Chain Cube: 2048 3D Merge Game Reviews

by Ewm2

Do yourself a favor. Get Ciube Merge instead. It’s the same game without the ads.

Way too many ads. 50% of the time is spent watching an ad. At some points you throw one cube, watch and ad, throw another cube, watch an ad. It’s totally ridiculous. But that’s not the worst part. The authors don’t care. I took the time to email them and explain how often the ads pop up. I used the quote they always use to answer this complaint about ads, “We had to add the ads in our games to keep them free to play” so they would understand I already got that point. Nope, same reply. I’m not even sure a real person read the post. Probably a bot that looks for a key phrase like “too many ads” or counts the number of times “ads” shows up in the text and then sends the canned response. The only way this works though is if people give them low ratings. All the reviewers who spend the majority of their review telling about the excessive ads but then give the game 4 stars just make it so the authors don’t have to care. So my recommendation is don’t download this game. You’ll be frustrated in less than 5 minutes with the amount of time you spend watching ads. By the way way, Vegas has the over/under on how long it takes for the “we had to add the ads to keep our games free to play” developer response at 2 days. I’m going with the under.

by Gabbmac

The game is fun and enjoyable. However, there are far too many ads. So when an option popped up offering No More Ads for $4.99, I went ahead and purchased it. Within less than 3 minutes of game play after the purchase, the ads were still coming. I gave it some more time, thinking it might be a glitch, but they kept coming. I went to Apple iTunes support to request a refund. After spending far too much time having to deal with a $4.99 refund request, I am told that it could take Apple up to 48 hours to review the request and then up to 30 days for the refund (if granted) to show up into my account. I have many subscriptions with Apple and have been a long time customer as well. Apples business practices, I believe lately, have been moving further away from customer satisfaction to more of a developer favored plan. I will be stopping some of my other services with Apple if this is how they deal with long time customers over what should be a very simple request. I am of the generation where if a customer has a problem, you take care of them right away, as the return business and customer satisfaction is worth far more than the initial problem. Bottom line is, enjoy the game for what it is, LOADED WITH ADS, but don’t be deceived by the option to buy out of the ads as it is a deception. This developer should be ashamed about this.

by Review Nickname In Mn Okay?

Update: please note that the troll bot did not in any way address the substance of my feedback. Original comment: This is about the bonus games that appear a few times each week. The past few times I’ve played a bonus game I am suddenly kicked, for no reason, into the “regular” game. (No, I haven’t piled cubes into the front barrier. This is happening, now repeatedly, for no reason.) A couple of things about this: 1) When I’m suddenly kicked into the regular game, the board starts me over with only 2 and 4 cubes and a zero current score; actual cumulative score shows. When I exit and re-open the game the regular board shows my actual current game, so that’s okay. 2) After I exit and re-open, the bonus game shows my actual SCORE but only gives 2 and 4 cubes. So, for example, when the goal is to create a 32k cube, my score correctly shows that my “created” cube is 8192. My minimum playing cube should therefore be 4, but my actual minimum cube is the red 2. This happened three times on Tuesday and I stopped. If someone gives a real response that addresses my actual comment and then the problem is fixed, I will replace with a five-star review because I love the game. I have a screenshot showing my 8k score with red “2” cubes appearing on the board. Anyone who has advanced to 4096 knows this should not happen!

by Cat580

3rd update: regarding the statement that the forced ads disappear with the no ad purchase let me reiterate to you that the amount and duration of ads remained the same before and after I purchased your so call no ad feature. You refuse to address the simple issue of delivering what you promise or refunding my money. I believe you have such frequent ads so people will purchase the ad free upgrade then get frustrated and just go away quietly because the purchase was only $5.99. That would allow you to just keep the money without providing the service you say you will provide. That is unscrupulous and vile. 2nd update: they can respond to my edits for my review but there have been no attempts to refund my money or resolve the problem in any way at all. UPDATE: the developer responded that without ads the game can not remain free. They offer a purchase price to remove ads from the game. I purchased that. The developer took my money but the amount of ads did not change and they won’t address the fact that they took my money. They are FRAUDULENT AND RUNNING A SCAM!!! The ads in this game are awful. Feels like every minute it require you to watch an ad. I understand that is how they make their money but they offer an ad free version for purchase. I PURCHASED IT AND CONTINUE TO GET THE RIDICULOUS AMOUNT OF ADS. I have emailed them but they won’t respond. Save your time and your money and play other games.

