Dapple is a color-matching puzzle game that has received some attention for incorporating a color-blind mode that aids its chroma-impaired players with distinctly shaped puzzle pieces instead of the normal globs of paint. I have heard that this method has actually allowed some color-blind reviewers to gain a better understanding of the primary and secondary colors. This is necessary to note before I officially start my review, as I am not color-blind, and therefore gain nothing from this mode of play, although I do commend the developers for taking a stand for the civil rights of all achromatopsians. Because I respect this move so much, I will first discuss the only great element I found in this game.
Dapple had me excited in the beginning. This was due in large to the music, which, despite any other qualms I had about the game, was constantly awesome. It?s like nothing you?ve ever heard; it starts off with a small jazz riff, transforms into a pickin? folk tune with some church-from-a-Japanese-RPG melody behind it, and eventually breaks with a drum-roll into some sick hip-hop beats, while at the same time maintaining all the other elements from the beginning of the song. This is the only song you will hear throughout the entirety of your Dapple career, but it is the best song I have ever heard on any mobile game. Ever.
Now on to what keeps this game from being fun.
I don?t feel it necessary to delve into Dapple?s every detail. You?ve all played puzzle games, you know how they work. There?s one mechanic, and then you use that mechanic to make patterns or lines which makes blocks or circles or triangles disappear. In the case of Dapple, you use a paintbrush to change the colors of amorphous blobs of paint, and when you can make a connection of at least four blobs, they disappear. Some blocks may get locked in with brown paint, which is the only source of difficulty in the game. The color changes take you back to kindergarten, as you have to remember your color combinations. A red paintbrush on a blue blob gives you purple, a yellow stroke on a blue blob makes it green, etc. These basic color combinations are the only the only ones that make sense though; adding red to orange yields perfect red, same as adding it to purple, however adding red to green yields brown, which you can?t make in the game. While I understand that this is true to real life, it doesn?t translate well into a puzzle game. It?s very difficult to gain any skill at this game, as no matter how hard I try, my eyes just won?t recognize that purple plus red equals red, because it doesn?t. If you actually took red paint, and mixed it with purple paint, it would be pink. I?ve known this to be true since Ms. Schmidt?s class decades ago, and can?t switch that way of thinking now.
See how confusing that paragraph was? Now imagine if that paragraph were a game. Yeah, I wouldn?t play it either.
Eventually I got so frustrated with Dapple that I just started touching the screen randomly, as there?s no punishment for wrong guesses. This is when I discovered that all my work to understand the color combinations was frivolous: I was a better player when guessing randomly than actually trying to figure out my next move. Or, if I sat there and tried my hardest to actually find combinations, a hint arrow would point me to my next move before I had time to find it. In all fairness, you can turn this hint arrow off, and I did, but still? The game has this complex structure that it would lead you to believe it wants you to learn, but if it?s this idiot proof than there?s no reason to do so! I achieved higher scores when tapping arbitrarily on the screen than when playing the game by its own rules, which ruins the entire point of the game, and therefore makes it meaningless except for its soundtrack.
I wanted to like Dapple. I really did. But every time I gave it another honest shot, it gave me something else to not like about it. I had friends play it, I had brothers play it, and everyone felt the same way: don?t play Dapple. Its bright vibrant colors try in vain to make up for its dull and gray gameplay. There are games exactly (and I mean exactly) like it that are much better and much cheaper. Just find some way to hear that song without spending five bucks. I recommend visiting the developer?s website, and checking out their trailers of the game. You?ll get to hear the song, and you?ll be able to decide for yourself if Dapple is worth your money.





EDIT: Dapple is now on sale for $2.99. But still don't buy it.