Christmas Pics Quiz - 4.5 Stars

What is it?

I decided to get into the festive swing of things so did a search for 'Christmas' on the app store and stumbled across Christmas Pics Quiz. I had 100 Pics on my phone a while ago for a play off in work to see who could complete the categories first... a very productive week! This game gives a bit more as it also combines the with the awesome game Guess the Emoji! I loved the original game of this and completed it within a few days. Unfortunately I lost my score in the great washing machine incident where, god rest its soul, my iPhone 5 went to phone heaven! I couldn't face going through the 200 levels to get back my score, so this game had ultimate appeal!!

There are several categories within the app, but my main game play has been Christmas pics, of which there are about 20 (easy to complete) and then the 100 levels of Christmas Emoji which was a welcome surprise!

The aim of the game is to guess what the series of emoji's are, for each correct answer you earn some coins. Each level appears by showing the available letters, normally more than needed, the blank boxes to create the words and the emoji's hidden below four squares. Each square you remove shows part of the clue but also reduces the amount of coins that you can win. 

There are a great mix of items in there, but some repetition. If you are good at word puzzle games, there are some levels that you don't have to uncover any of the emoji's. With that said there are some that did my head in! I mean seriously in German and Italian so some Google help was required. 

The coins are important as they can be traded in for clues. You can reveal a letter that will appear in the answer section, this was my favourite hint tool! You can also remove letters from the selection, but for the Italian and German ones this was of no use to me. 

The coins quickly run down and the game does, maybe a little too eagerly, offers to let you buy more. The game also asked you after a wrong guess if you needed help and offered to sell you coins, this was a little frustrating when I had only guessed wrong twice!

A good feature of this game is the notifications. On the first night I played it got turned off in a bit of a huff as my tired brain couldn't figure out what the hell the answer was. While in work the next day running between meetings I had the normal notification of 'come back and play' but with the awesome addition of a freebie clue of a free letter!

I will be sad to complete the series of festive levels but I am looking forward to trying the Winter, TV Shows, TV Stars and Cartoon sections!

Now for some ratings.....

Ease of use - 5

If you have played any of the Guess the Emoji type games then this will be second nature to you! If you haven't, then it is just tap on a letter to add it to the board or tap it again to remove it! Very easy game!
Price - 5

Free! There are in app purchase and some of the other categories are payed. Although that may be frustrating the free categories have up to 100 levels and are good fun!

Adverts - 3

There are adverts in this game and sometimes they can't be avoided based on how quickly they show up between levels. There are banner ad's throughout the game but they don't interfere with game play. I will say that the ad's didn't make me put the phone down unlike games like Scrabble and the god awful Christmas Cracker game last year (it still angers me after 12 months!).

Overall Rating - 4.5
This would have quite easily been a 5, but the full screen adverts that popped up resulting in me in the App Stored just stopped it :( 

Keep, jury is out or delete - Keep

Without doubt I will be keeping this game until it is complete! My deadline for this is December 17th when my shiny new iPhone 6 WILL be arriving.... if only my scores would be transferred over! Definitely recommend this to people that like word games and are partial to a bit of Catch Phrase! Happy guessing!

Where to find it:

Apple: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/christmas-pics-quiz-fun-festive/id755281885?mt=8 

Virtual Snow - 2 Stars

What is it?

This is an app that allows you to add snow fall to your camera image. I reviewed the free version so could not actually take any pictures. 

When you open the app you are presented with a screen full of instructions, the main one being that if you double tap the screen it adjusts the amount of snow fall. The instructions have been written in white bubble writing on a pale background so may be a little difficult for some people to read.  The instructions automatically disappear after a few seconds and the only way I could find to get them back was to close down and restart the app. 

When the app goes to the camera function snow is already falling and it looks good. When you double tap the screen the snow fall does increase, but the speed difference isn't that apparent. There are three types of snow fall: Light Fluffy; Snow Storm; and Blizzard. 

There is a menu option that can be accessed, but for some reason the text is horizontal when the phone is vertical and vice versa. The fonts used for the menu are difficult to read and the writing on the button images are too small.  After some playing with the app I figured out there is a snow flakes options of which there are three to choose from, upgrade option and more apps. 

The different snow flake options are basic, shaded and cartoon. My favourite is cartoon as its as basic and shaded are very similar dots. 

As I mentioned earlier the free version only allows you to view the snow fall through the camera options. You can take screen shots but they can be blurred and contain the advertising banner that is always present at the bottom of the screen.  You can upgrade the app to remove the adverts and take pictures to your camera roll for £0.69.

Now for some ratings.....

Ease of use - 3 

In the free version there isn't much to use as you can't take pictures. The fonts used for instructions and menus are difficult to read and seem to work against the direction of the phone.  
Price - 3

This is a free app, but has very limited functionality and the fact that you can't use the camera is a little disappointing.  The upgrade cost is low at £0.69 but it didn't make me want to buy it, but I can see the appeal for Christmas fanatics!

Adverts - 2

There are adverts in the app including pop ups and a constant banner at the bottom of the screen, all to encourage you to upgrade. 

Keep, jury is out or delete - Jury is out

This app has a nice concept and it is fun. The instructions and lack of camera functionality lessen the app for me but you can take screen shots and with the iOS7 you can crop the pictures, you just have to ask yourself if it is too much like hard work?

Where to find it:

Apple: https://itunes.apple.com/gb/app/pocket-snow-storm!-virtual/id485367333?mt=8

Android:  Not available.