by Snoodge3000

Yeah it’s a bit addictive and a good time waster but oh my god is it repetitive. It was to the point that I decided to just throw all the blocks in one place and see if it would work. It worked better than my previous strategy. Granted when I tried it in the next level it didn’t work so I guess I just got lucky. That’s the other reason I don’t like this game, the sheer amount of luck involved. you have no idea what block is coming up next, the blocks can have any number between 2 and 128 which just throws all strategy out the window, you can’t plan for anything! Also congrats on reaching 512 with the two 256 blocks we gave you how about a reward? Oh? You would rather not watch an ad for a power up you never use? You thought the power up was the reward? Well you were wrong because the reward was an ad for royal match and you get to see a king die in a new way every time you get this number because you don’t get to choose weather or not you want to see it! We’ll remove this torture if you give us five dollars! Except according to other reviews apparently not. I was sitting there playing this game thinking up this review in my head as I was constantly getting unwanted awards because it was more fun than the actual game. If you’re looking for an actually fun 2048 game, just go to cool math games and play the actual 2048, it’s also free and it doesn’t force you to witness murder every 2 minutes.

by Adz4dayz

… every time you create a new higher block, a ad comes up asking if you want to double your offer in 30 seconds. You have the option to decline, but this does not stop the ad, but just reduces the time to ten seconds. If you start a game, you easily will hit 40+ ads you cannot skip even if you wanted to. These ads early in the game will pop up frequently, I mean; a few ads every minute. Actually ridiculous, I read a developer note on another review, they stated that’s how they keep the game free. The game has no updates, there are no upgrades for the game; it’s a basic skill game. Why have ads that constantly pop up, that you cannot even skip? In that case, the developer should give x2 at the no option; and a x4 at the yes option. If the developer can’t do that, at least back the ads off the skip option, or at least do something new to the game that will make it worth watching 50 ads every time I get on to waste time for ten minutes.. smh. Should give this game a 2 star, on the basis of the development team taking advantage of the Ad revenue and not doing crap for the game or it’s players.

by Monstera77

I do not recommend this unless you're going to pay the $5 (which seems crazy high for its simple graphics and play). The ads are incessant and at times, actually disgusting and offensive. There is an ad for a game popping pimples on the bottom of feet, with visual examples, which I have no problem if someone wants to play that but really puts me off my snacking.
In most games you strive to do well so you can save lives and avoid ads, this game will punish a positive move with an immediate ad. It will ask if you want to earn something with an ad, when you say no thanks it makes you watch an ad. Ads come up in the middle of plays. Some ads have volume, some stay off like I asked them to. Some ads force you to click through instead of waiting for the consistent x in the corner.
I have played hundreds of games, don't spend money on them unless it's a reasonable upfront cost, and have never reviewed one, congrats chain cube.
This game would be fun without ads but I refuse to play the $5 at this point, so I'm going to continue to angrily play it until an ad finally causes me to rage chuck my phone into the garbage disposal, at which point I'll change my review to 0 stars.

by Mostly Maven

Fun game. It’s not very difficult but it’s oddly satisfying. I would even call it relaxing IF the adfree version didn’t have an interruption LITERALLY every 5-15 seconds of gameplay. I understand that developers need to make money and that means ads especially if the game is free. So when I enjoy a game, I will happily pay a one-time fee to remove ads. However, I didn’t expect to pay $6 and STILL be interrupted by non-ad pop ups every few seconds! It makes an otherwise zen game anxiety-producing. The pop ups also happen in the middle of plays, messing up your shot. The pop ups congratulate me every time I reach a high number. This would be fine if it ONLY congratulated me the first time I reach a particular milestone, but every time I get a 512 block, for example, it keeps congratulating me like it’s the first time. And the pop ups also offer free power ups if I watch an ad. It’s fine to offer extras for watching optional ads but again STOP INTERRUPTING THE GAME! Offer it once every thirty minutes, or better yet: keep it as an icon at the bottom of the screen or in a store menu. Sadly, I will have to refrain from playing unless this is resolved. I play games in the evening to lower my stress from working all day, not add to it!

