Puzzle Forge 2 is a pretty neat little puzzle game where the goal is to make gear for customers going to your forge. To do so, you place rocks on a grid and then you place molds next to two rocks to craft parts that you need to combine to create weapons, armors and more. Combining rocks makes better materials and the game adds a bit of complexity with gems (and the combining thereof) and magic that you use to power-up the gear you're making. You lose the game when you can't complete customer requests too many times or when the board fills up - the latter happens more often than the former.
My main issue with PF2 are the full screen ads it will serve you between each level. You can pay money to make them go away, but they're really intrusive and not at all random; you'll get them every time. It's quite easy to fill your board by trying to make the right gear your customers want but not getting the right molds or not having enough space to place rocks to combine them into the required material, but you have spells and one use items you can purchase with your hard earned cash in order to get you out of most tough spots. This is compounded by the fact that squares you use to craft items become unusable for a certain number of 'moves', limiting your options on the board more and more.
The game has some variety of quests and things for you to do. Besides the constant daily grind of making gear for your customers, you'll have special requests like grilling sausages from hot spots on the board or challenges like making only magic items. Sometimes adventurers will come by with actual requests for specific gear - high attack, high defense, etc. - and the gear you provide them will actually impact their progress through a quest. I kinda wish the whole game was like that, that gear you made would impact the progress of some bigger quest. You also have challenges, like making 8 swords or using 10 pieces of iron.
By crafting things correctly, your customers like you more and they give you more money and experience per finished product - on the contrary if you fail to deliver, they like you less - and leveling up rewards you with wisdom stones you can use to buy skills such has having more health, selling your things for more money or giving you odds to place higher quality stones instead of basic rocks. The progression feels okay, although some upgrades aren't that good once you get them, so a way to reset your skills would have been welcome.
PF2 is a cool match-3 game with a few twists and you can't just place stuff on the grid randomly if you want to have any chance to make it further along. However, the constant leveling-up helps you do better on subsequent tries - as your money and experience carry over whenever you lose the game - and you progress to more complicated requests with gem and magic requirements on rarer materials. It's a good little game.
