Bait and switch. I challenged the developers on Dec 17, 2014 about the status of this game. That's correct; 2014!

Back then it was $29.99, had TONS of placeholder options dimmed out/unavailable, and was always "about to be added". Of course the devs locked the topic (on page 4 currently of the discussion board for this game, I'm confident it wont make it much past page 5 with how slow their forums move) and went on scamming the playerbase out of their money at a high price point. When challenged, the player was always conveniently blamed for being at fault for being unreasonable/too demanding/impatient. Seriously, just go check out the locked forum post on page 4.

The placeholders that existed back then promised to have loads of content. If you weren't playing during the end of 2014, you probably aren't even aware as a player of the options that were supposed to be added as content during the development of the game, so you're not even witting to what hasn't been given to you. Just by reading the other reviews, it's clear that they chose to "correct" the options that use to be dimmed out for future release by just simply removing them. So now the game is $2.99 because the community is on to them and they want to pull a few more folks in with what really boils down to a mobile app game now.

The irritation levels for the folks that pay $2.99 probably won't be as high for the folks that paid $29.99 or $14.99 when they realize the short lived period of this game, but I wanted to leave this review to show the character and bait & switch tactics that they chose to employ for folks that may not have been around over a year ago.

Mar 23, 2021: Now FaeVerse Alchemy is a free to play game. It's funny to look at the developer comments on my original review and then see where the game is at now.

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Original 2014 Review:
This is an early access game and I will update my review as time goes on to reflect the current state of the game.

$30 is definitely way too much for this game.

Also, do not buy expecting the game currently has full controller support as currently advertised on the Steam store page. It seems the developer jumped ahead and added what *may* be added in the future. That is, provided he doesn't decide to move that feature to his "next game" as he has been doing with several other promised features.

On first impression you'll feel like you just bought a port of the iOS puzzle game for about 30x more than the portable version costs. The game has awkward menus that one must click and hold with the mouse to slide them around. The menus feel broken, as it seems like things are off screen and there isn't any intuitive way to access the off-screen menu items with the mouse.

Even in early access, the developer talks so highly of his game that I thought perhaps it would blow me away. I imagined never before seen mechanics and gameplay but found myself let down by the hype. I would recommend waiting until the price is reduced to at most $15.

It's interesting to find a game in early access where feedback is highly censored and not welcome from experienced fans of the genre. What is the point of making your game early access if you aren't willing to hear constructive feedback?


The gameplay itself is limited to one mode at the moment where you play until the gamespace fills up. This is quite challenging and fun. As you play you match 3 elements and each match creates new elements. These new elements then start to appear in the pieces you are given to make creating new elements easier. It's exciting to try and see what new element comes next and it makes for that "just one more game" feeling.

Sound effects are minimal and nice, just right for this kind of game. The music is a bit repetitive with only 3 similar (short) tracks. The music has the same low quality mono sound that Faerie Solitaire has. Hopefully the music will get an upgrade in quality as game development goes on.


You will find that the developer for this game has an interesting "my way or the highway" type personality. When the game was first released as early access the forums filled up with potential customers wondering why the price for this game is 3x higher than any other puzzle game on Steam, including the best selling games in this genre. They were still interested, just wanted to know the story behind the price. By their play time and achievements you could see many of them love puzzle games and own his previous game on Steam and were genuinely interested in purchasing and playing this game.

The developer started deleting price topics and making rules that comments are welcome as long as they are not about the price. He would then say that if you don't like the price then you must not be a true fan of quality puzzle games because he loves this game he is creating. He even started telling the gamers that this game isn't for you if you think $30 is too much. Requesting an explanation of what makes the game so unique results in a pasted copy of the match 3 concepts that are in this game, nothing unique or exciting about it.

Next up the developer created a sub forum called "Price Topics Go Here" and started closing and moving topics. You would think having so many topics about the price would give a clue as to what action is needed next for a healthy community. The sub-forum became too much of a hassle and was closed. Now he has one pinned (and locked) topic about price being something he will not discusss, even if it is questions about what makes the game worth 3x more than the competition.

I would definitely wait on this title--you won't have much of a chance to give input. If you don't like how things are--then, as he would say, "This game isn't for you."

Previous review updates:
Nov 2015: They finally changed the menu, most of the menu is still grayed out though. I feel bad for those that purchased in the beginning when they were charging much more and promising the world, afterwards they announced quite a bit of the content is being moved to other future games for various reasons. I don't support that kind of mentality. The price is much more reasonable now $2.99 is the current price. It's still a fun match 3 game and certainly the most polished looking Subsoap game yet. If you buy make sure you're okay with what is currently present and don't mind if it ever gets finished, updates have slowed considerably.

Nov 2014: The game store page shows full controller support (meaning this game can be launched and played entirely with a controller). I tested with a usb Xbox 360 controller (one of the most frequently used controllers on Steam) and found that nothing in the game can be controlled with a controller, there are also no options to enable controller support. No real gameplay changes. Still about the same amount of content as over 6 months ago. The menus are still clunky. Updates are slow and infrequent, not sure what is actually being done with them. Seems like a tweak here and there, no real content being added overtime. More than 80% of the menu items are still entirely disabled. You still need to scroll to see all the menus but you still can't use the scroll wheel you have to click and drag behind the menu as if you were on a touchscreen. This gives the game a more authentic mobile port feeling.

June 2014: Played another 2 hours of the game. Not much has changed. The small amount of content in the game is still fun. The menus still feel ported over from mobile and are not well suited for mouse--you'll find yourself needing to click-hold and drag the main menu around to get to the different options. The developer replied to my review, only commented on the items related to price though. The developer has stated that he's decided to remove the more advanced pet features from this game (not yet present, pets show "coming soon" on the menu) and make a separate game out of the majority of the planned pet features.

