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I've been playing Trivia Linked for the past week or two and enjoying its short daily quizzes. It almost feels akin to Wordle in how it is a short-form routine challenge, but I appreciate that it less of a guessing game. It's certainly not perfect and it lacks some very obvious features, but it is fun for what it is.

Make the connection

As you can probably guess from the name, Trivia Linked is a trivia game. It doesn't really have written questions, though. Instead, it serves up a prompt and then two possible choices. The right choice is a response that has some relation to the prompt. For example, a challenge last week had the prompt “Sic semper tyrannis” and listed “Virginia” and “Maine” underneath. Virginia is the right choice as sic semper tyrannis are written on the Virginia state seal and flag.

No matter which answer you pick, Trivia Linked then uses the correct answer from the previous screen as the prompt for the next question. Your goal every day is to get all 12 “links” between these prompts correct.

Just the facts

Part of what has kept my attention with Trivia Linked is its “question” design, or rather lack thereof. In addition to having a clever structure that has you basically word associate through terms and phrases, there's an added benefit having virtually no ambiguity when it comes to providing answers. This is a seemingly small thing, but it often is what ends up putting my off of other trivia games in most cases.

As for the variety of the questions themselves, I could stand to see different realms of trivia explored a bit more. In my time with the game, it seems like a lot of challenges have at least one link about identifying some historical figure's nationality. Still, I can deal with rigidity much more easily than I can either repetition or vagueness.

You get what you pay for

Most times, I complete my Trivia Linked challenge in one go since it doesn't have the wide-open possibilities of something like Wordle. That said, there was one day I got interrupted in my play only to revisit the game later on and see that my incomplete score got logged and everything I didn't complete got automatically marked as incorrect. I don't really care about maintaining my own stats or anything (which the app tracks right on the title screen), but it was annoying that I couldn't even give the other questions a go because I got interrupted.

There was also one time where I opened the app and it said that the game simply wasn't available to play, which was also less than ideal. Between these things and also the seemingly glaring omission of a fun way to share your results with friends, Trivia Linked definitely limits its own appeal. And, before anyone says anything, I know that the game has a way to share your results, it's just not visually appealing and feels more like an ad for the app as opposed to a reflection on your own performance.

The bottom line

Despite what might sound like some pretty significant issues, I am still quite satisfied with Trivia Linked's style of associative trivia. I suppose a big part of that is the fact that the game is completely free, but then again, I likely wouldn't mind throwing a little money at a game like this if it could tighten up some of its design.

Source link:https://www.148apps.com/reviews/trivialinked-review/

After making games about green, red, yellow, black, blue, and pink, Bart Bonte has released yet another set of 50 puzzles inspired by yet another color: Orange. While I'm not sure this game quite reaches the levels of creativity found in his last color-based outing, Orange is nevertheless a fun little puzzle game.

Orange you curious?

As with all of his previous color puzzle games, Orange is a series of single-screen puzzle inspired by and stylized around a single color. In the case of this game, it means solving puzzles using traffic cones, basketballs, eponymous fruit, etc. and often also having to manipulate or spell out the word “orange.”

Most of these puzzles have completely unique mechanics governing how you reach a solution, though some ideas get recycled with additional kinks added to them to keep them fresh. Each of these puzzles usually takes just a few minutes at most to complete and a lot of the game's appeal is the novelty of discovering what the next orange-inspired challenge will be.

Pondering the orange

I'm typically impressed with Bart Bonte's ability to capture a feeling or a vibe associated with the colors for his games, but with Orange, I couldn't quite dial in on a specific tone. Where Pink was whimsical and loud and Green was more meditative and calm, Orange doesn't quite feel like it has its own distinct flavor.

I think some of this affects the overall puzzle design, as well. Some of the challenges in Orange can feel somewhat obtuse. This has been an issue in previous games as well, but it feels the most pronounced here, which can leave you scratching your head on puzzles that seem designed for you to punch through with relative ease.

Color compare

Just as with all of the other titles, Orange is free-to-play and allows you to play through the whole game without spending money. Free players get served ads if they decide to use Orange's in-game hint system, though ads can be removed from the game from a straightforward $1.99 in-app purchase.

The hint system–as always–is great at indicating how to proceed through puzzles gently without just giving answers away. Unfortunately, though, I found myself needing to use these hints quite a bit to make it through Orange for the reasons I mentioned earlier.

The bottom line

Orange is another quality entry in Bonte's color puzzle series, though it does feel perhaps like a step back from what I enjoyed about previous titles. There's a slight lack of confidence here that makes it just a little less impactful than others, though with it being free you can find out easily enough for yourself whether you agree.

Source link:https://www.148apps.com/reviews/orange-review/