Bubble Shooter - Your standard puzzle shooter with a money-making twist.

Enter tournaments and win prizes

On the surface, Bubble Shooter Tournaments seems like your standard puzzle shooter type game.

...win money for wasting time!

However, it comes with a very lucrative twist: In the game, you can enter tournaments and win prizes.

A bubble shooter you have probably seen before

As is standard with free puzzle games, there is no setting or story. Your job is to clear the screen by shooting different colored bubbles into a mass of multi-colored bubbles. Get a group of three, and you make a clear. Your goal is to clear the board or last longer than the person you are playing.

Straight out of the 90's

The game's graphics do not impress. It looks like it something straight out of a Netscape browser from the late 90s. Yes, some of the graphics get a little sharper when it comes to things like Avatars, but "...it would be nice if they put a little bit more time and energy into making the game look sharper or making the background colors something other than vaguely pink."

There is no background music, though there are sound effects when you fire your bubbles. Those get old, fast.

Standard play with a cash bonus

The game allows you to create your name and select an avatar. You play by using your finger to guide the bubble, selecting anywhere on the screen to fire your bubble. This makes controlling your shot very easy - maybe a little too easy.

However, even in tournament mode, you do have to clear boards in a limited amount of time or moves. Furthermore, the game will always match you against someone at your skill level, so you never feel like you are getting crushed by an expert.

The game allows you to win in-game currency, but you have to use that currency to play against other players.

Fortunately, this game appears to have avoided some of the sketchiness that tends to come with tournament games, with many reviewers noting that they did win money.

The game-play is mediocre at best, but that's not what keeps you coming back. What has users returning for more rounds is the concept of winning money for playing a silly iPhone game, and in that regard, the game is brilliant.

The tournaments keep you coming back

The game is exclusive to iOS, so you can only download it on your iPhone. Fortunately, it is a free download. Ilyon Dynamics is the primary developer of this game. They worked with a company called Skillz, who manages tournaments and virtual currency in apps. Their expertise is obvious, and the tournament and money-winning sections of the game are some of its sharpest.

The game itself is not enough to keep coming back, but the tournaments are. If you don't do well, you want to do well, so you practice, and then you play again, hoping that this will be the round that earns you $25. In that regard, the game has an excellent hook.

TL/DR

A middling Bubble Shooter game that gives you a chance to make money