Where Cards Fall Reviews

First 5 minutes of this game and I was instantly disappointed. So much attention to the artwork and the actual game itself is numb. Why do developers put so much effort into looks if they aren’t going to do so with the actual gameplay itself. First and foremost for Apple TV users a controller is a must and there is no support with this game. Dealing with the ATV remote is an awful experience. Second, you must abide by the little circles. No room for exploring just select a circle and the little person moves. Tedious AF. Third, after 5 minutes of frustration, upset enough to right a review and then delete this terrible game. Apple, if you’re going to require a subscription for games like this you need to work a little better or else Apple Arcade is gonna be just another failed attempt at Mac entering the video game scene.

I like the simplicity of this puzzler of trying to guide the character to the final destination in each level. It has a feel similar to The Gardens Between, where it tells a coming of age story with minimalism and symbolism in its surroundings and short cutscenes. For QoL, the game could’ve benefitted with an undo button as the later stages if you happen to mess up or accidentally move the character off their position then you have to re-setup everything again which gets tiresome especially how slow the character moves. I haven’t fully grasped the story yet as it’s very subtle with its storytelling as you interpret what is happening since there’s no dialog, I was curious to see where it goes but...

My major factor to my score was that there is a major save bug with this game which I’ve lost my progress twice already after I was more than halfway completed. Not sure why it did as my local storage and iCloud has plenty of space available. But after the 2nd time, it’s not worth my time to redo it all over again a 3rd as the game isn’t compelling enough for me to repeat after this issue. Recommend to wait till this bug is fixed before playing this game.

The visuals and sound are lovely and the card folding/unfolding feels nice, but I quit very early. It feels like the aesthetic and the attempted story work against the game's puzzle nature. The detailed environment makes me want to explore and try things, but it's not that kind of game — you expand, collapse, and rearrange boxes to unlock cutscenes, and that's it. And all I got out of the few cutscenes I watched is that some people talked — no sense of the content, mood, or importance.

The narrative aspect also frustrates me because I have no clear sense of why I'm moving thru the levels or why buildings and doors made of cards are a thing. If the game were more purely a puzzler, this wouldn't matter — the goal is to solve the puzzles and the card-buildings are just a quirky choice. But half burying the puzzle nature under the story and aesthetic changes my expectations and leaves me disappointed.

Its a so-so puzzle game. Par for the course for arcade but engaging enough when there’s nothing better to do. The controls are annoying imprecise but I can live with that. There’s some story that you’re forced to sit through but honestly I’ve never felt the need unmute my phone so I don’t even know if there’s talking or just implied talking. It doesn’t strike me as captivating art.

The puzzles take maybe a quarter of my attention to solve so, when I’m bored enough to actually slog thru this game, I would prefer to also be able to listen to a podcast or a book. Not so. The game dominates the sound output even with the phone in silent mode and the slides for all sounds pushed to zero. How conceited do you have to be as a dev to think that your boring little game with easy puzzles is so engaging that it needs someone’s full attention? Those games do exist. Almost never on phones. Generally, a puzzler is something to waste some time with. If I want to play something that requires full-brain attention, I won’t do so on a tiny screen. It’s three star game otherwise: ok, not great.

I love the game but needs a lot of improvements. The major problem is that every time I stop playing, the game log out itself and lose all the progress I made and back to wherever they want and I have to play again the levels I’ve already played. There’s no option to save before logging out.
The story of the boy is confusing and there’s no option to skip it. I stopped playing the game because I’m tired of playing the same levels over and over again.

This game looks great but is frustrating. The pace is slow. There are several things that look like they can be interacted with (household items, people, signs) and seem to invite action (ghost people reading a sign) but do nothing, leading to a lot of useless tapping to convince yourself that there’s nothing to be done. Then you might notice the icon in the lower left and decide to see if there is more info there. You might tap the card deck and see some individual cards. What happens when you tap these unmanned cards? Some explanation of what your doing? A detailed view of that card? No, your level gets reset to the beginning without warning, and that card disappears. Expecting other great random frustrations from this game, i think I’ll stop here at the beginning where its left me.