by GamesPlayedByDev

There’s something oddly satisfying about watching those colorful cubes pop all over the screen to grab major combos. With that said, the ads soon take away all feelings of enjoyment and transition you to a quick feeling of “I hope I didn’t get that high combo because I KNOW THERES A AD COMING!!!” That unfortunate reality has me seriously considering deleting this game. It’s that bad. Then the option to pay 5 bucks for no adds is simply outrageous. It instantly makes me think the developers did this on purpose to force you to go that route. To me choosing a barrage of ads over user enjoyment is a huge no no. Don’t get me wrong I fully understand the point of ads, I just feel that at the end of the day we as users should be able to enjoy or time without being taken out of our emersion to watch ads every 2-5 mins. Then to add insult to injury they give you the “no thanks” option on watching an ad and doubling your reward or not. Clicking that “no thanks” just simplest takes you to an ad anyway just with no reward for watching it. End of the day the actual game is a good time but you’ll spend more time on ads then actually playing. 3 stars (generously) for me.

by Y88Y88Y88

Was going to give this 3stars, but then I read that people still get ads after paying for “no ads”. Not cool. So yeah. The ads. Incessant. Every time you get more than the most basic of blocks it stops the game to tell you you’ve earned a participation medal and you can get 2 if you watch an ad. If you say “no thanks” you get one medal - and are forced to watch an ad for it. I was going to pay for no ads, but it’s $5. This is not a $5 game. It’s a mindless time killer that’s pretty fun (made so largely by the wonky physics), but it’s a $1 game. My work around is turn off cell data for the game, turn off WiFi when I want to play. That stops the ads. But it doesn’t stop the participation medal pop ups. And when you get the pop up there’s a long delay before the “no thanks” comes up. So you sit there and wait to go back to playing. The pop ups can often be seconds apart. Lower the price and actually remove the ads, and I’ll probably give you real money for it. And give you more stars. It could easily be a 4 or 5 star game.

by Emit7eddie

The game is fun so I paid the full version to get rid of the ads… now the game pauses constantly with an annoying message asking you if you want to watch an ad for more points. The box pops up suddenly right where you press for the game control and causes you to agree to watch an ad. At this point, you have to wait to watch a long ad or close the game and start it over. The point of paying is to get rid of the ads, not what seems to be tricked into watching an ad. It is so annoying that I tried to get a refund but it doesn’t show up in the options. So I guess I am out of luck.

It’s a brainless fun game if they get rid of the constant pop up that causes me to agree to an ad. No idea if this is by design, I wrecks the game for me. It’s a inexpensive 5 star game if they dump the ad which I thought I paid for.

Words with friend has a similar option to watch an ad but they allow you to make that decision by clicking on it in an appropriate section and not blasting the screen with it constantly.

by Atagana

I very rarely review apps. Especially time-wasting games, but I think those thinking of downloading should have this info.

Ads. They are horrendous. The quantity, the quality, the obtrusive nature. God, they are bad. *Side note: I listen to a lot of audio books. This game has the ads that will stop my audio book to play extremely loud and obnoxious music for an ad. This infuriated me.* But I know that these developers have to make money. So I paid the couple of dollars to support them and get rid of ads. Problem solved, right? Wrong. Now, the game interrupts my play every couple of minutes to ask me if I WANT to watch an ad anyway. Had I known the developers were going to take my money and then invasively continue to attempt to monetize my play time, I would’ve deleted ChainCube a long time ago.

