Tidalis

This one is a weird one to review. I need to decide whether the final decision is "Is this a good game?" or "Is this something I can recommend?" As a core game design, Tidalis is absolutely fantastic. The game loop is a unique mix between match-3, block dropping puzzles, and those old pipe laying games. There's nothing quite like it. Click on a colored block and it will shoot a stream in the direction of its arrow. If that stream hits a matching colored block, that too will shoot. Combo at least 3 of blocks and all of the blocks will explode. You can't move colored blocks, but you can rotate the direction they'd fire. Various game modes change it up with new blocks raining from the sky, special tiles that require unique strategies to destroy etc. It all is a genuinely good puzzle game and I WANT recommend this game. But the truth is, I'm just not enjoying the game. Little annoyances add up and I just never reach that zone mindset where I can just enjoy the game. Technically, it didn't age well as the resolutions don't scale. On my laptop monitor, the game shows up in the middle 25% of the screen with black borders all around it... the story animations are even smaller. This scares me knowing that 4K resolutions are a thing and even 1080p is on the way out. It's not unplayable on my monitor but it is small enough to bug me. As for the adventure mode, it has its own share of irritations. Each step on the adventure map has an animated story scene and its own unique stage. These give you one of the many game modes and objectives ranging from standard "Destroy X blocks" to pretty cool "Destroy X red blocks without destroying Y green ones". Theoretically, these would be quite interesting. But in practice, I keep finding that the required blocks aren't even on the map. So, I find myself alternating between "Waste time hoping the the correct color will fall" and " Waste more time waiting for it to fall into the correct spot." If this was a rare occurrence I'd overlook it, but I've played for an hour and it's happened several times. Giving this a thumbs down is painful because this game is well-made, has a clever core loop, and is a game that I really want to put on my phone because its darn fun in short bursts. But on steam, sitting at home on my PC, I have better options. Not necessarily better puzzle games, but ones that provide a more satisfying and engaging experience. At the end of the day, would I recommend this game? No, I'd probably recommend many casual puzzle games over this one.

Decent match 3 game, but I would be just fine if I never played another one again. Do me a favor, do it, do it.

Fun relaxing casual puzzle game. Nice music too!

wow, its really good, def love the blocks. wow1

Puzzle game about activating blocks with arrows. The arrows point to the direction of blocks they will activate. You can make some neat chain reactions The graphics are a bit dated and the game isn't really my thing.

One of the best puzzle games I've ever played. A shame it never took off.

Te digo una cosa; con unas mecánicas algo confusas, el tiempo de entretenimiento es bastante limitado. Fácilmente olvidable y abandonable. Además, sólo está en perfecto shakespeariano