JellyBooom review

JellyBooom is a fun match 3 style game for the iPhone and iPod touch from Ninewheels Apps. As soon as you launch the app for the first time you’ll know it’s gonna be a fun game. JellyBooom comes with game-show style background music and goofy jelly block characters enriched with high-res graphics and simple gameplay. The idea behind the game is simple, as with most match 3 games, and JellyBooom blends in its own unique style. The jelly bricks have faces and show emotions, which adds to the cute factor. The blocks will freeze or get locked in place if you’re not quick enough with your moves. The bubble popping sound effects are spot on and the complexity level builds up with enough pace to keep you from getting bored.

In JellyBooom there are rows of jiggling jelly bricks piled on top of each other. The rows or columns can be slided up/down/left/right to match 3 or more colored blocks. Though you can only move stuff vertically or horizontally, the blocks can match diagonally as well. You can cause chain reaction combos intentionally or unintentionally, which adds to its lighthearted fun.

In Original mode, you’re playing survival, trying to remove as much jellies in a limited amount of time and avoiding being stuck. There is a countdown timer gauge in the level that is renewed each time you clear blocks. Don’t let it get to the bottom or you’ll die. You have 3 lives in each game.

Jellies sometimes will stick together with a chain. When this happens, you’ll have to slide all the blocks simultaneously. The other challenge is when jellies are glued together, in which case you can’t even move that line. The “chained” and “glued” jellies seem to appear when you’re not playing quick enough or just when the levels get more difficult. Either way they definitely make this game a lot more challenging.

Scoring is calculated using combos generated. You can see the number of combos accumulated on top in yellow. You’ll notice a couple of magic help arrows next to the pause button. These help items are awarded after every 3 stages and will clear up a bunch of jelly blocks, great for when you’re glued or chained in or just can’t seem to find a match. They come in either vertical or horizontal styles, and you can rack up to 3 of each. Next to the arrows, you’ll see a single colored block. This is the “mission” jelly, so keep an eye on this mission through out each stage. Clear this color and you’ll get double score and you can do it a few times per stage. Time Attack mode is where you try to get the most combos in 1 minute. Leaderboards are on OpenFeint.

There is no way to exit out of a stage for some reason. You can pause a game using the pause button, but there is no way to exit a level and go back to the main menu. Games are auto-saved which is good if you have to close the app.

Although I really enjoy playing JellyBooom it can get pointless after a long time, since the levels just never stop. You just keep playing and earning scores. There is no way to see how you’ve done in the past levels or view a list of upcoming stages, which would really help.

You will find that JellyBooom is good for quick pick-up and play gaming. If you have a minute or two and just want a match-3 game that opens quickly, looks beautiful, and is fun to play, this will be a good buy. There’s also a free version to get you started.

Here is a video demo of the JellyBooom app on the iPhone

AppSafari Rating: 3.5/5

AppSafari review of JellyBooom was written by Joe Seifi on February 6th, 2011 and categorized under App Store, Featured, Fun, Games, Puzzler. Page viewed 5004 times, 2 so far today. Need help on using these apps? Please read the Help Page.