Storm Tale Reviews

Storm Tale is an enjoyable Match-3 game with a very good level progress through achievements and excellent graphics. Am only about 33% through the game, and would strongly recommend it to anyone seeking a relaxing, quiet Match-3 game.

it's a nice game that looks great and plays wonderfully, but progression is slow and it takes forever to buy new buildings - it's not my favorite Match 03, but it's very nice - eight out of ten stolen cheese wheels

I've already played a few Match 3 games and this is definitely one of the better ones of this kind. I had a lot of fun with it. There are various bonuses to complete the level faster or to get to the next level, which really helps in some levels. I would buy it again and can recommend it.

Mobile-like/port. Limited boosters and gems for more moves system. Some specifics: Can skip story dialogue, which is kind of bland anyway, but can't skip level load and results screens. Achievements work on relaxed mode, which is good with the mobile-style booster/gem system that's in-place. Booster descriptions don't explain what they do, just where to place them. They are also purchased with gems earned through story and trophy system. Gems are also used to get more moves if using challenge mode. Comboing TNT/Bombs, etc doesn't have any special effects. Each still destroys the exact amount of tokens as normal. Building the town is pre-designed, you don't get choices. Trophy rewards have to be collected manually. Cloud save is janky. It insisted my save was out of date between Desktop and SteamDeck, but nothing carried over. While it functions, it plays poorly on Deck. The cursor showing on SteamDeck means extra tapping or swiping to make sure it's in the right spot and it's easy to swipe the wrong token.

What can I tell you about the game Storm Tale? Keep in mind, I'm a huge fan of match-3 games and can play just about anything, so don't think I have any difficulties with the genre. 1. It's a somewhat botched port from the mobile platform: it still has the mechanic of collecting emeralds to squeeze money out of you, but since they added a "relax" mode, these emeralds are pretty much redundant. This mechanic is totally unnecessary. Plus, there are minor bugs: on the playing field, you have transparent people and animals, and Steam achievements are unlocked separately from the game's own achievements, with a bit of a delay. But these are just trifles. 2. It's incredibly boring; the game has a hundred levels, and from start to finish, it's practically the same mechanics. How does the game ramp up the difficulty? Very simply, if initially a tile could be broken with one hit, by the end, it takes three. Basically, you breeze through levels at the beginning and then crawl through them at the end. That's about it. 3. I bought the game because I saw the city-building aspect. I thought, "Hooray - my beloved match-3 plus city construction!" But no such luck. You just accumulate money and they draw new buildings for you. That's it. No actual building or city development mechanics in the game. Such a letdown. I finished the game. Don't know why. It's a very average "match-3", a port from the mobile platform, lacking interesting mechanics, a storyline, or any extra features. On the bright side: the music and sounds are pleasant.

I really enjoyed this game. I like Match 3's that aren't too smarmy and ridiculous and ones that aren't so difficult that make you weep with frustration. I also appreciation choices that don't penalize you (such as playing straight matches -vs- limited moves). I'm quite proficient with Match 3's, however, my extreme OCD and limited moves just don't get along together. I keep wanting to clear the whole board rather than focusing on the goal, which is usually just clear out some portion or part of the board or get to the other side, or something like that. The story line is decent and the graphics are good. The achievements are all doable, though the having to stretch the play out into days can be frustrating. But all in all, well done.

Game feels like a free to play mobile game that has currency i would have expected to be purchased if i was playing on a mobile device. (EG Pay to win) However there is no satisfaction to this game when completing stages. Feels very one dimensional. No depth to the game just incremental updates that have no meaning to the gameplay.

