As part of the marketing machine leading up to hotly anticipated Da Vinci Code movie, Sony Pictures Digital has released a casual game called The Da Vinci Code (download free trial here), and it's surprisingly good. There is not a lot of positive history of integrating media brands into casual games, but it's a growing trend, and this is a great example of how to do it. The game is nicely done Match 3-style game with 90 levels, the gradual introduction of new features & challenges, and the option to play either the Story mode or the shorter Chase mode, and a good help feature if you're stumped.
The key is how Sony integrated the movie assets into the game. Rather than re-tell the book story, the game has an interesting prequel story wrapped around it that has much of the same flavor as the book. In addition, the newer features that arrive are derived from the movie (e.g. must finish the game before the inspector does, or if you don't move fast enough, then the evil character enters the game to chase you down) And the music and graphics are perfectly done for a mystery drama, adding to the enjoyment. The only issue might be that the difficulty level seems a little higher than other related games, but it encourages you to buy the game to keep going
Verdict - Great Effort - buy it if you like Match 3 games or even if you are just interested in the Da Vinci Code (download the free trial here)
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