puzzle quest

content/games/ds/puzzle-quest.md

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+---
+title: "Puzzle Quest a.k.a. Roleplaying Bejeweled"
+date: 2023-06-08T16:56:00+02:00
+score: 3
+game_release_year: 2007
+howlongtobeat_id: 7427
+howlongtobeat_hrs: 34.7
+game_name: "Puzzle Quest"
+game_developer: 'Infinite Interactive'
+game_genre: 'Puzzle'
+tags:
+  - 'puzzle'
+---
+
+What do you get when you combine an animal zoo with the Bejeweled gemstones in a 2D grid? [Zoo Keeper](/games/ds/zoo-keeper) (2004). What do you get when you combine RPG mechanics with those same jewels? _Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords_ (2007) and a bazillion successors, spin-offs and rip-offs such as _Puzzle Quest Galactrix_, _Gems of War_, and even a _Marvel Puzzle Quest_. As an RPG fan but a match-three skeptic, I was long aware of this game but dismissed it as too casual and too bland. I was right about the latter, but wrong about the first: _Puzzle Quest_ successfully manages to mix (some) RPG mechanics into the well-established Bejeweled line and ends up feeling refreshing because of it. I played the first incarnation on the Nintendo DS, which was released for the DS and PSP and later ported to other platforms---it even recently got a ["remaster" on the Nintendo Switch](https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=puzzle+quest+switch).
+
+I'm clearly in a puzzling mood lately: honestly, the energy for something more meaty is temporarily absent. Although, in a sense, _Puzzle Quest_ could be called meaty as well: the campaign takes more than 30 hours to beat and the inclusion of various RPG mechanics makes for a surprisingly strategic game where an eye has to be kept at all possible moves your enemy might make the next turn.
+
+But let's first start with the easy part, which is also the bad part: _Puzzle Quest_ on the Nintendo DS is butt-ugly. Animations are barely present, matched jewels appear and disappear sloppy, the artwork is passable at best, and the UI is very player unfriendly. I've been punished for making an illegal move countless of times when the game misinterpreted my stylus touch, it was unclear to me how to even select an item in the shop or get more information about it, and I had no idea you could change your 6 active spells in the "Hero Inventory" sub-screen somewhere. That means my wizard was holding off his powerful fireball spell for five levels because I was stupid enough to keep on low-level firebolting enemies---whoops. That might have been partially my mistake, but the roughness of the interface and overall graphic design is hard to ignore. It's just not pleasant to look at. If that is going to be an issue for you, the Switch version of course features extremely crisp jewels and a slightly reworked interface, based on the PSP layout because of the screen orientation. 
+
+![](fireball4kind.jpg "Left: I trigger a Fireball in a 3x3 grid. Right: a 4-of-a-kind chain going off.")
+
+I was also quick to mute the generic music that runs in repeat. As soon as you hear a title screen music popping up in battles you know low-level assets are being reused, which is not a particularly good sign. So far, little RPG vibe... It doesn't get any better when you take a closer look at the quests themselves: the main storyline is forgetful and a bland high fantasy matter that mainly consists of annoying fetch quests and laughably bad banter. After a few hours of stupid text, I just skipped them. If you don't care about the quest at all, you an always engage in an instant-battle from the start screen. Optional quests are present and usually a good idea to pick up just to grind and get ready for the chapter boss. The occasionally rewarded loot never interested me much once I bought the potent Firewalker's Staff that acts as a multiplier, but to do that, you'll have to hit the shops often, as items are stocked randomly: another annoyance. 
+
+So far, nothing but misery, so why bother even touching _Puzzle Quest_? Because the Bejeweled addiction is still present and correct. Not only that, the curve balls that have been thrown in are surprisingly interesting. Here's a short overview of the features that makes _Puzzle Quest_ stand out from your average match-3 clone:
+
+- The four available classes (druid, knight, warrior, wizard) matter and do offer a slightly different play style: skills bound to a class (such as my Hand of Power and Fireball) predict which gem colors you'll be going for to trigger a finishing move. 
+- The right equipped items can be a huge boost to your damage/defense/health, so it _is_ important to gear up.
+- You can capture monsters to use them as mounts which means the seventh skill slot is flexible (the Rabit Bite from a Giant Rat in the above screenshots).
+- As you level up, you can dump points into various skills such as fire/earth mastery, which grants mana bonuses to matches and even potentially changes the gems on the field after a match. 
+- There's even a Citadel mode where you gradually expand your own stronghold, opening up possibilities to craft spells (after collecting the right runes) convert money into skill points, ...
+- You can pick up companions along the way which grant bonuses to certain enemy types. For instance, Darkhunter provides a damage bonus against undead.
+
+Additionally, there is no time limit (although it's there if you want to), and more importantly, your enemy is working in _the same grid_! That means every move counts and you need to keep watch of your enemy's mana level, "hate drafting" now and then to prevent a bomb from going off. 
+
+![](shopmap.jpg "Left: Buying new gear in the shop. Right: the world map where I can pick quests.")
+
+There's a difficulty setting that tends to be too easy at _easy_---ignoring obvious skull matches that are direct hits---and sometimes too difficult for me at _medium_. Make no mistake, this is still Bejeweled: new gems appear randomly if you cleared a (part of a) row or column. That means you might get lucky---very lucky. Or your enemy might. 4-of-a-kinds that trigger another turn will cascade if the right colors appear. Or they will destroy you, which can make attempting to find a strategy quite frustrating. In the end, I just went with damage multipliers (Hand of Power) and a 3x3 grid destroy spell (Fireball) that also grants the effects of the destroyed gems, meaning it's easy for my wizard to "snipe" those extra damaging glowing skulls. I've read the Warrior class is even more ridiculous. 
+
+Is _Puzzle Quest_ worth it? Here's an indication: somehow I ended up writing more than 1000 words about a Bejeweled clone. The original _Puzzle Quest_ clearly has a lot of neat ideas of which some are well-implemented. It's unfortunate that the muddling presentation distracts from the game, which I presume has been heavily tinkered with in the three years between this and _Puzzle Quest 2_. I ended up getting bored with it about halfway through and that's okay: _Challenge of the Warlords_ is surprisingly packed---even tough the quests themselves are empty shells.
+
+If you fancy a gem slider with a bit of body, take a look at _Puzzle Quest_.