Appletell reviews Math Sticker for iPhone, iPod touch

Category: Games
Developer: Cloubble Adventure Teams
Requirements: iPhone 2.0 software
Compatibility: iPhone and iPod Touch
File Size: 0.5MB
Version Reviewed: 1.2
Price: $0.99
Rating: 4+

First things first. Like any good reporter would, I went to the developer’s website before I downloaded the game. Guess what? Under construction…almost like the website is hosted by a 17 year old hacker in their room under their bed. Creepy and eerily plain. So my first impression was that I would probably not download this game if I was not doing a review. As for the game? It just flat out sucks.

I really don’t know where to start on this one, so I guess we will start at the beginning. The instructions tell you to find and relocate match sticks to make the mathematical equation true. Your score’s dependent upon your speed and the amount of moves you make to solve the puzzle. Each puzzle has a maximum score that counts down as you work the puzzle. There are a set number of moves to solve each puzzle, and each time you make an extra move, you have points taken away. The game also has three themes available to change the look of the match sticks and the color of the screen. The different themes are pretty cool actually—best feature of the game by far. There is also a skill option that lets you change various difficutlty setting such at number of digits, and the kind of arithmetic being used.

As for the game play, well, that is just broken. You start by selecting a digit. Any digit on the board is editable. Once you have done that, the number will come forward and grow larger for you to tap again. Here is where it goes bad. Once you tap on the number a second time, the game selects a random match stick from the number and puts it in the top right corner of the screen. You cannot choose which match stick to take off. Durning game play the sensitivity of the taps in relation to the numbers is sporadic at best. You do not have the ability to simply take a match stick from here and put it there. If that was the case, the game would be playable.

I have handed this game to five different people in my family in the last two days. Same result from everyone: Bad. The longest someone has played it is about a minute and a half. The gameplay is infuriatingly random, you never know which match stick is going to be selected once you pick the digit you want to work with. Placing that match stick is just as frustrating.

Overall? Don’t waste your money.

Appletell Rating:

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