Spooky Dwellers - Collector's Edition

No one's been to your late grandmother's home since she passed, but you've decided to refurbish her home and host a Halloween party there. Guess what? Those glowing talismans she left you aren't just strange trinkets, but necessary for banishing the spooks which have taken over the place! This is the first of 2 games which put a new spin on some of the mechanics used in an earlier series of games made by IKIGames. The goal in most levels is to direct the light beams so the lights shine on the ghosts hanging out on the edges of the playfield. A few levels play more in the traditional M3 vein of clearing all the tiles. There are an assortment of obstacles blocking the light rays: tiles to clear, blocks which must be charged up with matches or powerups to slide out of the way, jack-o-lanterns, and pipes which must be rotated or moved along conveyor belts to aim the light beams. Some of the CE extra levels feature new creepy critters who are inside the playfields blocking the lights and floor spikes which must be raised and lowered strategically. While there are levels which you need to pay attention to the order obstacles are removed to prevent the level becoming impossible to finish, most of the game is pretty relaxing unless maybe you're playing in timed mode - there were a few levels in timed mode where the timer was very tight. Otherwise, the biggest challenge with most of the game is getting the gold pumpkin trophy for clearing all the jack-o-lanterns before all the spooks are banished or all the tiles are cleared. It's not necessary to remove all the pumpkins, but does improve the color of your trophy. Plenty of Steam Achievements; none were impossibly difficult to obtain, but some will have you trying for a while. An assortment of minigames to play every so often in between M3 levels: HOS, swap-piece jigsaws, memory card games, and in the CE extras, a guess the higher or lower card game as well as a bounce-to-hit coins game where you aim skulls and bombs using a slingshot. If you're a completionist, very worth it to play the minigames because you'll need the gold coins from them and the M3 levels for redecorating your grandmother's patio in preparation for your Halloween party. The graphics are a little creepier than in Spooky Dwellers 2, but still on the "scary lite" side and not truly frightening for most, nor overly gory, although there are blood stains and splatters here and there along with realistic-looking ghosts. I've got to wonder about Grandma though because if that was her idea of a good-looking patio (even if it is a Halloween party)...yikes! But overall a fun M3 game which won't take you forever to get through and a nice treat for Halloween.