Legend of Solgard 9+

I’m really enjoying Legend of Solgard. The matches are varied from very easy to maddeningly difficult, and the challenge level doesn’t always seem to be tied to the journey level. I’ve seen some complaints from people that you gather game stuff and xp too slowly, or that you have to pay to win. I can comfortably play in the morning and evening without running out of energy and I’m not buying from the store. (Sorry, King) However, I did pony up for a $4.99 special because I’ve honestly had a lot of enjoyment so far and look forward to more. I’m always surprised by people who are shocked at the concept of paying something for an app—do they really think companies make them because they don’t plan to earn any money?
Having a guild group that works together to whittle down a boss is nice, although it looks like we have no chance against the coiners in the leaderboards. I totally love the fact that the store will hang on to two treasure chests for you since I need to be at work during the day or getting some sleep, so 8 hours away is no big deal. (Thanks, King!)
The characters are very cute and I love most of the animations except for that thing Grimchop does—you’ll know when you see it!
I’m no expert in match 3 games and I’m sure there’s always room for improvement, but I’m having fun, I’m never quite sure if I’m going to be pumping my fist or groaning in despair after a hard-fought battle, and I love the graphics. Try it out!

I love this game, I really do. The gameplay mechanics are fun, there’s a great creature variety that can be built up over time, lots of fun play modes, and a very engaged player community. This could be really big over multiple years if Snowprint/King manage it well.

Why one star? They’re not managing it well, they’re doing the exact opposite. There has been a long-standing “test” that gives dramatically better gold rewards to some players and much worse rewards to others. This is creating a toxic haves and have-nots culture in the game. Great players who love the game but drew the wrong straw are quitting. It is straight up poor management of a player base and not okay. End the experiment and put everyone on a level playing field before you completely destroy the player base you’ve built!

* Updated Jan 28: all the feedback seems to have worked and with the latest update they’ve put players all back onto the same equal footing, so upping the rating to 5 stars again

This is a very fun game that really draws you in at the start. At first it seems like there is good progression. And it is true that there are enough game modes that you can “grind” and level up your character. But alas it will happen - the inevitable paywall. Unfortunately it comes in a pretty frustrating way as things seem to go good until your turns no longer can come up with matches in any way shape or form as the computer. Yes I get it’s a game of chance but something gets really fishy when you can have the exact same characters as the computer (on arena mode for example) and somehow every turn they get matches on ALL their moves and you PERHAPS get one. It happens very consistently almost to the point that you have no choice but to spend to level up your characters or to unlock new ones to stand a chance. Even if the computer got matches half the time it would be more balanced but they seriously get the best random placement 90% of the time. There’s no way I should get obliterated over and over using the same characters at the same level as the computer. And the campaign eventually uses so much energy even if you win you can only play around 5 matches or so before having to wait for the extremely slow energy refill system. So again to play you’ll have to pay. I really really liked this game and the numerous game mode options made me feel like I could patiently grind day by day but the playing field has officially become way to unbalanced.