Okay, maybe I bashed the game too hastily and i could continue (after the timer) for a while. My only problem though is that the game doesn't seem to accept any kind of failure or lack of luck. When i look at my gold or ressources, i'm able to manage but barely everytime and the first tiny mistake early on cost me two hours of waiting. Maybe it's just me being really bad though : )
So it's just resource collection? Buildings and tools aid you in collecting more resources... to build more buildings and tools? How deep is the city/village building sim part of the game? The description mentions collecting taxes, do you get to raise or lower taxes to manage the morale of your subjects?
Lol, as long as you don't ruin the financial budget of your kingdom and keep a few wares at stock to sell them in times of need, no problem at all. Let me know how you liked the game. I think people can compare this game to games with an IAP model like Pocket Frogs, Tiny Tower or Pocket Planes, it's on the same level. Not neccessary, but speeds everything up if you want go through it a little faster. Oh, and it's really fun that even some of the tiles on the board when doing the match-3 are animated. And on the field, graphics of the tiles change during the year's seasons. It really shows love for the detail. It also surprised me that this game is no "you'll unlock this after that after that and after that, that.". At the start (tutorial), you need to build a few things first, these are the only options. But as you get deeper into the game, you really have to think about what to to do - to harvest, to construct or build next? Mindless placing of everything once really doesn't help. Do I build another house for more workers? Or should I improve my settlement? The game has both a strategic and tactical part. Another surprise, you construct special equipment (= power-ups, which help you to clear the board faster or do other stuff) yourself. This is done with the things you are gathering / harvesting. So you're not having to spend real cash to buy expensive bonus items or power-ups (*points toward a lot of KRPGs and Match-3's), instead you just go to the field or mine and collect ressources and build your own power-ups yourself. This way, you can fit the game to your own playing style. AYou know you need a lot of wood soon? Craft power-ups which help to collect wood faster. Need more pigs? Same.
Well, ok, here are a few gameplay tips: Spoiler General rules: 1. Build chains as long as possible on the boards. You can move and collect in all 8 directions of a windrose. Always give it another thought, look for the best way to chain up the most tiles. Count the tiles. Ideally, every second chain has at least 7-8 tiles in it at the first 2,5 hrs of play time. After a while and some training, spotting the best way for a chain becomes natural. 2. Use your power-ups wisely; for example, when the board is too cluttered to make long chains. Chaining will get more and more difficult the more different tiles show up. Always remove the tiles which are the most on the board first. Ask yourself before mining/harvesting, what kind of wares and which power-ups you might need. 3. Very important: you have limited turns when harvesting and in the mine. Always look where tiles could fall and build newer, longer chains which can be cleared in just one go. This saves you precious turns and lets you come out with much more wares to sell or build with. Kingdom gameplay: 1. At start, just follow the tutorial until you get the market. 2. Harvest the field and mine 2 or 3 times each to build up a little stock; this way you don't run out of supplies or gold too fast and you can concentrate on other things like building or hiring workers and of course, build up a little pile of gold. Always try to collect a few of the most expensive or food wares on the board, this will cover the costs of your fee that you have to pay at the beginning of the match-3 round easily. 3. Workers are important. I suggest you to build a second house for them as fast as you can, because workers reduce the number of tiles you have to collect to get one ware. The effect in one move might be little, but over a whole match-3 round, you might come out with much more wares as without workers.
Thanks! I knew most of them since i've played a lot of match 3, but the power up part was what i was missing, there's some really great combo waiting to be discovered with those
Yes, I know, but I thought it couldn't hurt to write down a few of these strategies for people new to this stuff. As another tip about chaining: the game itself helps you alot. As soon as you place your finger on a specific tile, only these of the same kind remain highlighted, everything else dims or fades out. That's a good help to check exactly how the tiles are positioned, if they all connect and which way to go to collect the most of them. Really good designed by the developers. Beginners should always try to start the chain at a dead point and end it at a dead point, collecting everything between. That can be easily trained by just trying different starting points for one chain and checking which chain gives you the best outcome. Run zigzag, jump over corners, only go diagonally - just try everything. Sometimes you thing you can only chain up 8 tiles, but on a different way you notice that a chain of 11 tiles is possible, for example. When you have only two or three turns left: check what you have collected! If you see that you only need three more chicken to get another full chicken bar, prefer this over collecting wood which just started from the scratch and won't be filled until you're out of turns. Oh, btw., when you've crafted buildings, these buildings also have little timers and spit out some power-ups after a given time for free. You can check the time by placing and holding a finger on the house. Also and always collect the little money heaps and stars they spit out. You notice that there is a bonus when the building has an exclamation mark on it.
I have a suggestion to the publishers of this game, while it really appeals to me, IAPs make my blood boil, I see most of them as a purely greed factor of the creators. My idea:- Release 2 versions of the game in the app store Puzzle Craft (69p with iap's) Puzzle Craft Pro (£1-2 with no iap's) That way people like me can buy the expensive version knowing we'll have no lame iap's shoved in our face and we can have fun, but also people who don't mind them won't lose out as they can get the other version? To me thats common sense and good business practice as you'll get more sales, currently you're losing sales off people like me who refuse to buy because of the iap's? Consider it?
