JQ: chemistry is about as simple as a quiz game can get. I am shown a chemical element and have to choose the correct answer from four options. There are three difficulty levels and 75 questions in total, so there is not a huge amount of content here, but I actually like how direct it is. I can start playing immediately and there is nothing getting in the way of the quiz itself. For a game that costs very little, I think keeping things simple makes sense.
The part I like most is that it can actually test whether I know the elements instead of just asking completely random general knowledge questions. I have to remember names and recognise the correct answer among similar options, and the harder settings give me a little more reason to think before clicking. It is not teaching me chemistry in any deep way, but it can work as a quick way for me to test what I already know. I also like that the questions are broken into difficulties, even though I would have liked a bit more variation within each level.
The biggest weakness is the lack of depth. Once I have gone through the 75 questions, there is not much else for me to discover. There are no experiments, no periodic table to explore, no explanations for why an answer is correct and no proper lessons that would help me understand the subject better. If I get a question wrong, the game does not really turn that mistake into a learning opportunity. That makes it feel much more like a knowledge check than an actual chemistry learning tool.
I also think the presentation is very basic. The music is pleasant enough and the clean quiz format means I can concentrate on the questions, but there is not much personality outside of that. The game was made using Clickteam Fusion 2.5, and it has the kind of simple presentation I would expect from a very small quiz project. That is not something I really mind because the whole game is built around answering questions, but it does mean I am mostly judging it on how useful and enjoyable those questions are.
There are also a huge number of Steam achievements, which is actually one of the stranger parts of the package. The game currently lists 510 achievements, while the actual quiz only contains 75 questions. I do not think the achievement count adds much to the game itself, and I would much rather have seen more questions or some kind of proper progression system. Still, it gives me another reason to go through the quiz if I am someone who likes completing everything, even if the achievements do not make the chemistry gameplay any deeper.
What I think the game gets right is knowing exactly what it is. I am not going into this expecting a full chemistry course or a complicated educational simulator. I am getting a short multiple choice quiz about chemical elements with three difficulty levels, simple music and a very low barrier to entry. That is perfectly fine for a quick session, especially when I only want to test myself for a few minutes. I just wish the game did more with the subject because chemistry gives it so many opportunities to add interesting information without making things much more complicated.
Overall, JQ: chemistry is a perfectly decent little quiz, but I do not think it has enough depth to reach the higher part of my rating scale. I like the simple controls, the three difficulty levels and the fact that the questions are actually focused on chemical elements. The 75 question limit, lack of explanations and very basic presentation hold it back quite a bit, and once I have seen most of the questions there is not much reason for me to keep playing. It works for what it is, but I see it more as a quick quiz than a proper educational game.
Rating: 6.9/10
