Two candy match-3 games, and the difference between them

Candy Riddles is the larger of the two by a wide margin. The board sits inside a painted world: a gingerbread village on a hillside, a beach with sugar palms, a path of levels winding between them. Characters — a red star, a small bee in a wizard hat — appear at the edge of the screen and hand you the level goal.

The candies themselves are drawn as jellies and gummies in five or six clear colours, with striped and wrapped variants for the special pieces. Goals are the usual collection tasks: bring down a number of gingerbread men, clear the jelly under the board, reach a score inside a move limit. Failing a level offers you the chance to continue, which is where the in-app purchases live.

It also runs timed events with leaderboards against other players. Those are optional and do not gate the main level path, but they are the clearest sign that this is a game designed to be opened every day rather than once a week.

Match 3 Candy is the opposite proposition. There is a green field behind the board, a score in the corner, a pause button, and that is the entire interface. No map, no characters, no shop screen, and the listing declares no in-app purchases at all — only advertising.

The board is a tall rectangle of jelly-bean candies in six colours. Levels are goal-based, shown as small counters at the top, and the move allowance is generous enough that the early stages never feel like a wall. Special pieces work the way you would expect from any match-3 game: four in a line gives a piece that clears a line, five gives one that clears a colour.

What you get for the smaller download is speed. It opens instantly, there is nothing to dismiss before the board appears, and closing it mid-level costs nothing. For a game to keep on a phone purely for waiting rooms, that matters more than production value.