Saturday Casual Gaming 212: Merge Quest

Every so often, I'll be playing a game and an ad will pop up that I don't entirely despise - this is how I found all three merge games I've been playing after all! I've told you about Merge Dragons and Evolution, but today is about Merge Quest by PotatoPlay.

And yeah, it's about this wonky/cute in real life.

So what is Merge Quest?

This idle RPG follows a young hero whose lady has been stolen away from him during a tender moment by a werewolf. There's not a whole lot of dialog to tell you this, but the gist is there. You, as the hero, must now go on a ceaseless, undying killing spree to get her back.

It's serious business...
But look at the PotatoPlay logo!
Oh man, I love that cute little Groucho-browed nightshade root!

In order to kill monsters real good, you need to use the money you get from their corpses (or from random ad chests that appear) to level yourself and your pets up, and most importantly, to forge new weapons and shields.

I'm pretty sure this is from an earlier build of the game, since your weapon stats no longer appear in the upper left.
Instead, they appear above your inventory.

This person likes to fill their inventory before merging.
I merge as I go.

How do you merge?

Well, it's pretty simple. After forging two lower-level items, you can drag one on top of another to create an item one level higher. Lv1 + Lv1 = Lv2 and so on. I'm up to Lv12 right now (the sword is a fish - spoilers). I love how creative and bizarre some of the weapon/shield designs are, too! I mean, At level 8, your sword is a plunger and your shield is a toilet seat, and at level 10, you're wielding traffic signs!

There are three different "skills" you can use, too, after leveling your character up enough. I've only gotten Rage, which you gain after leveling to 25. That's not enemy-level 25, that's you level 25, which you increase in the icon with the helmet icon. Weirdly enough, these screenshots don't have the pet mechanic mine does, which is represented by a golden paw print icon, and you can have up to six pets, only one of which travels with you. I have a little fire dude who sometimes shoots fireballs.

There are a few other mechanics to cover, besides sitting there and racking up coins, spending them, merging weapons, and grinning as you beat a dragon over the head with its own bones. First, let's talk about those little blue gems - you get those for finding new weapons, or you can find them in ad chests which will sometimes fly across your screen slowly, or you can win them at a prize wheel that shows up sometimes. These blue gems are great for buying weapon, shield, and coin drop-rate in the little shop icon at the bottom right of the screenshots. They can also be used for other bonuses! These gems can be purchased for real money, but with three free ways to earn them, I don't see a point. I'm no power gamer.

There are two other "currencies" in this game besides the gold and blue gems, though.

The first of these not-quite currencies are purple gems. You earn these when you reincarnate yourself using an icon of a golden meditating person with a red heart in the center. This icon is located next to the gold down-arrow icon on my screen. Purple gems can be used to buy and level-up Artifacts - powerful weapons, armors, or items that don't appear on the character model but boost your attack and defense by a ridiculous amount. I have two Artifacts with 2-3 levels each, and my boost is at 220%. That's nuts.

The second not-exactly-a-currency is called "shards". These are used to transform your character into another skin. Currently there are three skins: GEN, Snow White and Little Red. Yes. Your hero dude unashamedly turns into a very copyright-infringing version of Snow White if you have enough Snow White Shards. You do not have to do this, but playing as Snow White boots your stats (both Atk & Def) by 400%. Little Red has a hammer and increases your Attack, Defense, & Coin Droprate by 400%; GEN turns you into a blond dude in a red gi which increases your Attack & Defense by, get this, 1500%. Skins are powerful. You get them for free, when you're lucky.

It takes 80 GEN shards to transform into GEN. It takes 30 Little Red shards for her transformation, and it takes 20 Snow White shards for hers. You're probably never going to be GEN without real money, I suspect. That's fine - you can enjoy the game without morphing at all.

All in all, this has been a fun game to fall into, and I look forward to seeing where it goes - obviously PotatoPlay have been working on this for a bit, since there are changes between what you can find in a Google Image Search and what you get on your phone.

I got my copy for free in the Google Play Store, so I know it works on Android. I don't know if it's available for iPhone, but you can check if you like!

Go Enjoy Something!
FC