It’s not very often that we review two games at the same time, in fact we’ve only really done it once before but when we were sent a copy of Macthify to review it seemed to make a lot of sense to cover it and Dobble in the same review, because they are strikingly similar games.
Dobble, also known as Spot It!, is a game is played with a series of disc shaped cards each one illustrated with a number of random objects. There are a number of different games types available, but each game boils down to the same basic concept; on any two discs there will be one—and only one—matching pair of icons and your job is to spot that pair before anyone else.
We covered Star Wars Dobble a few years ago, and although we liked it we were forced to admit that its really just a fancy game of snap, perfect for kids and family events but not something a hardcore cardboard addict is going to be reaching for every game night.
The difference between Dobble and Matchify is that Matchify is played with two separate decks—one of which sports a red border—and the aim of the game is not to spot two identical items but to link two separate items together. You may link the bride with the groom, the clown with the circus tent or the baby with a milk bottle. This simple difffernce changes the pace of the game; its still a frantic race to find a match first, but there’s sometimes a delay as players try to mentally make a link between the two items... well to begin with at least.
This icon linking gameplay is not without its problems. The rulebook states that the links are defined, in that a certain object must always link with another specific object. The problem is that people’s brains don’t work like that, the baby’s bottle should always be linked to the baby—according to the rules—but of course someone will make a link between a cow and the baby’s bottle, and you can’t just say “no, how dare you have an imagination”.
The other issue is that there are only so many icons on the cards, so even halfway through the first game we had learnt most of the links, which on the plus side meant that the game sped up, but also meant that the aspect that differentiated Matchify from Dobble was now moot and we were back to playing the exact same game.
Both Matchify and Dobble are not games for me, and I really am the wrong person to be reviewing these. They’re games that are perfect for kids but for many adults—including my parents who find Ticket to Ride at the top end of acceptable complexity—the games are too simplistic.
This review is based on a full retail copy of the game provided by the publisher.
0 comments:
Post a Comment