You can’t beat a good social game playing application to kill a few minutes every now and again. Couple that with some mathematical thinking and it’s a perfect combination. I’ve played this most recent application “Matching with Friends” and am really enjoying it.
Zynga has some great word games but this one is just a bit different. It’s steep in mathematical reasoning and visualization and I’m really enjoying it. I still have a long way to go towards mastery but so far, it’s been a great learning trip.
It’s a simple concept. You play on an 8×8 grid and you’re presented with three 1×3 pieces at each round. Your goal is to place the pieces on the gameboard to make chains of 3 or more to score points. Pink, yellow, red, blue and green are the operative colours here. The longer the chain, the greater the point count.
To heighten the level of play, you’ll notice that some of the squares on the grid are worth double and the corners are worth triple. Wild card squares (show as stars) appear periodically to create matches. Combine them with long chains and multipliers to get the most points. It’s great fun to do a little mental math to see how many points a potential move will be. But, if you want more points, rotate the piece to a different orientation and maybe move it to a new location! There is so much logic involved in finding the perfect location for your tiles to maximize the score.
You’ll note from the screen capture above that I’m still learning how to optimize my moves but it’s fun trying.
If you’re stuck there are various bombs to blow up any tiles that are in the road – you can’t layer here.
And, the best part is that the pieces have musical tones attached to them! So, you can create a tune by moving your finger around the playboard while thinking!
This game is a winner. If you’re competitive and like a good challenge, give it a try to see if you don’t agree.
Powered by Qumana
doug -- off the record 
Please share your thoughts here. I’d enjoy reading them.