Games like Brickshooter and Frozen Bubble

January 18, 2015 1:09 PM

I'm looking for Windows games that are similar to Brickshooter and Frozen Bubble.

Relatives love playing Brickshooter and Frozen Bubble. They're variations on the classic "match three" scenario. But they're getting bored with doing very similar things over and over and are looking for a little (but not too much) variation. I'm looking for suggestions of games that are similar, but not identical. They've also enjoyed playing Candy Crush (things falling from above, match several), Tetris (match shapes to make lines), Sokoban (solve a puzzle by moving squares to different locations). Games like chess are completely out as there are "too many rules". They tried to have a go at God Of Light on my phone, and seemed to enjoy it but the graphics put them off (they handled the concept of the game just fine).

Caveats: the games need to be playable offline as the internet connection is spotty and ideally have simple, clear interfaces as one of the relatives has problems with their vision.

posted by Solomon to Computers & Internet (5 answers total)

I found Two Dots to be awesome - easy to learn, and new rules are added very slowly after you've mastered the original concept. The only thing is that you only get 5 lives at a time. New (free) lives are generated every 20 minutes so it can get annoying if you are on a tough level and keep dying. Or you can buy new lives, but that gets expensive. Not sure how that compares to other games because this is the only game I've played through more than a handful of levels!

On review: Sorry, I'm an idiot and got tripped up by the game they played on your phone. This is a game for mobile devices, not a Windows game!
posted by barnone at 1:28 PM on January 18, 2015

Do your relatives have Windows 8? I'd recommend Hexic. If not, they can download and try out Hexic here and purchase it if they enjoy it. In Hexic you create groups of the same color tiles to clear them from the board by spinning pieces.

I'd also recommend Lumines on Steam. Lumines should be playable offline after you download it and toggle on the offline mode in Steam.
posted by QueenHawkeye at 3:22 PM on January 18, 2015

Check out Zuma from Popcap. It's a classic that they should find very familiar yet challenging in a new way. It's spawned a whole genre of clones like Luxor, which itself has four sequels, so if they like that one, they'll like the others.
posted by blue t-shirt at 7:47 PM on January 18, 2015

They might like the Atlantis games: The Rise of Atlantis, Talismans of Atlantis, and Call of Atlantis. (The last one is actually a hybrid match 3/hidden object game.) All are lots of fun. They can download them for free (and legally!) from this site or this site, among others.
posted by SisterHavana at 2:04 AM on January 20, 2015

Response by poster: I've only installed Rise of Atlantis so far, just over a week ago, and they've played it for a few hours *every night* since. I've suggested I install something else for them, too, but they seem fixated to want to play RoA and nothing else right now. When I can wrest the laptop away from them, I'll get them to try something else as well. Thanks for the suggestions!
posted by Solomon at 10:55 AM on February 2, 2015