I really like this game, it’s relaxing and the quality of the graphics is awesome.

My only qualm is that the game is inconsistent with where I leave off every time I exit and re-enter the game. I have progressed a bit but I’m taking the game little bits at a time and there have been instances where the game opens up and I’m WAAAAY behind in levels that I have passed a few days ago with no way to get back to where I was. And then other times it plops me right back into where I was. I just don’t love playing roulette every time I open WhereCardsFall .

iCloud box is checked and it logs into my Apple account when WhereCardsFall opens so I’m really not sure how this keeps happening. Bummed out and hope this is fixable.

The puzzles are interesting but repetitive. The whole house of cards of different sizes thing is unique but once you figure out a couple of solutions all the rest are just slight variations. The worst part is I finish a level and it’s not a sense of satisfaction but rather dread, that I have to sit through another cutscene. These are usually vague, sometimes long, always unskippable (and that’s the most egregious offense).
This whole “coming of age” story thing makes no sense and isn’t even a story because there’s no dialog or anything to give the viewer any “buy in”, it’s just this confusing interruption in the game play. That said the puzzles are what keeps me playing but never for more than a level or two because of the cut scenes.

The gameplay is fun until it becomes repetitive. If the play scenes were a little longer and perhaps a little more complex, it would be even more fun. As others have stated, the cut scenes are a pain. There is no way to skip them, and they provide no additional details on how to solve the next level. To the developer, please add a Skip button, or better yet an option in the settings to always skip the cut scenes. This way the game flows a lot quicker.

I wasn’t expecting a whole lot of this game as I tend to lose interest in puzzle games pretty quickly. The graphics are beautiful and the music isn’t distracting. The gameplay? Annoying. Other than showing you how to move the cards and build houses and get hints, there are no instructions for this game. Want to know what this card does without clicking it? Too bad. Want to know what this random asset is? Click on it and figure out how you messed yourself up. Want to get further help? LOL - silly, that’s not what the help button is for! It just explains the mechanics of the cards.

Also, the “story” makes no sense! I get that it’s a slice of life/trip down memory lane kind of deal, but I have no idea what I’m looking at in the cutscenes. Who’s eyes are those? Why are they different colors? Is the main character aware of the eyes and therefore interact with them? Your guess is as good as mine because that’s not explained - ever. The whole thing feels pointless.

Love the actual puzzles. Not too easy and not too hard. With a few here and there that actually stumped me for a bit.

Great artwork.

Personally I could do without the storyline cutscenes. It really slows down the actual gameplay.

Game mechanics could use some fine tuning. It would be nice to be able to zoom in or out. It’s really frustrating not being able to see the entire playing field on some levels without moving the screen around. The game seems almost too eager to react when I’m adjusting the size of cards. I barley move my fingers and it rapidly expands or shrinks between sizes. Or I touch part of the screen intending to move my view to that area, but the game interprets my touch as me wanting to move my character, which in some frustrating instances can cause me to have to redo many moves.

It is a very nice game but it loses its current level lots of the time and it is annoying!! I’m in the page third right now and already passed 6 level there and after some time it still starts me at lage 3rd level1! Please fix this bug

I think the game puzzles are interesting and enjoyable, and I’ve been having fun working through them. I don’t mind the cut scenes, but I find them very confusing. I don’t know what they are showing me. Are they building to some ultimate story? If so, you’ve lost me. I don’t think you need to remove them, but a skip would be good for some. And making them a little more understandable for those of us that enjoy a little story with our puzzles would be good for the rest of us. Thanks for a fun game!

Okay. So this game is very fun, and it is very relaxing. It has a very good storyline and I enjoy the game. However there are a few improvements that could be made. First, there should be customization options. Please add some feature into the game to where you can change the background color/design of the cards as this would make it very nice. Second of all, you should allow players to create their own characters and use them in the game as it would make the vibe and feel of the game more personal. Lastly, you should allow players to decide what to wear from a closet or bedroom or just a menu. Again this would make the game feel better. Please don’t add in-game currency though, as that would ruin the peaceful and puzzle-like vibes that run through the game. Other than this, I really enjoy the game.

