Game Reviews

Slide Circus

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iOS
| Slide Circus
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Slide Circus
|
iOS
| Slide Circus

Sliding block games are all about slight variations - little twists to the formula that either add something new or take something away. A few of these iterations work, while the rest of them remain too loyal to an old template or wander too far from the familiar, and become forgettable.

Slide Circus adds its new ideas slowly, teasing you with a precise difficulty curve and an enticing lick of paint before sideswiping you with portals, locked blocks, and more. In the process it creates one of the most memorable sliding block puzzlers on the App Store.

Slide with me

Things begin sedately, with simple pictures that are easy to reconstruct. You slide blocks around with a swipe of your finger, and each column wraps around the screen. Send a piece of the image off the top and it’ll reappear at the bottom.

Your success is calculated not just in completing the image, but the number of moves it takes you to join the scattered parts back together again. Take too many and, while you can move onto the next puzzle, you won’t get the perfect score completionists hunger for.

Soon the game is trying its utmost to upset the serenity of your sliding. Locked blocks can’t be moved at all, completely jamming two columns and narrowing your scope for block-swapping. Portal blocks, on the other hand, are parts of the image that remain stationary but that you can slide other blocks through.

Slide of hand

There are plenty of puzzles to work your way through, each more difficult and carefully considered than the last. It’s easy to get flummoxed, but the game lets you check the image you’re trying to recreate as many times as you want.

Slide Circus is a game of logic and clear thinking, wrapped up in a gorgeous UI and with a great soundtrack to boot. It’s not fast or furious, and nor is it a revolution in the sliding block genre, but it is brilliantly well-constructed and a lot of fun.

If you’re looking for a game to scratch that simple, sedate puzzling itch, then you could do a lot worse than picking this up.

Slide Circus

A clever twist on a well worn template, Slide Circus has enough new ideas to make it essential for sliding block fans
Score
Harry Slater
Harry Slater
Harry used to be really good at Snake on the Nokia 5110. Apparently though, digital snake wrangling isn't a proper job, so now he writes words about games instead.