Since you need no IAP, why 2 different versions? And why charge more for the version without IAP? You are willing to pay three times more just to know that you can't speed up things by buying gold? Sorry, but there's a lack of of logic in this suggestion. I assume that the hate concentrates mainly on the presence of IAP in the game. Not that it is optional. 'Cause IAP is the devil. No matter what.
Simple, reason I can then play at my OWN speed without having to worry about hitting a pay wall also I won't be nagged, moan at, annoyed or harassed every 2 mins with 'hey!! you can buy coins!' adverts shoved in my face. quite frankly its worth the extra money to me for the peace of mind. also please note this is not 'hate' as you put it, I'm trying to suggest a method thats best for ALL, not just myself.
That's exactly what I am experiencing with the current version. Nothing is shoved into my face. Did not bash against a pay wall. No annoyances so far. Just a tiny button which leads to the in-game shop. Which I pressed once out of curiosity, then never again. Did you even buy it and tried the game? Or are these all assumptions, some based on bad experiences from other apps? I just don't know where you've read that all these things will automatically show up in the game. Everything else is speculation and also the amusing part about the IAP dislikers: swearing and cursing about those evil IAPs in the game, yet just a few of them actually saw what's up.
of course its speculation, we can't see it unless we buy it and once bought you're stuck with it, theres no such thing as refunds. So its best to find out first, sometimes I go for it anyway in the hope that the publishers aren't greedy so-and-so's but Chillingo have a rather iffy background when it comes to iap so I can understand people's attitude.
The game is not that deep, the taxes are just a minor distraction. No morale system for your workers, they're basically slaves with a minimum wage.
IIRC someone suggested that to Clockwork Pixels, the developers of Kitten/Puppy Sanctuary and they said Apple doesn't allow that. I have no idea why people are taking out their pitchforks for Puzzle Craft, this is a great game where the IAP is well, optional.
I really don't understand how some of you people are hitting a 'pay wall' here so fast. Played the game for well over 2 hours, level 9 now, and sitting at a comfortable 300 gold, and I haven't sold a single thing in the ingame market so far, or bought any IAP gold. Any of you buggers that are holding out just because 'It is infested by the IAP demons!' are doing yourself a disservice, because I'm having a blast with it. The basic premise of the game is this, you have 2 different match 3 games in it, one for farming, one for mining. Both gather different resources, farming is focused on gathering food, wood and hay, while mining is focused on stones, iron, dirt, and other minerals. It all starts out relatively simple, spend 30 gold on a farming session to collect food, which you use as a resource to be able to mine, gather some dirt, stone and iron in the mine for new buildings, and so on. After a while you unlock buildings that add stuff to these games, sort of a Tinytown mechanic, match 8 grain tiles, and a carrot tile will pop up on the board, match 8 chickens, and a pig tile will pop up. Get enough of these tiles on the board and match them, and you have a new resource to play around with. Further buildings will make gathering crops or livestock not take a turn, or add turns to the mining game, increase the chance of favorable crop/mineral tiles to pop up, but also add hazards to go along with the benefits, like rats that eat a crop every few turns, or pockets of gas in the mine which can explode. And I've not even touched tools you can craft and workers yet. Long story short, a LOT of depth and strategy gets added to the games as you progress further. Anyway, there's my 2 cents on this deal, if you like Match 3 games, get this pronto.
Super fun game!! EveryOne talking about pay walls and IAP being shoved in their face have obviously not played this. The IAP in this game aren't needed, it's there for the impatient. If you just play the game you won't even think about it. The game itself is super fun. It's a deep puzzler and a shallow city builder. Every building opens new puzzle possibilities and there's a nice balanced complexity to it all. The strategy comes in balancing which resources you collect and how you use it. The matching puzzles are done really well. You have a full "year" to match as much as you can. As it gets into winter the tiles actually change and become snow covered Different building open up other options, an you can craft "tools" like shovels and stuff to help you meet your goal. There's combo in the matching system and it gets tough trying to line everything up so you can get exactly what you want. Overall this game is a great leap forward in the matching puzzle genre, with simple fun gameplay balanced by deeper strategic workings. Give it a try, it's solid. If you want to use the IAP system it's there for people who like it , but the game is not crippled without it, and you can ignore it without a second thought.
Another cool feature I discovered: you can build your kingdom however you want. Most games require things like: unlock and place one building after each other or something like that, but here you can build and place whatever you want after the first pre-defined buildings. You're free to design your kingdom as you like.
Dear All, Thank you so much all the positive replies gathered here in the topic. We are totally thrilled that you feel the vibe of Puzzle Craft. The more deep you go the more fun it gets! If there are any questions, concerns we are here for you, Best Regards,
1 question, how does the game determine where the extra item spawns for matching 7-8 of the same tile? Is it random?
