcomed the development. Soon after, torches appeared in fixed locations around the board. These require players to match elements adjacent to the torches, three separate times, to light them. I also found the torches a lot of fun, as their locations became more challenging to light.
The final gameplay mechanic required me to move various treasures to specific portal locations on the board. This was my least favorite of the obstacles, as it felt like too much of a chore. It felt especially bothersome when coupled with other challenges, like lighting torches and unearthing keys.
Tricky Little Devil
In addition to the standard levels, every 15 to 20 levels, you’ll face Little Hades in a boss battle. To free the level’s chained god, you’ll need to juggle several challenges thrown at you. First, you’ll need to deplete Little Hades’ health meter by matching elements. On top of this task, you’ll need to complete the objective(s) displayed in the upper left corner of your screen.
These objectives could be any combination of gameplay mechanics, like torches or crystalline tiles. Further complicating the situation, Little Hades will periodically transform elemental tiles into stone blocks or crates that will block players from accessing certain tiles. Luckily, these blocks disappear once players complete three sets of matched tiles.
In my many hours playing the game, I struggled to complete the final boss battle with Little Hades. Even as boss matches go, this level seems overly difficult, requiring players to juggle matching certain elements, depleting his health bar, lighting torches, and destroying blocks. This proved especially difficult without access to multiple boosters and weapons to throw at him, as I had used them in tight spots in previous levels. However, persistence paid off, and I defeated the little villain, only to discover there was another series of levels waiting.
Beyond Little Hades’ boss fights, players hungry for more difficult levels can complete Little Medusa’s timed weekly challenges. Little Medusa appears once a week for several days, offering players a chance to defeat her trials and win prizes. Players must complete ten different levels to line up mirrors and reflect light to stop the Gorgon. You’ll have five lives to complete these more challenging stages. If you end up running out of lives, don’t worry too much, as they refresh pretty quickly. Little Medusa’s levels are some of the most challenging in the game and are a lot of fun to play.
Mortal Complaints
Overall, Puzzle Gods provides the right amount of interesting challenges and fun gameplay. However, later levels require players to juggle various challenges, offering little in the way of help. Players can access boosters and weapons by freeing the chained gods and spinning a daily wheel. Sadly, these aids aren’t replenished nearly as fast or often enough as players may need them. This is where Puzzle Gods’ completely free-to-play status as a Netflix game comes as a disadvantage, as players willing to spend money to unlock boosters cannot do so.
My only other complaint concerns the aesthetics of the game. While Puzzle Gods boasts a vibrant and cartoonish world, it suffers from its generic, emoji-like characters. Perhaps I’m being a bit too harsh, as the gods are cute enough. Yet, given how vastly interesting the legends are surrounding the gods of this game, so much of their personality feels absent. While the environments, music and gameplay more than makeup for these design blunders, I was often distracted by the gods’ generic appearances.
Puzzle Gods provides plenty of challenges for fans of the genre and offers hours of fun, despite its lackluster character design. While nothing particularly game-changing is introduced with Puzzle Gods, the puzzle game remains a worthy entry in a crowded genre.