Other than the fact that the game is only almost bearable after paying money, this is a great game. Good concept and decent physics engine. If they fix this ad problem, the game would be 4 stars.

by Bcbhtbkivc

I love this game, it’s so fun and relaxing. I bought the ad free version about a year and a half ago. Last night when I was playing this cool thing happened that never has happened before. I had a lot of really high blocks and when I flung one at them they all started combing rapidly until my screen exploded with a bunch of 128k blocks, it was really cool. After I did that I had to start a new round because no more blocks would fit, but after that every time I create a new block I would have to watch an ad. The message that says claim would pop up and I would hit no thanks because I don’t want to watch a 5 hour add and have to search for the tiny x that they hide, but it shows me the ad anyways! I already bought the ad free version I shouldn’t have to sit through these ads. BTW it’s really annoying how that “claim reward” message pops up every two seconds, even when I have the option to not watch the ad. I think you guys strategically make it pop up out of nowhere so we will accidentally hit claim and have to sit through the super long ads.

by The Game Needs IMPROVMENTS

I played this game a bit ago and it’s a fun time waster BUT I was curious what happens if I use all my multiplying things on one block, I figured it out the hard way man, I cant believe I lost my billion something block that I spent 20 multiplying things or whatever you call it (I don’t know what they are called because I played this game a bit ago) , so the score was there but the block was INVISIBLE (see what I did there??) I was like “what????”, “what the heck is happening” I thought I was lagging because of the sheer number but when I logged back in some days later GUESS WHAT it was still INVISIBLE then I deleted the game and now I’m writing a review to tell other people that the game can’t process such huge numbers and that it needs improvements like a bunch of other games the devs just need to fix some stuff and this game will be in near perfection also the ads FIX THE ADS I DONT WANNA SEE A OLD KING DIE IN MY FACE IN ALL SORTS OF WAYS please please pleassssssssse fix this I beg you 🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏🙏

by Clarisse Carlson

If you want a challenge this is not the game for you. If you like mindless fun this may be the game for you. Somehow this game is addicting, probably because combining the blocks is like little shots of dopamine in the brain and there’s no stress or thought needed to put into it. Right now my score is 11,646,948 and it’s still going up! Once you figure out you can just repeatedly shoot the 2x heart at cubes you can really rack up the score quickly. There is no risk of losing, because you can fit quite a bit of the cubes in the provided space and they bounce around to combine themselves. Pros: mindless fun, cons: too many ads!! Many times I’ll open ChainCube and the cubes will somehow combine themselves without me doing literally anything, and since it very, very often hits 512, the little congratulations message pops up and most likely will lead to an ad. Usually I just close out ChainCube and re-open it and it takes like 1.5 seconds, so whatever, but it gets pretty annoying (but not enough to uninstall because like I said it’s pretty easy to restart ChainCube ). I guess your view on if the easiness is bad or not depends on if you want a challenge, but for something that takes no effort and is somehow rather satisfying it’s not terrible.

by Hefto

This is a great game but there are far too many useless interruptions. When I first started playing I was impressed with the gameplay but the ads were life-sucking. But I saw a click button for “no ads” and it was I thought a pretty steep price ($5.99) but there was just no way I could enjoy the game otherwise. So now there are “no ads” but every time a significant block is formed play stops, I am congratulated, and there is an offer for a “reward” like a bomb or what not. But that’s only a “reward” if you watch ....wait for it... an AD! And the button to “accept” the “reward” is right where you are now tapping from muscle memory after playing umpteen rounds. In my opinion the frequency of ads is coercive in getting people to purchase. And the continued interruptive notices and “rewards” are deceptively Not mentioned as continuing after purchase. I’m expecting some kind of response within a week or I’m gonna dump this and get my money back.

by Mischiefs

I ended up actually purchasing this game and I never buy “free” games. For such a simple game it was hugely addicting, especially for those short moments of waiting and you need something to fidget with. The ads in the free version are seriously annoying especially when you would chose to skip the double reward and the ads would still play. It also put a huge strain on my battery, but I kept coming back to it. I finally bought the ad free version and I have not been disappointed. You still have an option to double the reward by watching an ad or if you end up “losing” you can watch an ad to continue with the same game. I racked up to almost 6 million points before I started a new game just to see how long it took me to get up to the same number of points. If you are looking for a very simple game, that is very satisfying it’s worth the $4.99

by Davrodg360

Few ideas to make it better, and achieve the financial goals and generate revenues from both gamers and advertisers- charge 1$ for one full add every 5 minutes (20-30sec) or 5$ for none. If you keep interrupting the game with ads that can cause iPhone to drop Webex and audio due to their use of sound to play, and a repetitive small library of irrelevant products that I assume generate limited ad revenue and often times cause game abandonment thus making even less user interaction and ad revenue - use the education and apply UX and client focus to drive better revenues and place relevant ads for the user base and user meta data to retain users, improve ad click and acquisition of new users to offset the need to force way too many ads per minute and still meet your financial objectives!

