Macenstein

It takes a brave journalist, a hero, some would say, to recommend the top-selling app on iTunes, but that is just what this man is willing to do.

Fair warning, Threes (on sale for $1.99) is a number-based puzzle game, so if you are an idiot, you may want to steer clear. However, at its heart Threes is really a matching game, so even very young children should be able to understand the rules.

As you can see in the gif above, the object is to combine like numbers together and keep the board clear. So you can drag two 3’s together, to form one 6, and drag two 6’s together to form a 12. The only real math comes in the form of the blue 1’s and pink 2’s, which can be combined to form a 3. That’s it. Of course, as with most seemingly simple games, there IS a fair degree of strategy that can be employed, and I have slowed my gameplay down from its original “boom! match. Boom! match” to ” Hmmm… if I drag this here, what will this set up in two moves…”.

Threes also attempts to avoid the stuffiness that sometimes plagues number games by adding cute voices and tiny faces to the tiles, and the music is also well done and somehow manages to not become annoying even in prolonged marathon plays.

Anyway, I love the game, and you should get it. My high score is current in the 3000’s 7000’s after only a day, which I think is pretty good (despite the top players being somewhere around 100 million) so part of the reason I am reviewing this is to brag a bit and throw down a challenge to the rest of you. GameCenter = Dr Macenstein.