Relaxing puzzlers need to find a balance between being calm, engaging and challenging. It’s a difficult mix to strike, and while =7 has some nice ideas, it doesn’t quite manage to blend them together to create an essential gaming experience.
The game is all about matching dice. You need to bounce a die along a line of other dice, landing it so the two faces add up to seven. Rinse and repeat. You’ll score points for making more matches, with a multiplier for reaching the end of the level.
You control the game using swipes. There are three sections at the bottom of the screen – swipe one to bounce one die along, another for two and a third for three. It’s a neat way of making sure you’re not making annoying mistakes.
There are stars to collect as well, hovering above certain dice. Sometimes it’s impossible to grab these, since if the faces of the dice don’t add up to 7 it’s game over and you need to start the level again. You can spend the stars on new skins for your dice.
Except the skins only change the bouncing die, leaving everything else looking exactly the same. And when you think about it there are only three combinations of matches to make here already.
You keep expecting the game to add something new, to throw a twist in to keep you interested, but it never comes. Sure, there’s a drone-like compulsion to the bouncing, but it’s more akin to counting sheep than anything else.
This isn’t a terrible game by any means, but after a while the lack of depth becomes telling. You’ll fail because you lost concentration, and you’ll have lost concentration because things have just gotten a bit dull.
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