What makes a good match 3 game these days?

Sup duders?

I've got the itch for a good match 3 game of late and i'm curious as to what the best example of this genre is these days? I played a lot of the original Puzzle Quest back on the 360, of which I don't have access to any more.

I've tried searching around here and come up blank but there are so many F2P games doing this I really have no idea what's good and worth playing? I'm good for Steam or Android and i'm looking for a game where matching blocks makes things happen, there's progression and there's little to no bullshit involved, I don't mind paying a few pounds sterling/bucks for such an experience.

Cheers muchly fellows!

Marvel Puzzle Quest is exactly what it says on the tin and is pretty alright. There's also Puzzle Quest 2.

I haven't played it yet but I've heard good things about Gyromancer. It's on sale on Steam for $3 right now. It sounds like pretty much Bejeweled the RPG.

Might & Magic: Clash of Heroes is a great Puzzle/RPG hybrid.

@topsteer: Gyromancer's excellent. If you've played Bejewelled twist you've played the basic Gyromancer match 3 mechanic.

I'm kinda embarrassed to admit this but Huniepop's really good. The match three part, anyways...

As far as I'm concerned Bejeweled 3 is the pinnacle of the genre.

I'm enjoying Bret Airborne currently.

Most of the best match-three games are the ones with tactics, progression, and a variety of pieces. Also, it definitely helps if you can make awesome cascades.

Bright colors and random shit happening on screen that doesn't make sense. My wife has been playing Candy Crush for almost two years now and I'll watch her from time to time and I'll just stare at the screen and NOTHING makes sense to me about it. I'm sure if I actually played it, I would understand hopefully but yeah Bright colors and random shit happening is what a match 3 game is about nowadays.

Or boobs, huniepop.

Huniepop is actually REALLY good. Its part Dating sim and part Match 3 but the match 3 stuff is actually really well done and can be challenging. It is at its heart an eroge game so there is a lot of naughty stuff in the game but its a porn game that is actually competent in its game play and fun to play on its own right.

My video game hating lunch room is full of ladies into the King games. "Level 390 on this one, level 85 on this one, 60 on this one."

With that being said, I play Jewels on Android all the time if I'm sitting around. There's no real progression, but topping out some high scores is always an old-school treat. I guess there's Jewels 2 that has more stuff, but the original is so pure!

And I know some people are way into Jewels Star, which is level-based from what I remember.

@brightside: In case you missed it a few years ago, 10,000,000 is a great take on match 3 gameplay. Super simple, yet super engrossing, and it actually has an end, which I really appreciate.

Yep, 10,000,000 is pretty enjoyable. I even S-ranked it :D

10 million and all the variations of Puzzle Quest come to mind.

10 million for the phone and Marvel Puzzle Quest it is! Cheers guys.

I've heard a lot of positive things about the game play in Hunieop too, also that it might be a fun self aware dating sim. Not sure it'd be worth the $10 to me just to see some funny writing and half naked cartoon girls though.

@brightside: Hunie pop is not self aware. It is completely sincere. It's a straight up porn game.

Nothing? They're all terrible.

What makes a good match-three is solid controls and a RPG-progression or scenario-based reason to want to prioritize certain matches over others. When I played Puzzle Quest, I was a druid whose game plan revolved around matching yellow and green gems to cast my spell that allows me to take 3-4 turns in a row. In 10000000, it really depended on what I was trying to unlock next; some runs I might prioritize XP or coins. Huniepop appears to lead you in this direction because different girls prefer you matching different gems.

In fighting games, there's a reason why you might stay on the ground as opposed to jumping, reasons why you'd use a light attack instead of a fierce attack... a good match-three has a reason why you'd emphasize matching certain gems over others.

In answer to what makes a good match 3 game I think the best ones are the ones that are different as there are far too many the same. The ones where you swap tiles to make a match bore me to tears and same with the ones that you slide or swipe (with the exception of Swiped Gems and Swiped Fruits which are in a different league). Colour Grid on Android kept me hooked for weeks and I've just found one called Orbie which is in the PlayStore and the AppStore. Both these are similar and in my opinion are far better than the swap sort. Does anyone know of any others that are different?