Links

It’s odd how a game can make you want to like it despite not being very good. Links is just such a game.

Its falling block, match-'em-up gameplay is as shallow as a teaspoon, and for the most part it just doesn’t work very well.

It tries valiantly, though, and it has some great ideas, not to mention an enchanting visual style. Sadly, it all probably worked better on paper than it does in final execution.

Busting your blocks

You start with a nearly blank grid with Tetris-style coloured blocks cascading down from the top of the screen. You're charged with manipulating the blocks by dragging them into position before double-tapping them to make them fall to the bottom.

Flicking a finger upwards on a piece will change its orientation, so you can can match it with any available spaces. The idea is to match a set number of same-coloured blocks, which then makes those blocks disappear.

Additionally, there are six icons at the top of the screen that affect gameplay when pressed. One slows the cascade speed, one unleashes a power-up block, one causes all of the blocks to collapse into any available spaces, and so on.

These icons are only made available by successive block combinations, after which you can pick the icon that best suits your tangled mass of blocky conundrums. It’s a good idea for a game mechanic that falls down in several ways.

Colour blind

Firstly, the shape and colour combinations of the blocks have not been tailored to the extent that scoring coloured combinations is fun or rewarding. It often feels like the stream of cascading blocks is too random and mismatched and that all important sense of possibility is seldom apparent.

Match-'em-up games thrive on two things: the knowledge that you could have scored big if you had just made a slightly different move, and the incredible combination matches that come about unexpectedly after a perfectly placed piece.

Links lacks both, which saps any excitement or reward from the experience. Moreover, interesting though the special icons are their usefulness is hit and miss (usually miss).

Missing link

This is all confounded by an overlarge board with room for too many pieces. Despite the limited possibilities to match colours and eradicate blocks from the board, it takes an age for it to fill and games become protracted, even boring, affairs.

It's a shame, because Links has great visual style. The board is speckled with incidental animations that make moving and placing the blocks an enjoyable process, and you can customise the behaviour the blocks, adding in a glow effect or shapes within each cube.

The sound effects and music are also well-finished and thoughtfully designed, which is at odds with the garbled and occasionally tedious gameplay.

Links tries hard and in some areas succeeds. The most important area, however - gameplay - is the most damaged and this goes a long way towards undoing a good idea and accomplished presentation.