GAME: Star Blast by Peak Games

GENRE: Match-3 puzzle

PLATFORMS: Android, iOS

It has been 10 years since Candy Crush, the hugely popular match3 game, was released and became a staggering hit. Even now people are enjoying the genre. There’s something alluring about the simplicity of matching colours and breaking tiles. Star Blast has some of those ingredients that make it hard to put down.

Star Blast is a straightforward match-3 game. Instead of swiping to match tiles, like in Candy Crush, here you just tap on a set of matching tiles to break them. If you’ve played any match-3 game before, the rules will feel familiar. Breaking big sets of tiles gives you different boosters that help blast more tiles. You must strategically clear out these tiles to achieve an objective within a certain number of moves. Levels are fun and well-balanced, but these are not where Star Blast has tried to innovate, as even the obstacles are exactly like what you would find in other games like Homescapes. The game plays in portrait mode — you can play it in one hand with your thumb.

The lack of innovation in levels is not entirely a bad thing. The familiarity lets you get in without having to think too much, which is majorly why we like to play these puzzles in the first place. Clearing levels unlocks a short visual story of a Hollywood star bear named Brad. These stories are quirky little snippets that are interesting to unlock, like Brad recreating the famous Titanic scene but in a mildly funny way. There’s no narrative, just these disconnected snippets that eventually unlock at a snail’s pace. Over time, I found myself not caring about these at all.

The best part about Star Blast for me was the bonus levels. Every once in a while, you get a level where Brad is in peril. Like in one where lava was coming up to him, with the escape door locked and its key on the match 3 board. I rushed to collect the key before Brad was fatally roasted. The level was super easy but unlike the main levels, there was an urgency, which was stressful but fun. Many other bonus levels came up from time to time, like one where I only had 3 moves and had to blast boosters in the right order, or one where I just collected as many coins as possible. VERDICT: Star Blast is a simple match-3 game familiar to others that you might have played already. But this simplicity and familiarity make it all the more approachable and even fun for when you don’t want to think much and just tap away at some tiles in your break. The story snippets that get unlocked are interesting, but you might eventually lose interest in them. The bonus levels are some of the best parts of the game, offering a fresh taste of fun puzzles that feel very different from what you’re used to. I rate it 7.5 out of 10.