by Little Lilbug

I love this game but I have a couple issues to address. First one is that the adds are excessive. One add after every single level is way to much. Next I would like to address that this game is way to easy. In fact it is so easy it would only be hard for a newborn. Also levels are weirdly short. The levels are also all over the place because one round you have to make it to 256 next is 512 then it’s back at 256. I am not trying to be rude in any way shape or form I just thought that it would be good to address this and I think someone will agree with me. Thank you so very much for reading this and yes this pretty long I just tried explaining as detailed as possible. So that’s it but over all this is an awesome game that I would definitely recommend for people who like games that will not ever end and that are relaxing. That’s all I have to address but all the things that I said I think should be worked on and I some people will agree with me. But again I’m not trying to be rude or mean or bossy in any way shape or form.👍🏻

by InfrequentReviewerForNow

I think because there’s no real end point here — I find this so much more addictive than most games. I genuinely struggle to put it down and I find that “just a few minutes” turn into “how was that just 40 minutes?!” I figured out quickly that the ads were too annoying to enjoy the free version, though. Like no way would I be able to stand it. The ads are long and for icky games but I love the haptics of the cubes. Some say you still get ads with the paid version, but no: you just say no to the extra bombs and life and go on about your business. I don’t even need those. I think my largest cube now is 256k or something and I rarely get things so stacked up that I need to use one of my 300+ life points (like, maybe 5 times total). However, if you find it hard to put this thing down, decide to never use your life points if you get stacked up. I should have done that the first time but now I’m too invested. And yet I doubt that would solve the problem of not wanting to stop playing. But at least it keeps me off Twitter and such, which was the point.

by Wyntormoon

I’ve been playing this game most as long as it’s been out. It’s a great game to play while waiting in line pretty much anywhere, waiting for someone to get to you, even at the gas station. It’s great. I had recent stopped because other things had gotten in the way like life, and I was almost going to delete the game because of the Constant “you have a new cube” here is your reward “rainbow colors” that kept getting in the way or the black “new reward” ones and it was like every other cube. So then I stopped.
And several months went buy and I went in to try it again and I was bored and WOW, what a difference. Not sure what you guys did, but THANK YOU!! No more annoying pop up adds, I’m at 6,808,670,205 in points and I’m getting 1, 2, 3, and 10, million cubes now and all of the little four, eight, 250 cube are gone!!!! Thank you so much. I can’t wait to see what happens when I get past 7,000,000,000. I hope there is a “now the 512 cube is gone”.
Thank you, thank you!!!!

by Freaking Nerd

Have you heard of an app that allows you to check out hundreds of great games in a matter of minutes? This awesome app invites you to the virtual fairground of wonderful games out there, connecting you to the diverse group of developers with fascinating catch phrases such as the ones telling you how their games are “harder than you think,” showing you courageous attempts of virtual individuals trying to perform challenging, highly motivating, and thought-provoking tasks over and over before unfortunately failing, making you feel good about yourself in comparison and kindling that inner desire to open up your wallet! Oh, and although this may sound impossible, should you ever get slightly bored of this exciting game-shopping experience, ChainCube will even let you engage in occasional cube-matching events, which provides the opportunity for your brain to take short moments of relaxing diversion, before going back to check out even more of those other games! Kudos for the developers to think outside the box!! Who knew you could make an app that accompanies eye-shopping of games developed by others with a tiny serving of your own game, instead of the other way around? An awesome, premium game-shopping experience for all!