Early access, not recommended at this time. I picked this up with a coupon, but if you're interested, install Faerie Alchemy on your Android or iOS device for free.

The core match 3 gameplay is good, and the planned features sound promising, with a storyline, multiple game modes, a pet system, and multiplayer. Though the game has potential, the current state is what you would expect from a free mobile game. The controls are touch oriented, and those features nonexistent. There is only a single basic game mode along with a rudimentary inventory and crafting system.

Interesting and challenging free to play coffee break game without the hassle and annoyance of "buy this" pop-ups. Basically plays like tetris with a match 3 twist. In fact, there are lots more twists then that. The only part really like tetris is the pieces drop down where one wants them to be placed after rotating the pieces. The match 3 similiarity is 3+ same pieces are required to eliminate those pieces from the gameboard. Beyond that is where the twists and differences begin. The first and biggest difference is there is more then one piece to place. As the game progresses there are more and more different pieces that appear. One new piece per "level" achieved. Also when 3+ matches are made as the match pieces are eliminated the next "higher" piece will appear in their place.

There will be 7 different modes eventually. As of Aug 8, 2016 this game is still in early access and not all modes are working. I will only talk about Abyss and Chaos mode.

Abyss mode is a daily game (one game per day). What makes this game interesting is the fact the pieces and the order of the pieces appear do not ever change. Before saying BORING, Abyss mode is a scoreboard game. So if one can remember just exactly what the pieces are and the order they appear in one can potentially gain a higher and higher daily score. It is basically a memory game.

Chaos mode is even more challenging but the potential for incredibly high scores is immense. In Chaos mode the pieces that appear are randomized. However, the player gets 4 start-up "special" pieces that can be used at will and throughout the gameplay special pieces randomly occur which must be used. I have not seen all the special pieces yet but some of these special pieces include: addition of a row at the bottom, destruction of all same game pieces (player choice), destruction of a column, one piece only for 4 turns, 3 pieces for 4 turns, 1 random piece added to all columns, etc. Definitely makes for a challenge.

The other modes are or will be:

Infinity Mode - It is impossible to ever end.
Puzzle Mode - Complete unique puzzle layouts.
Pure Mode - No special pieces are able to drop.
Versus Mode - Play PVP or COOP with a friend locally.
Explore Mode - Go to different FaeVerse worlds and their locations, complete goals, and unlock more.

Recommend to those who like quick little games that have strategy involved, any one who enjoyed Tetris, match 3 enthusiasts, and puzzle solvers.

Update: I just want to point out this review was made 2 years ago...

Final update: after what seems like forever the developer have decided to make the game "Free" which is there way of saying we are giving up but we aren't. After the horrible mismanagement not only in development, but also in the PR aspect I would Highly recommend NEVER dealing with this Developer for anything.

While this game is fun, it is very much unfinished. Many of the promised feature are not there. There is hardly anything in the game right now. This would not be a big deal for me being that it is early access, however there has not been a update or any progress in months. The dev have either secretly abandoned the game, or have a very poor work effort. They constantly claim they want to wait to have something big or finished before they update the game, but in the amount of time its been since there has been a update there is no reason why a large portion of the game hasn’t been finished. So for now even with a 90% off coupon I would avoid this game. Even if the dev released an update at this point I probably would not change my opinion until its actually released with the content promised because at this point that will either be never or in 2050.

Consists mostly of greyed out game options that can't be selected. Maybe some day it will be a whole game. When/If that happens, and it's worthwhile, I will be changing this review. But as for right now, it's absolutely not worth the price tag. There are free flash versions of games exactly like what's offered so far. Save yourself 30 bucks.
(EDIT)
The developer makes excuses on every negative review. "I'm making this game only for people who like it." That is NOT how you give customers what they want. Listen to what the people are telling you they are PAYING you to make this game. Don't just put out some abandoned piece of trash like this, and then tell everyone why it's their fault when they point out you released broken trash. The last time I contacted the developer I was told there would be "weekly updates to fix these issues". That was now over two months ago. Not an update since. This is an abandoned project, or worse, a cash grab-and-run scheme from the start. I can't tell which. Don't give FaeVerse a freaking dime. To support this kind of "developer" is to punish the gaming community at large.

At first I thought it was a tetris clone, then I thought of bejeweled... after i played it though I realized that it is something both similar and very different to the games this must had been inspired by.

Game play wise I think its brilliant. Its clever, fast and it requires you to think ahead. It generally played smoothly but it did crash often (not mid game though).

In some ways it feels like it was not finished, or maybe that it was actually finished in a real hurry... the menu system is rudimentary and a lot of things are not explained (such as the requirements for some levels). I had to struggle a bit to understand what some of them meant (truth be told, some of them I still don't understand). Maybe these are explained somewhere, I couldn't find where, but to be fair I didn't look very hard.

Would I recommend it ? yea I would, its a tough challenging, yet casual, game that has a lot to offer. It will frustrate those with little patience for it seems very hard in the beginning. it remains fairly hard but the learning curve is not too steep.

If you like games like tetris and bejeweled (and want a slightly more challenging game) definitely give it a shot.

This game is far from finished. It currently contains 2 "Game modes", and they are just spin offs of bejeweled like games. That being said, this game has some potential. The crafting of items puts a new spin on the boring gameplay similar to so many others. I would recommend waiting for the game to be completely finished before even considering in a purchase, assuming it ever will be finished.

This is a dead developmental project.

Honestly how can you trust a dev that abandons a project AFTER people have bought it? Now it seems to be free, which just pours salt on the wound of people who paid.