Suika

Game
    Review

Suika Game (2023), also called Watermelon Game, is a spatial puzzle challenge about matching fruits. You select where to drop each new fruit into the cup, aiming to get matching varieties touching so they merge, create bigger fruit and score points. It stands out for balancing simplicity with challenge where planning and chain reactions are all part of the fun.

It's a simple game about efficiently stacking fruit to avoid the cup overflowing. The twist is that when two matching fruits touch, they merge and become the next biggest fruit. This creates a risk-reward challenge where bigger fruit matches gain more points, but take up more space. Once you get to the largest watermelon fruit they disappear when matched. There are 11 fruits in the game and they go in a cycle from smallest to largest; cherry, strawberry, grapes, dekopon, persimmon,d apple, pear, peach, pineapple, melon, and watermelon.

As you progress you learn how to work with the game physics and the series of ever-larger types of fruit to perpetuate longer and longer runs. It draws on the tactics of Tetris, requiring efficiency, but with more fluid gameplay from the physics of how the fruit interacts with each other. For example, getting this wrong and merging two fruits can send surrounding elements flying out of the cup and end the game.

The result is a game that feels methodical and meditative to play. But to get a high score requires more skill, planning (and a little good fortune) than is initially apparent.

Our examiner, Andy Robertson, first checked Suika Game 5 weeks ago. It was re-examined by Jo Robertson and updated 5 weeks ago.