by Number707

I have to say out of all the action games with crazy graphics I have on my phone I always end up back to this one. I agree with the other reviews about the one thing that downplays it is that whenever a cube is made it momentarily freezes the gameplay to let you know it made a cube. How does that cause a little frustration you may ask? Well it wouldn’t be so bad if it would not interfere with the shot you are making at the moment because it ends up going a different way than where you are sending it. I think a perfect fix would be instead of it freezing your gameplay it would instead just show a banner on top of the screen without it stopping the game. I know it is also intended so you may have the choice to play an add so you can get double the bombs as a reward but you really only need 3 if even that because the game is so easy. I didn’t mention that I payed to not have any adds but it is basically the same thing if the game pauses to ask you if you want to play an add. Not complaining just suggesting.

by Clbodden

For the past several days, ChainCube keeps automatically launching the browser on my phone and taking me to a scam site for winning an iPad just for answering a few questions and picking a box to see if you won. Then it wants you to enter credit card information for shipping charges, so it’s clearly a scam. The page is formatted to look like a major online retailer, and the comments are in the format of a social media site. They are fake comments since the date they were supposedly posted keeps changing to the current date, but it’s the same comments. This doesn’t happen when using any other app, and I don’t download apps or visit websites that could potentially harm my device. There is something going on with this game specifically. I don’t see any way to contact the developer directly, so I’m leaving this review. Please fix this issue, and I will give this game the 5 stars that it deserves.

Update 29Nov2023: The issue noted above was addressed soon after my initial review, so I’m changing my rating. I love this game, it’s a great one to play idly as I’m watching TV or listening to a meeting. Well worth the money to remove the ads. I’m also very happy that smaller cubes get removed as you hit higher cubes. It makes way more sense that way. Awesome that 256k is no longer the biggest cube! Looking forward to continued updates and features!

by 19matt81

Wow, it’s amazing... I don’t how they did it. Literally the most ads you will ever see in any app ever. If you play the game for 3 minutes you will have watched more ads than if you watched 3 Superbowls back to back. It’s like an app for just watching ads. It’s like if they scooped out all your brain matter and replaced it with ads. ADS. ADS. ADS. Its like if you got the Covid vaccine but all they injected was ads. Remember the time when you learned to drive? This game is like that but if the windshield was covered with ads, and you were blinded by ads, and crashed into a billboard full of ads, and it exploded into little ads that all started running around your car replicating and making little baby ads and they started crawling up your body and tattooing your skin with ads. ADS. ADS. ADS. Oh it’s also like that time when I was watching ads, and I took a break to watch ads, then I got some ice cream and it was pralines and ads, then I checked who texted me and it was Mrs Ads and she had sent me ads and when I laughed I spewed out ads and I texted her back ads, and then we texted each other ads and then I called her and we talked about ads and then I hung up and went back to watching ads. Other than that, cool game. But lots of ads.

by Kjive

Downloaded this game a week ago and I haven’t died yet. My score is so high it’s basically meaningless. Not trying to brag- the game is so easy it’s nearly impossible to lose. The game is bugged so after ads it sometimes shoots a block where you didn’t intend but it doesn’t even bother you. If you can match colors you have all you need to succeed. My two year old could even do it if it weren’t for the strange density of ads for gun games that I don’t especially want him (or me really) to see. So why am I still playing it a week later? I don’t know! I am usually a person who likes to challenge myself. Maybe it’s just satisfying to watch those blocks bounce around? Maybe on 2020 a game where you can’t lose becomes especially appealing. Either way, this dumpster fire of a game is for some reason exactly what I needed right now, so 5 stars.

by Get'em Tiger's

I don’t mind adds at all, but some games have so many breaks for adds that you don’t get a chance to really get into the game and enjoy it, hence this game. You want us to review the games we pick out, but get upset when we remark about the “ nuisance” adds. Any intelligent, fair minded person realizes you make these games for income. We are just saying “oops, this one has way too many adds, so I will just delete it and find more games that I enjoy from the adds in the games that are not 30% game and 70% interruption from the adds. I have over 122 apps on my cell alone that I was introduced by the games you have created. But, they are all from games you have time to enjoy before it cuts to “ commercial” (and some are subscriptions). This game is a fun game, but a little to easy, but sometimes I need an easy game!❤️🌹Thank You