Physics based puzzle games are not exactly uncommon, especially among casual game markets like the App Store, so when I first took out my iPod Touch and loaded up Tumbledrop I honestly didn’t expect it to stand out that much.  I also didn’t expect it to become one of my favorite games on the platform.  Damn I was happy to be proven wrong.

Completing a level with only one move is a real challenge, and super satisfying!

You only have one goal throughout the entire game: get the pink star to safety.  On every level you’ll have some sort of arrangement of yellow blocks with the pink star somewhere on top.  You’ll tap on yellow blocks to eliminate them and that’s where the physics come in as the whole structure starts to tumble, hence the name.  In order to pass each level you’ll need to ensure that your pink star lands on solid ground and doesn’t plummet into the pools of water on either side, a task rendered even more challenging by addition of a cooldown period between each block elimination.

I wouldn’t blame anyone for thinking that until now the game still sounds pretty run-of-the-mill because everything I’ve talked about up till now kind of is, but that’s only because I haven’t mentioned how amazingly charming this game is.  Every piece has a cute little :3 emoticon face on it and when they are about to fall into the water their expression changes to one of absolutely silly terror.  It just adds so much fun to the game when you remove a wrong piece and watch as a whole pile of totally freaked out little block fall slowly to their doom, and it almost makes you want to fail levels on purpose just to get a laugh.  Every level ends with a big smile on your star and a giant screen filling rainbow just so you know you did well.  All in all it just oozes with so much charm and silliness that the only people it wouldn’t make smile are the same kind of people who punch babies.

The main mode in the game simply tasks you with completing various sets of levels that increase in difficulty as you progress.  You can earn medals on each level by either completing if with very few turns or with as many as possible.  It’s actually quite fun to return to a previously completed level and try to figure out how to get these different medals; believe me it’s way harder than it sounds.  Normally I would have to knock Tumbledrop for the fact that its gameplay can start to rely too much on trial and error, however the developers included another game mode called quick play that throws that complaint out the window.  In quick play, you’ll complete randomly selected levels and try to rack up as many points as you can.  The catch is that if your star falls into the water once you have to start back at 0.  This forces you to really think about what you do and try to predict how the physics will react.  Overall I thought it added a great level of replayability and a lot more challenge to an already great game.

Watching the pieces freak out when they're headed for the water is absolutely hilarious

If I were to rate this game on the quality of its rainbows alone I would give it a perfect score.  But light spectrums aside, this is honestly an amazingly fun, charming, and challenging game that everyone should probably buy.  That’s why I give it the only rainbow-filled rating we have, a Golden Tap.

Fantastic art style, and I can’t wait to get my hands on it!