Matchsticks Mania

Fun puzzles, useless timer & stars

Pros: • Clean graphics; rules always visible. (These are problems in many competing apps.) • Some puzzles are quite challenging. • Lots of puzzles, but they’re split into different groups, so selecting them is easier than if they were all in one screen. And there are still so many puzzles per group that I haven’t yet made it to the second group to find out whether or how it’s different from the first. (That said, there are still too many puzzles per group. And why are they called “episodes”?) Cons: • The timer is useless, and the star system is pointless. These are related: the number of stars awarded is based on the time taken to solve the puzzle. But if you get fewer than full stars, you can just replay the level, solve it in a couple seconds (you just solved a puzzle with very few moves!), and get full stars. I don’t think a rating system makes sense in this kind of puzzle anyway. I’d strongly recommend getting rid of both the timer and the stars. • Sometimes the interface doesn’t recognise my selection when I try to pick up or place a match. Not infrequently I have to tap several times before the app responds. • I find shape and math puzzles different enough that I’d really appreciate having them offered separately. This would be easy to implement given that the puzzles are already separated into groups. • There’s no progression in puzzle difficulty that I’ve noticed yet. • The congratulation screen pops up too quickly to see the solution you just laid out. • The music is too repetitive. Yes, I could switch it off, but I like having a reason to keep it on!