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Category: Matching game
Developer: PlayScreen
Requirements: iPhone 2.2.1 software
Compatibility: iPhone and iPod touch
File Size: 9.6 MB
Version Reviewed: 1.05.14
Price: $3.99 (Lite version available for free)

There’s no shortage of games where you have to match blocks in order to make them vanish. What Match 3D brings to the table is that the playing field is an 8x8x8 cube which you can rotate on any axis by flicking. You make the blocks disappear by matching three or more side-by-side (diagonal doesn’t count), so you’ll have to quickly learn to think in three dimensions.

Fortunately the Match3D interface makes this easy to learn: getting to the inside boxes is done by tapping the wire-frame button on the bottom of the screen, which takes you along the various views: surface, top and bottom. Using the left and right arrow keys next to navigate the inner levels, you’ll soon learn that since the boxes have symbols on all four faces, you’re dealing with 48 fields of play. Though the boxes are small, there colors and graphic design make each one easily identifiable.

The game gets even more complicated as you advance in levels: multi-boxes and bombs will help you race the clock, but blank boxes (which can’t be moved) and locked boxes (which can’t be switched) will quickly start to add up. The key to getting past the higher levels is mastering your powerups, which can allow you to do things like eliminate a single, troublesome block, to randomly reassign all the blocks on the grid, and to cause all the blocks to throb if moving them could cause a link to happen.

Many of the options can be turned off; locked, blank, bomb, and multi-boxes can be disabled, as can the clock for more leisurely games. If you do play with the clock, quickly eliminating boxes and getting multiple chains add more time. There are two modes of play: classic (where eliminating a set causing new blocks to fall in to fill the hole) and Survival (where the blocks are not replaced, and you advance to the next level by finding and eliminating all possible combinations).

Match3D has quickly become one of my favorite iPod touch games; colorful and fast moving, it takes advantage of the iPhone interface and adds new life to a familiar concept.