Honestly I love this game. I’m not sure what I was expecting when I downloaded it but let me say I have been surprised.

It’s a little tricky at first because there are no directions or like a tutorial to get you used to the gameplay before you start, since there’s no words or written notes.

Other than this small blip, the game is amazing. It’s fun, challenging, cute storyline. I’ve almost finished it and I started the game this evening, I just can’t put it down.

Please (!!) make a follow up to this. I absolutely LOVE this game….so much that I’ve ended up playing a bit before bed, except it turns into hours and the sun is coming up. 😂 i love doing puzzles and some abstract thinking - this is even great to replay & set my own goals (ie: time trial, not use hints, finish in least amount of moves…)

Keep it coming!

Just finished. Worthwhile level of challenge. Beautiful artwork. Peaceful and engaging. Definitely worthy of high marks if you like challenging but not excruciating puzzle games.

Opportunities for improvement.

1. Agree the cut aways are not everyone’s cup of tea, but I liked them. Eventually, you enjoy the creative artwork and get the unique storyline, albeit melancholy. However, I was a little ticked off with the ending being less than anti-climactic. For all of that effort, something a little bit more celebratory in both a graphic and storyline perspective would have been just rewards. Sadly, without more punch in the end felt cheated of my time. If it not for the artful puzzles, I would have given it a lower rating for that reason alone.

2.Please give the user the option of opening and closing the deck of cards with different movements or clicks. Having to pinch Open and close was extremely cumbersome. Most importantly, if you made an error, it could send your character to places you didn’t want to go and completely mess up all of your hard work on that level. I almost stopped playing because of it.

This game has been one of my absolute favorite games on Apple Arcade. It is truly one of a handful that keeps me giving up my $5 a month to play it.

Sure it is not without it’s issues but updates will fix them and it’s small things here and there. Honestly, forming the cards to build things and solve the puzzles is really gratifying. And I like that it’s challenging enough but not ridiculously so. It’s a mobile game, I play games on my phone to unwind and relax and this game is so perfect for that. Thank you for making it, I think it’s a masterpiece and I look forward to future updates!

The game mechanic here is original and quite satisfying to interact with. I can't imagine how this works on a PC as the touch interface seems ideally suited for how it's presented. At first I thought the game was going to be rather short, but then the scenes kept coming and new intricacies are introduced at a reasonably modest pace.

I wish I could say I was getting a lot out of the story, the made-up "gibberish" language seems rather pointless and I have no idea what the disembodied eyes are supposed to represent.

The save issue as described by others is present...i.e. if WhereCardsFall closes down due to memory management it's possible your progress can be reset to an earlier level. I discovered that if I immediately close and relaunch WhereCardsFall it returns me to the latest level I'm playing. Amazing that the sophisticated gameplay and graphic design can be so well-executed, but these simple housekeeping tasks present challenges.

All in all, the game has me hooked and I would be interested to see a sequel.

It’s peaceful and has an unique take. I haven’t played a game like this one before. The scenes are beautiful; the music and game are very enjoyable. I would not say that the premise or anything about the game is frustrating.

If you’re looking for a fast-paced, get-to-the-point game, I’m afraid this isn’t the one for you. The adolescent scenes are enjoyable and calming. I enjoy the reminiscent feel. I don’t think this is a game for everyone, but the controls are simple and easy to follow. The ones who commented that it was “frustrating” or “confusing” simply haven’t played a lot of games. A layman can understand it. You’ll know right away after the first two levels if it’s a game that you’ll enjoy.

