Castle Story: Puzzle & Choice Reviews

by Thebugmom

Ok - the positives - early in the game when you can beat the levels, it is a LOT of fun, making choices, fixing the castle, etc. However, It quickly devolves into pay to win - levels become too hard to win by playing and you must rely heavily on cash money purchases for in game currency in order to progress. I experimented and had a level I could not beat, trying over and over, then I made a cash purchase and Lo and behold, got exactly the moves I needed to win, lol. I would never let me kids have access to this game!!! It’s a shame because the match 3 can be very zen like and it’s fun to fix up the places, I’d be happy to pay a fair price to do just that. But this game is rigged to get your cash.

by ShFluffy

Update 2- Now up to two dozen lives owed... crown/bomb combo kicks me off EVERY. TIME! I would have won about 10 games if this hadn't happened. Emails to your feedback go unanswered... what is happening? It was a good game until this!
Update - you now owe me 9 lives... EVERY SINGLE GAME FROZE IN THE MIDLDLE AND KICKED ME OFF!! I reboot only to have lost a life and the boosters ... PLEASE. FIX. THE. GAME. 😤
The game seems to purposely mess up moves, like if I slide one way it goes another, and the bees are more against you than with you half the time. Over half the levels I’ve played have literally ended with ONE square left... maddening!
And now after the 9/29 update today, almost every other time I would do a crown/bomb or rocket combo, the game would freeze, kick me off, and I would have to reboot to find I’m a life down and any boosters I used taken🤬 ... y'all owe me about 4 lives, and couple of each booster!
It’s too bad, because the premise is good, but I should not be spending 30-40 minutes on ONE level between having to reboot and the glitches... people will get discouraged and delete the game. Hopefully it will be fixed soon.

by Not Satisified!

This game says it is for 4 years of age plus. Why are the games so hard? There is no way a 4 yr old can win some of these games. Several different age levels in our family are playing this game and some of the games are extremely hard. It took me almost 2 days to win one level with no kind of reward to help out. There is no way my littles could win it! And why does it take 2 and 3 scrolls just to do simple little things? Why not just use 1 scroll for each task done? And why does the direction change when you are trying to use a bomb or one of the bonuses? I want to go one way and it goes the other! And sometimes I might be almost winning with maybe 1 or2 left to do and have maybe 4 or 5 moves left to do it in and all of a sudden my moves are gone! Why not have a choice level that you have to pick for the level of difficulty ? That way everyone could be happy and you wouldn’t have to use up all of your bonuses before you really need them? I am not very happy and almost ready to delete!

by Poo2New

I became ill and downloaded game so not to be bored. It was fun for awhile because I was moving up levels. The levels got harder and harder to pass. Right now Ive been trying to pass 87. There is no way, I have been trying for 2 days. There have been a couple of other levels I had trouble with so I bought a hammer and i passed the level. This game is obviously set up so you have to buy the coins, the time, the bank that gets filled up with your winnings, and the tools that make the game possible to win. Plus getting all the scrolls to talk to the other people in the castle and decorate. Well they succeeded in getting me to purchase $100.
I know, I know, I could have stopped at any given time, but I was crazed woman and was going to do anything to win.
also, there were no instructions the first time I played. Little popup’s did appear a couple of days ago…. better late then never! The End

by SMC5115

I’ve lost so many levels and rewards because the game glitches. For example level 369 had two colors on one square and I couldn’t move either one. The dynamite was behind one and it wouldn’t let me use it so I lost the level and the rewards.

Thanks for contacting me but there is no possible way for me to go back and screenshot what is happening. I also agree about the fish. Those levels are absolute trash. Any other game lets you move them by matching next to them. This game makes you hit them with a power up. I was also charged $60 when I bought ONE $9.99 coin pack. They charged me several more times. I tried to dispute but it got me nowhere. This game is a cash grab. Definitely not worth the money or the headache. Deleting CastleStory . Don’t waste your time or money.

by Luckylittlecat

For instance, the other night I saw an ad showing the little princess being abandoned (as in literally thrown out) by her unfaithful father after her mom dies and left alone to fend for herself in yet another “fail” scenario. Child abuse is not something to joke about or try to justify, especially not where children can see it.
Another ad shows the royal family mourning the old king’s death, then cuts to the young king cheating on the queen so that she and the little princess must leave for an abandoned house, which they apparently fail to fix up. The idea that women can’t be both handy and good at interior decorating is simply not true.
It’s 2022 now. Please stop showing these harmful stereotypes to kids. It’s only driving people away.

by Pattyjm59

This is your typical game like Homescapes, Gardenscapes, etc. It starts out fun for several levels, although this one did become a bit tedious sooner than the others. There are no extra mini-games or such like the others have. But just like the others, as you get to the higher levels, they start charging more for stupid things. At first everything is only one scroll, then it goes up to two scrolls for everything. And they charge you one scroll to go to sleep, walk downstairs, read letters, etc.

That in of itself is not a big deal. But then they make the higher levels so difficult and virtually impossible to pass unless you pay money and buy power ups and more lives. Most of these games do this and it’s extremely annoying. I would just as soon pay a fee upfront and be able to play without having to buy anything else. And when the levels get too hard to pass without buying things, it’s frustrating and will quickly make you lose interest.

