after 10h playing this game seems the only way to wind is paying to get better items. uninstall it now

Interesting idea, very bad implementation and begs for money on any occasion

9/10. A good time killer

I first heard of the game a long time ago, but I was wondering how a free-to-play Match X game would work out, so I picked it up. 900+ hours later I still find this game ok for focusing on other background shows what I wouldn't bother hearing / watching otherwise.

Gems of War is basically very similar to a mix of the original Puzzle Quest and Puzzle Kingdoms, while expanding a lot of different fronts. In Gems of War you have a team of up to 4 troops, one of which can be your hero (the weapon troop). You match gems to get mana or do skull damage and each troop can cast it's own spell and has some special passive skills (after being unlocked).

While essentially a Match 3 game, Gems of War exceeds more on the meta game department due to the very large possibility pool of about 1500 troops and about 600 weapons (as of the day of writing). Each of them are classified based on different factors, like rarity, kingdom, class, mana color, race and so on. With this in mind, there are different events (daily, weekly and seasonal) that come in with different restrictions so you can mix and match from your available troop pool in an attempt to get as far as possible and help both yourself and the guild you are in. The troops can mostly be collected from different sources, most of which are chests with varying random chances associated with them, while others only come from specific events and sources. While the current design of the troop section looks similar to a trading card game, you cannot actually trade your troops, so your overall collection is purely based on your luck and some other contributions.

As a core concept, GoW is pretty simple, but it surpasses other Match 3 games in the overall diversity and probably addictiveness. The cycled weekly events and new troops keep the content fresh while the interaction with your guild can provide some sense of sociability (although all chats can be turned off).

Also GoW has a lot of pop-culture references and a lot of cameos from their previous games or from different other sources from the gaming industry, while blending in well with the overall aesthetics. I find this pretty cool.

The negative parts of the game come in a lot of weird forms that will impact you in some way, but sometimes either not directly or not for a long period of time. The first issue here, as a new player, is after finishing the forced tutorial, you will be staring at a screen with dozens of options and you'll have little idea of what is going on, because, sadly the game gives you a very poor overview of all the screens. A lot of extra information can be found on their helpdesk info screen, but not actually in game.

After exploring these menus you'll quickly find out that a lot of them, contain only paid deals for different items that you don't even know if you need or not (and you mostly don't). The paid items in GoW are mostly not necessary. They will give you a head start on some events and may provide some items that may be harder to obtain naturally. At he same time, most packs and deals are way, way too expensive for their actual worth in-game, so if planning to actually buy anything, you should think if you will get an actual benefit from that amount of cash. On the positive note, the game keeps tracks of your overall purchases and you will get permanent bonuses based on your lifetime contributions. At level 6, you get access to a VIP daily deal, but to unlock that you have to spend over 200$ with the game (and I don't plan to).

The other weird part at the beginning is the difficulty. Besides not knowing what anything does, you will have just a handful of troops and will struggle with the global quests which will be way, way over your overall power. At level 20 when you will join a guild, you will receive so many keys, that on your first Monday (if in a higher tier guild) you will receive hundreds of new troops. This will give you too many options in a very short time and may not even help you out that much because you will need to upgrade the troops for them to be actually useful.

Difficulty balancing persist throughout the game and is obvious in the weekly events, the explore battles and especially in PVP. For some weird reason, in PVP you are matched based on your character's level, not by your troop power, so once you jump to the next interval (like passing level 999) you will probably loose every single match. At higher overall power, you will start to notice that paid users will probably have better stats due to the fact that they can upgrade early, but at the same time, the meta can work in your favor and stats will probably mean just an extra turn.

The most frustrating part of the game is the low drop rates of the various loot boxes and tying these to various events (like for example Journey and Bounty which require Orbs of Ascension to upgrade the troops, if you don't want to buy the whole pack), very grindy daily tasks (like the Underworld), or the Soulforge (crafting boss and dragon troops). Sometimes these percentages change (like when a new mythical is released or after collecting and upgrading the guild guardian troops) and the new percentages are not reflected in-game. Due to the random nature, you can basically waste months of resources in an attempt to find a mythic or a specific component and you may not be able to get it even if the percentage shown may be ok. Also events like the Underspire are mathematically impossible to finish without spending resources each day. The asking price is very high, the benefit is very low and I'll have to grind forever for items that cannot even be bought. I feel a distinct lack of respect and I don't feel the need to contribute back.

Overall, if your a fan of the Match X genre, you should check this game out. Being a free-to-play, it's actually worth nothing to give it a try.

Other recommendations:
- Puzzle Quest: Galactrix for the 6-way, match 3 puzzles. It also has some trading elements. The first Puzzle Quest games are great overall.
- Tetrisphere, while this is a old game for the Nintendo 64, it is basically Tetris on a 3D ball. You must match elements until you can reach the core. Really unique concept.
- Idle Champions of the Forgotten Realms, for the meta game. You make formations based on different tiered champions and try to match their abilities to progress as far as possible. The game is disguised as a clicker game, but the (auto-)clicker part is only used to gather resources later in the game.