A Honeycomb of Puzzling Fun or a Sticky Mess?
We came to Bee Flowers from Afil Games on the back of playing one of the publisher’s other indie offerings, Pirate Trails. For all intents and purposes, what we’re looking at is very much the same game; a twist on tile-switching, hexagon-moving, Pipe Mania style affairs. The difference? Well, the pirates have sailed off into the high seas and instead we are tasked with helping a little bee colony populate flowers, before cosying up inside their hives.
Much like any game of this type, and especially those from Afil Games, Bee Flowers is about as cheap and cheerful as you are likely to get. A puzzler without too much of a mental test behind it, you’ll no doubt splash your £4 on a download, kick back for 90 minutes or so, and lap up the last remnants of achievements and Gamerscore as you go. If that’s your idea of gaming heaven, you should buzz along to this one with immediate effect.
Buzzing with Boredom
If you want more from your games though, Bee Flowers is not quite going to come up smelling of roses. There’s hardly a test of your gaming skills to be found through the thirty stages on offer, and even though it is trickier to work through than Pirate Trails, it certainly isn’t by much.
Your one and only goal on Bee Flowers is to rotate and swap multiple hexagonal tiles, all in order to create a safe passage for your little bee friend to pass along. From a starting point somewhere on the play field, you’ll need to send your stripey friend through all flower fields, pollinating them as they go, before rocking up for bed, deep within your hive.
That’s the basic premise, and at no point does Bee Flowers deviate from it. With tiles that encompass straights, curves and various types of junction pieces, and a cursor that is on point, it’s super easy to set up a trail for them to follow. And when you’ve got just the one bee to navigate, as in the early stages, there’s hardly a thing to put a stop to your passageway plans.
Bee-Line to the Hive
Of course, Afil Games try to ramp up the difficulty slightly as further levels open, adding in a few more bees for good measure. Keeping them from flying into each other, or getting confused as they whip their way down dead ends is about as tricky as it gets.
But unlike Pirate Trails which we sailed through, the puzzles found in Bee Flowers do get a little more taxing, so much so that you may – just may – occasionally call on a hint, as a full walkthrough flashes up on screen. We’d be extremely surprised if you needed to rely on that for more than 10% of the levels offered though.
Blooming Bland: Bee Flowers’ Visuals and Audio
With a few differently coloured plants to populate, and the odd clicks of butterflies fluttering around a stage, there’s been a little bit of effort put into the decorative aesthetics too. Don’t get me wrong, Bee Flowers is far from a stunner in terms of visuals, and there’s not a doubt in my mind that you’ll quickly switch off the backing track that accompanied your puzzling, but it’s just about okay presentation wise.
However, that’s about all it is – an average puzzler at best. And it doesn’t even come with an ounce of replayability either. Granted, a swift press of LB will shuffle stage tiles so you could in theory go back through previously completed levels to complete them over again if you must, but mostly you’ll get to the end of the thirty stages, perhaps drop back in to clear up a missing achievement, and then have Bee Flowers uninstalled before you know it, patiently waiting for the next Afil Games fix.
A Honeycomb of Mediocrity
A simple tile swapping puzzler, much like other games from Afil Games, you’ll be done with everything Bee Flowers has to offer in just an hour or so. With Gamerscore bagged, and a super cheap price point barely a sting, this is about as average a game as you can get.
But perhaps that is exactly what you want in your gaming life…
Buzzing Links
Buzz into a World of Puzzles with Bee Flowers on Xbox, PlayStation, Switch, and PC – https://www.thexboxhub.com/buzz-into-a-world-of-puzzles-with-bee-flowers-on-xbox-playstation-switch-and-pc/
Purchase Bee Flowers on Xbox – https://www.xbox.com/en-gb/games/store/bee-flowers/9MTN41VLDZX0