That being said, it is fun to play until you get to the point that I mentioned above. But now it’s time to delete it and find another one.

by Mike's Lady

I started off by loving this game thinking “Finally a game that isn’t so difficult that you can’t enjoy it.” Now that I passed level 300 some levels are almost impossible to beat. The amount of coins you earn are so low that it takes forever to have enough to purchase power ups. They just did an upgrade and now it takes 3 or 4 scrolls to accomplish one thing in improving the castle. As with all the games this one is no longer enjoyable. I guess it’ll be one more game deleted. Very disappointing Creators of the game.

by Rippedoff4thelasttime

Like too many match 3 games, it starts off fun, but after they think you are invested in the game, a higher percentage of the levels are impossibly hard so that you either have to buy items to get through the level or spend hours to days of frustration trying to win.
These levels are designed to be impossible until the designers manipulate the fall of the symbols to allow for a win. It’s no longer about skill but about how much money you can spend.
I fully understand that designers deserve compensation for their work, and I’m more than willing to spend money in a game as long as I think the game is fair. But when you come across impossible levels where you have no legitimate chance to succeed, it seems like cheating. And these are not only the ones labeled “Hard” or Super Hard” levels but the regular levels too!

Castle Story has the potential to be one of the very best Match 3 games out there. Unfortunately, it too quickly gets to a point where the frustration factor far out weights the fun factor.

by Darth_bearded

Happy his game is entertaining enough. The AI isn’t the best but the two blaring problems are that they force you to use a MAGIC scroll to talk to someone and the points system is completely jacked up.

I can suspend disbelief long enough to enjoy decorating a castle with magic but having to waste a magic scroll to speak with someone in front of you, or having to pay 1 scroll to move in a grandfather clock makes sense but it also costs 4 scrolls to move in a couch.

There’s a lot of these errors in this game. One is that it was made in the first place. DO NOT SPEND A DIME on this game.

by Tamy 7665

I love everything about this game and it would be my absolute favorite with 5 stars if it wasn’t for the delays in getting the next chapters up and running. When I finish one then I have to wait a month or more for me to be able to update the game to continue I’ve just finished the throne room and because of having to wait 3 different times for updated it took me 4 months to finish it and now another update. I’m not understanding why I’m having to do that when there’s players in my group that’s way past my lever by 500 levels how is that possible for it’s not been designed yet.? Why wasn’t the game finished being designed completely before it was allowed to be played?

by Jamie Lee Bree

My first review was glowing because this was the only puzzle design game I had that was not frustratingly tedious and difficult. I like decorating more than puzzles (though I enjoy them both.) Having to use 4 scrolls for 1 rug is a bum deal. Especially considering the puzzle difficulty has increased and some levels must to be played multiple times to earn 1 scroll. That’s not fun. That’s a chore. Now the difficulty has increased, this game is more like the other design games I had, which I have all deleted because I get tired of the repetition and difficulty. Just want something relaxing, not frustrating. Thank you

by Garnet Jewels

I really like the decorating in this game and the most the puzzles. Im getting more frustrated, though, as the game goes on. Some of the levels are too hard and not fun at all. I just want something fun and a little challenging to take my mind off things not so difficult they make me more stressed. The game should not have "hard" or "super hard" levels. But if you have patience and determination you can play without spending money.

by Laurenslo79

Love this. So many rewards throughout the game. It wouldn’t load for a full day and I was getting pretty frustrated. But it started working again, thankfully.
Would give 5 stars if you could do two moves at once. Like if you have a crown next to a rocket and another crown next to a bomb, you should be able to make those matches quickly at the same time. I play other match 3 games that allow two moves at once and I wish they would make that happen in this game.
I also wish you could interact with the characters and environment more.
Other than that, super fun.

by Nebulpusnerd

I’m not sure how old some of the other reviews are but I’m KILLIN IT in this game!

Challenging levels, good amount of boosts provided as rewards from passive background events and story completion, hard levels are hard enough to need boosts. I like it.

My feedback is that some of the order of events is a little weird. Like, I’m in the bathing room and I found it odd that you replace the tub and then immediately put little stuff instead of handling the other big stuff in the room. But that’s minor.

by JoanCarol

I have to be honest. I have never bought anything in ANY game. If I can’t pass a level, I wait till I can get more “gifts“and then play again. Homescapes was horrible. I got to level 1509 and deleted it because it was an impossible level to beat, even if I bought something, which I didn’t. I would like the mini games too like I said in other games, but this one is pretty good. You can eventually pass every level it seems.

by Giovanna7777777

After the update I went to play the game and the room that she was working on outside in the garden everything’s missing except for the water in the water feature. Water features missing everything that I worked so hard to put in there is gone. Someone needs to fix that. What did your programmer do anyway? I know I won’t be playing until it’s fixed.

by Sonic And Shadow :-)

This game is a great idea but how many people have made it past the 49th level? That one is just plain frustrating. I’ve used every one of the power ups, And I always run out of moves before I get to the vases on the bottom four rows. I can’t seem to make rockets that go the right way. It’s just that level. Other than that, it a great game.

by ZeroDegree273

So yeah I really enjoy this game but when I got the telescope that went on the table there was another telescope on the ground in the place when it was in the chest and then I closed all my windows there was a man in shining armor at the front door of the castle before I closed all my windows. Then I opened up CastleStory again and then the man in shining armor it seem like, well, he let himself in but then I realized the telescope was gone and the man was where the telescope was yeah so something strange is going on...

by Vgsquirrel

This is really a fun game and the puzzles so far are not hard and that makes it more fun. However, it crashes and closes every couple of minutes and now crashes as soon as I try to open it!
I sent an email to support yesterday. Now I can’t play the game at all. It would rate four or five stars if it worked.

UPDATE customer support has been very helpful in trying to determine why the game crashes. I suspect the problem is that my device is too old to run some of the newer games and not a problem with the game. I am giving it five stars because the game is so much fun and because support was so prompt.