Overview
Diamond Quest! is a Match-3 / RPG adventure game from Storm8, the makers of Jewel Mania, Candy Blast, and Bubble Mania. In Diamond Quest, players explore a rich fantasy world populated by cute and collectible Puzzle Pals. Presented with a linear series of levels via a classic Saga map, players play puzzles to unlock and free trapped Puzzle Pals, while the Trickster Lucien terrorizes the land. In each level, players will encounter a series of Monsters that they must attack by activating their Puzzle Pals or break past a Mystical Gate, with a series of task requirements to pass the challenge.
Puzzle Pals deal damage to Monsters based on the player’s level, governed by experience points. Charge Puzzle Pals by clearing their color’s Gems and move them along an Activation Track. Once charged at the end of the track, Pals attack, dealing HP damage and activating a unique skill, such as forming a blaster or clearing an obstacle from the board.
Challenges
With Diamond Quest, a level designer, a content designer, and a system designer were sat in a room and told to come up with a new, Western-style match-3 that combines RPG elements with a Gacha mechanic. The goal was to create a new experience with two proven genres that could push monetization beyond the ARPU of Storm8’s existing and successful match-3 games. This included a goal of doubling the ARPDAU of our most successful match-3 of the time, Candy Blast Mania.
Throughout its development, Diamond Quest changed many times over. We spent a great deal of time researching and testing different meta systems and alternatives to the traditional saga map. References included CSR Racing and other non-linear progression designs. We finally landed on a simple collection-based meta system (Puzzle Pals) and a Saga-style map, after experiments hinted that non-linear progression wouldn’t mesh with the final design goals.
Introducing experience points and player levels proved to be a challenge for the product but lent itself well to the replayability of passed levels and the constant challenge provided by encounters and challenges without Monsters. Our conclusion pointed to the criticality of ‘effort over skill’ in this new casual-core title. Effort over skill allows players to grind through hard levels, consume more lives, and increase monetization and overall engagement.
Contributions
As the Senior Game Designer for Diamond Quest!, I had many responsibilities. I was one of 3 designers on the design team and saw the game from initial concept through its live operation. Over the course of the game’s lifecycle, I designed over 200 levels, owned player level curves, defined winrate targets, developed and/or oversaw the development of all Puzzle Pals and region themes (including outsourcing art requests and writing Puzzle Pal biographies). When I left the product after a year of operation, I was leading the content team of 3 associate level designers, each of which I had trained. I was the gatekeeper for sign-off on all of Diamond Quest’s content and levels.
Diamond Quest introduced several obstacle mechanics that I designed that are brand new to the genre, including Lanterns, Geodes, and Power Gems. Lanterns must have a Gem clear next to them to prevent dimming by 1 point, out of a maximum of 5; if all Lanterns go out, the level ends immediately, allowing for an additional end-game upsale. Geodes provided bonus power to Puzzle Pals when cleared. Power Gems deal epic damage when they are all successfully activated.
Game Success
Keys replaced the traditional 3-star system; players could earn 3 Keys instead - creating a new, high-value currency/commodity. A number of Keys are used to pull gacha, and a player is awarded with a random Puzzle Pal per pull, with a chance at getting a duplicate (which would power up your copy). ARPDAU was heavily impacted by the Puzzle Pal system and we successfully doubled the monetization KPI of our portfolio’s best games during live events. Monetization was also boosted through normal elements of boost usage, +5 moves, and buying extra life. This game was pre-Fishdom and pre-Gardenscape, and at the time, meta elements such as their deep vanity systems and stories hadn’t been proven for puzzle games.
Diamond Quest rose to have Storm8’s third highest DAU and continued live operations beyond 500 levels, with the highest ARPDAU of the match-3’s in the portfolio, at the time. Diamond Quest breached the top 50 highest-grossing games and spent months in the top 100 on the iOS app store.