Reiner Knizia’s Topas: Making Dominoes Challenging
I’ve been a huge fan of board games all my life. In fact, I’m so odd that I often buy board games just to read the rules and see the mechanics of things. That to me is just as fun as actually playing the game. I know… I’m strange that way.
Among my favorite games to read/play is anything by Reiner Knizia. For those not in the know, Reiner is the creator of many great games that challenge the mind. It helps that he has a PhD in Mathematics, but it’s also earned him a slew of awards and a place in the Gaming Hall of Fame.
Some of his games have been finding their way to the App Store and I’ve picked them all up, with mixed results. The reason for the results has more to do with the different developers that have taken on the games than the actual games themselves. Happily, the latest game, “Topaz” skews things back into the positive side.
Don't let the cartoon look fool you. This game will work your brain.
In Topaz, Doctor Knizia’s ability to take a simple puzzle concept and twist it around your brain is in full form. The game play is simple. You drop domino looking tiles on a board, matching up colors and try to score as many points as you can. But you can’t total up more than seven points in any one string of colors. It’s simple, but there is a lot of strategy that goes into making sure that you can get the most points possible.
There are three game modes to keep things interesting. In “Arcade” mode you place your tiles on the board normally, going for points. Once you complete a row of seven points the tiles are removed, making room for more tiles. If you can make it through 36 tiles the board clears and you keep going, gathering points.
“Color” mode forces you to gather 10 points in each of the four colors. Keep in mind that you still can’t get more than seven points in any one string. But my favorite mode is “Weakest Link”. In this game you actually play four separate games with eight tiles each. The score that counts is the next to last highest score. For some reason I really like this quirky scoring method and find myself playing this version the most.
Each play mode has full online scoreboard with AGON. Being able to test your skills against the world is a great incentive to play again and again.
I really like the overall look of the game. The comic look is a nice way to mask the high challenge found within. The colors are rich and vibrant.
The only real problem I have with the game is the control. It’s not that it’s horrible, it’s just that you need to play this game with two hands/thumbs/whatever. With one finger you drag and drop the tile into place, but you have to tap the screen with a different finger, without letting go of the other finger, in order to get the tile to turn. This game should be an easy one handed game, but the two finger control makes it a little bit of a disappointment for me.
But that one little issue aside, I’m finding “Topaz” to be not only one of my favorite Knizia games, but one of my favorite puzzle games on my iPhone as well. It’s a great pick up and play puzzler that can have you spending hours and hours playing “just one more time”.
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Excellent review. My only exposure to Reiner Knizia’s games has been through playing on my iPhone. Most have been really good fun. Easy to play and understand but challenging to do well at. Looks like this is another of his games I should try.
Welcome back, Bob. You and I see eye-to-eye on a lot of things. These little puzzle games are ideal for the iDevice format. The Knizia brand makes this an easy buy.