Bright and colorful Match 3 puzzle game. It has a decent story for this kind of game. It starts out a bit dramatically with your village being burned and wiped out, and you must solve the match puzzle boards to earn gold to rebuild. I've seen a few reviews that say it feels like a mobile game (not sure since I don't play mobile games, only 2 times in hospital when they gave me a tablet with games on it to occupy myself with some years ago). I could see this on a tablet, or on Facebook. No micro-transactions, but it is set up in a way that it could be done, I suppose. ***[b][u]Accessibility[/u][/b]*** Very few options- no colorblindness settings. But the icons are large and distinctly shaped. There could be some issue determining stone tiles from gold tiles, or seeing red apples on green grass tiles. You may need to use system color-blindness settings to make things more visible. Text is fairly large, but there is no UI or font scaling. Multiple difficulty settings to customize the challenge level of the game, which is nice, Make it easier or harder, with 3 game modes- Challenge, Timed, or Relaxed. And 2 difficulty settings- Expert or Casual. Puzzle difficulty progression is good, no sudden spikes in difficulty, and the game has an optional tutorial that is good at explaining things. You can also access the tutorial at any time in a book found in the upper right corner of the game board. For people with short attention spans or difficulty focusing on long tasks to completion- this will be a tough one. There are multiple achievements for playing a certain number of levels in a row- meaning you keep playing through levels without exiting the game. And as you increase in levels, it takes more time and focus to clear the boards needed to complete the levels. The story is delivered through voice acting and full text, so it is possible to play without needing to hear anything in the game. [b]For people with photosensitive seizure disorders- there are flashing lights and explosions which give off quickly flashing lights. This could be an issue, and the game has no warning about this, anywhere.[/b] ***************************************************************************************************** The game is fine for what it is, a casual Match 3 puzzle game. It does have some visual or audio glitches at times, most of which do not affect gameplay, though one can- if you grab the sword or another power-up icon to use on a tile at the same time an auto-shuffle occurs, the power-up can get stuck on the board and become unusable until the next level. I did get hit with this one twice, and though I was able to complete the level in spite of the glitch- it was a pain. You can restart the level from the menu button at the top of the screen. You can (and likely will) have all Steam Achievements before completing all 100 levels, but you do have to complete all 1100 levels to complete the rebuilding of the town. You can replay levels by locking the book at the top right of the game board, clicking on the Levels tab, and clicking on a level you have already played but want to play again. This is important if you are playing on expert and/or challenge mode. You may need to replay to get top scores or use power-up a certain number of times for achievements. Best bought in the bundle of 2 games (ST/ST2) and on sale. It's not a bad game, and would be family friendly and appropriate for children to play with parental supervision (some thing may need to be explained), and could be good for learning problem solving, planning and strategy. (quick edit to correct a few typos)

A standard Match 3, no surprises here. However, all its components work well, making for a fun time. Game mechanics are varied enough, and scale right- no sudden jump from basic to what-the-heck levels. The graphics are very pretty and the music pleasant and unobtrusive. Players can select from three different levels of difficulty- easy, hard, or timed. Achievements (54) can be obtained on any of those modes. Worth the play.

A nice match 3 game with a story and town building. I completed the game (on the easiest setting) and got all achievements in 10 hours. It will take a bit more if you choose a higher difficulty setting. I think this game is made by the same developers that made that magic school match 3 game series, because it has similar power-ups and sounds and special things like lava blocks. For me the magic school ones were more fun because the story was upbeat, just purchase items to decorate for halloween. This game has a more serious story and the soundtrack sounds like medieval theme. Basically some big bad guy and his evil minions came through and destroyed the village and we have to rebuild everything. Earn gold during the match 3 levels to purchase buildings. You also earn green stars to purchase power-ups. There are 4 power-ups and unlike in the magic school games where they recharge over time, in Storm Tale you purchase the power-ups and only have a small amount so don't waste them or be frivilous in their use because you will run out. You have a daily chance of getting a couple free power-ups from the treasure chest game--basically pick a chest out of six and get a random power-up or some green stars. I found my best chance of getting powe-ups instead of just a handful of green stars is to choose from the middle column. The power-ups are: Sword - removes a tile/icon Axe - removes a block, stone, chains, or metal tile (does not work on fire blocks) Whirlwind - takes all the icons and randomly rearranges them Lightning (my favorite) - removes all of one type of icons (i.e. all of the bread icrons) -- handy for chained icons and iced ones. In addition to power-ups you get bombs of different sizes when you match 4, 5, or 6 icons. Achievements are pretty easy, most of them you get by playing (like remove a certain number of tiles) but there are also some you have to do like play 25 levels in a row and play 6 days in a row. A little irritating but not hard to get. As I said I got everything in 10 hours. My only complaint is it's too short, though there are 100 levels. Maybe I should try it on hard difficulty and see how long it takes me!