What BlockZap is, and what it is not
An honest description of our first game while it is still in development, including how it makes money and what we have decided not to do.
BlockZap is a block puzzle. You drag pieces onto a grid, and filling a line clears it.
That is the whole game, and we think that is enough.
Made to fit your day
A game should work with two minutes and with two hours. If you have a few seconds in a queue, that should be a real go at it, not a loading screen and a tutorial reminder.
How it makes money, plainly
BlockZap is free and supported by ads. If the ads bother you, $4.99 removes them permanently. Once, and it does not expire. We were tired of games where there was no way to get rid of the ads at all, and of paying for a game that then stopped getting updates.
There are also boosters and extra lives to buy. Lives refill on their own over time, so buying more is a shortcut rather than a requirement. We are telling you this on the same page as the good news, because a studio that mentions only the flattering half is one you should not trust.
The leaderboard is clean
Boosters help in normal play, but ranked runs are a separate mode where nothing is for sale. If your name is on the board, you put it there.
Kids Mode
Our own kids play this, which changed how we thought about the rest of it. Kids Mode switches off purchases, the leaderboard and player names, and holds ads to age-appropriate content. A parent turns it on and it stays on.
We are not going to pretend it removes ads. Ads are what keeps the game free. What we can do is make sure a child never sees a targeted one, or anything rated above general audiences.
There is no chat or messaging anywhere in BlockZap, in any mode.
It is not done
We are still building. There is no release date, and we would rather not invent one. When there is something to play, the waitlist hears first.