Dapple – If you’ve played Aurora Feint, Bejeweled or other games where you line up three or four similar objects to eliminate them, then you already have a good idea of what Streaming Colour Studios’ Dapple is about.
Dapple comes with a twist though. You have to match paint blobs by first mixing two complementary colors and then aligning four blobs of the same color to eliminate them.
Dapple’s graphics are bright, lively and well rendered and the soundtrack and SFX are engaging. If you like mix-and-match games, you’ll get the hang of it quickly, although Dapple is more challenging than most games I’ve played in this genre.
At each turn you’re give a color-tipped brush, which you must mix with a complementary color on the board. For example, mix the yellow paint on the brush with a blue blob to make the blob green. Tap the blob once to get a preview of the mix and how that affects the colors in the adjacent blobs. You need at least four blobs of the same color to remove them from the board.
At the higher levels, brown squares with a dab of color in the middle drop into view. To eliminate them, you need to match the color in their middles. The brown squares are a bit of a priority because they spread to adjacent squares, making it more difficult to eliminate them.
If you match at least six colors at once, you’ll receive a water drop bonus, which explodes nine squares surrounding it. If you match eight or more paint squares, you’ll receive a diamond bonus, which explodes all the paint blobs of the same color on the board.
From the home screen on Dapple, tap the appropriate button to start or resume a game, learn how to play, options, high scores and credits. Under Options, you can adjust the soundtrack and SFX, reset game playing tips, enable hints and color-blind mode.
Dapple has three modes: Classic (free play), Timed (play against the clock) and 2-Play (play against a friend on the same device). In Timed mode, you also have the options of Easy, Medium, Hard and Ridiculous.
Dapple has a lot going for it, but I’m not sure I would be willing to pay the usual asking price of $4.99 for another match game. However, Dapple is on sale at the moment for $2.99 (40 percent off) and that sets it off from the regular crowd.