Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords is a match-3 vs turn-based fantasy RPG hybrid. At first, it sounded like the weirdest, most likely to fail mesh of genres ever, but it's actually ingenious. You and your opponent take turns matching pieces on a match-three style board. Matching a certain color gives you mana of that color, and matching skulls deals damage to the enemy. Whoever runs out of life first, loses.
It's pretty strategic: being a class-based RPG, there are a lot of character skills that can be used during battle. Sometimes it's better to forgo immediate damage for a huge chunk of mana, and sometimes it's better to forgo mana for your own skills and focus on snatching mana your opponents need before they do. Plus, it gives the game a decent amount of replayability.
The quest itself is... the writing is not great, and reads off as amateurish. But the real issue is that the game is padded to an unbelievable extent. There's an unbelievable amount of fetch quests in the game, both as sidequests and as part of the main story. "Go kill a monster, then return and kill another". "Go fetch three to five things before we can go after the bad guy". "Go somewhere to get an item, and there will be a surprise ambush on the way like on those eight other quests". So on and so forth.
Especially if you complete all of the side content, it's possible to reach the level cap about halfway through the game, which means that for the other half, the game's combat stagnates. Equipment becomes similarly irrelevant. The RPG systems are only designed to support a game 20 hours shorter.
Which is a shame, because this is otherwise the best match-3 game I've ever played. I wish it didn't grossly overstay its welcome as it does, because with a better and shorter story, this could have been an even more unforgettable experience.
It's pretty strategic: being a class-based RPG, there are a lot of character skills that can be used during battle. Sometimes it's better to forgo immediate damage for a huge chunk of mana, and sometimes it's better to forgo mana for your own skills and focus on snatching mana your opponents need before they do. Plus, it gives the game a decent amount of replayability.
The quest itself is... the writing is not great, and reads off as amateurish. But the real issue is that the game is padded to an unbelievable extent. There's an unbelievable amount of fetch quests in the game, both as sidequests and as part of the main story. "Go kill a monster, then return and kill another". "Go fetch three to five things before we can go after the bad guy". "Go somewhere to get an item, and there will be a surprise ambush on the way like on those eight other quests". So on and so forth.
Especially if you complete all of the side content, it's possible to reach the level cap about halfway through the game, which means that for the other half, the game's combat stagnates. Equipment becomes similarly irrelevant. The RPG systems are only designed to support a game 20 hours shorter.
Which is a shame, because this is otherwise the best match-3 game I've ever played. I wish it didn't grossly overstay its welcome as it does, because with a better and shorter story, this could have been an even more unforgettable experience.