My least enjoyable Arcade experience BY FAR. I really wanted to like this one, but found ABSOLUTELY no redeeming qualities. The story is boring, ineptly told, and completely pointless. The puzzles could have, SHOULD HAVE, been great, but instead they are so poorly defined, perspective-wise, that almost all of my difficulty came from not being able to decipher exactly how tall or how distant the fixed and movable puzzles pieces were. Allowing us to rotate the scenes, or better art and design work on the perspectives, would have completely changed this game (for the better). After about 15 puzzles, I just gave up and started using the hint system, which, if you can believe it, is also terrible. How hard is it to include a working hint system? The hints sometimes work, but will often show you where a piece needs to go, without any hints about how to get it there.

I finished this by watching videos of the solutions, just because I want to experience everything Arcade has to offer, but I was frankly relieved when this “game” was over. I would give zero stars if I could.

I saw that there was an update so I tried this game again hoping that they had done something to remove or speed up the slow, nonsensical cut scenes. Boy was I disappointed. This game has got to be one of the most frustrating I’ve ever played. I want to like it because the graphics are great and the concept is cool. The puzzles are fun and challenging. BUT THE CUT SCENES MAKE IT UNPLAYABLE. And it wouldn’t be so bad if they even half way made sense! But it’s just awful.

It is a very buggy software.

- Aesthetics over fun
- Boring puzzles
- Weak narrative

The game is ok for a 5 year old. 12 years is really pushing it

The game is great but playing on an iPad 7th gen feels terrible (the game runs at <30 FPS)

I will start off by saying that this was one of the reasons I joined Apple Arcade. This game is ingenious with the way they present you with puzzles. The mechanics are fun and fairly easy. Some puzzles will make you stop and rethink your play. Only downside I can find is that there’s absolutely no replay value once you complete the stages, nor any rewards when successfully clearing out a stage other than opening the next stage. Graphics are intriguing too.

Now, it seems that my game save has been reset after WhereCardsFall update. This is really a bummer because I was more than halfway done with the game, and knowing exactly how much replay value it has (none), I find it very hard to just start over. I will leave WhereCardsFall on my phone with hopes that the game save will show up again, but knowing how this works, I will not get my hopes up.

Thanks for this experience. I enjoyed it while it worked.

This game is lovely, with a calming atmosphere and clever puzzles. Unfortunately, many of the cutscenes and some of the levels have random flashing/strobe lights that can trigger migraines or seizures for people like me. It’s always disappointing when I encounter an enjoyable game that could easily be accessible but is not due to superfluous strobe effects.

The cut scenes seem obscure as others posters mentioned. At first they were something to just get through but I did eventually start paying more attention to the story. It seems to relate a little but not a lot. I did experience most of the glitchy things that others also mentioned but meh I just kept plugging away anyway. It would be nice to save mid level progress and also lock the person in place. It would also be nice to be able to skip the story if I wanted to. Or if not to be able to zoom in more close to the characters and their scenes. I like the hints a lot. I stopped playing the enchanted world game because it was maddening to not have any hints at all. Oh and I almost forgot to mention. I really like the music and sounds from this game. When I play with my beats on it’s very soothing to listen to.

I really enjoyed the gameplay on puzzles, also the sound design and music is amazing. It gives some sense of satisfaction. But that euphoria of finishing a puzzle is getting ruined by the forced cut scenes that you have to watch it and try to make sense of it!

It’s a simple platformer(in a sense), it’s very aesthetically pleasing and movements are intuitive.
I’m not sure if the cutscenes involve loading new levels, I’ll admit they are irritating.

If you’re unwilling to let them be skippable, please at least make them automatic if possible.

Overall A+. devs deserve a cookie.

Love the puzzles! Best game of all I played.
On first green iPad Pro there’s problem with battery consumption: 1.5 hours game play used 75% of battery.

Ok my last review was a little harsher than intended and apologies for that! I gave the the game another try and enjoyed it. it’s a great relaxing puzzle game with a unique mechanic. The visuals are gorgeous and the game is definitely worth checking out!

Updated *** All fixed woo!
Original- Great game but has iCloud issues. Near perfect game but had to take off one star for icloud not working. I been playing on iPhone and now trying to play on ipad pro but it won’t sync no matter what I tried. Happy to update when fixed.