Cloudtop Chaos is the free-to-play sequel to a paid game to Cirrus Business, a playful adventure game aimed squarely at the young child and cutesy gamer demographic. Whilst knowing the original story may help for the opening cutscene, you need no other knowledge going into Cloudtop Chaos. Instead, this is a selection of entry-level, casual puzzle games, designed for endless play and high score challenges. It feels like a simple and approachable way to introduce puzzle games to younger children in a stress-free setting.
Whilst there is a cast of animal characters, they don’t serve any purpose beyond the main cutscene and doing the occasional dance if you trigger the disco ball or change some of the main roaming areas’ visual backdrop. The player is introduced to a floating cloud with several different puzzles on it. The plot is to play the puzzles, to generate chaos (points) which then colours back in the world to add some randomness and spice back into the world, after putting everything a little too much in order in the prequel.
Many of your standards are here. Mahjong with colourful tiles and a Pipe Mania style game to water flowers bring the most abstract gaming. A match-3 style swapping icon game doesn’t require speed; it’s move based. Match a certain number of each symbol, and the player levels up and gets some more moves and match targets. A bubble popping game asks you to link 4 bubbles of the same colour together as they move down the screen after each move. There’s also a 2-player card game that asks you to collect tokens for cutesy items to score points, but each card adds a few things and removes the value of something else. The card game is by far the most involved and strategic, and well worth a quick game or two as a fast board game-styled versus battle. AI can step in if you are playing solo.
The endless, chase-your-score nature of the game is fine, but it lacks cohesion, and none of the puzzle games stand out as being addictive. They are bright and colourful, much like the ten-minute decorations for the cloud you can trigger by speaking to the whale in the centre of it. There’s some nice, gentle gaming to be had for free, but I think it’s firmly aimed at that 3-5 year old range who are getting used to puzzle games and logic for the first time. Mahjong and Pipe Mania might be beyond that age group, but the rest will work well. With all the bright, fluffy colours, though, I was expecting more glitz and fanfare for what you do. Instead, this plays and feels quite workmanlike, and that might not keep your nipper entertained for long stretches of time.
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