Space Holiday: A deceptively simple connect-the-dots game on iOS

Earlier this month, we brought you a preview of Space Holiday, Powerful Robot Games' iOS puzzle game that challenges players to draw lines between stars to create portals to travel out of one stage and into the next. Now that we've had a chance to go hands-on with the full title, we've found that the game's colorful graphics and simple outer shell actually hide a challenging brain-bender within.

Each level in Space Holiday becomes more complex than the last, but the overall goal remains the same: connect the individual stars in each level with lines so that no lines cross, and no obstacles are trapped within the final shape. These obstacles come in the form of asteroids that may be stationary or mobile, adding to the challenge. Stars themselves come in different varieties and may also be moving. Your objective, then, is to find a balance in using certain star power-ups to your advantage to remove or otherwise eliminate the threat of asteroids before making a final shape.

While there may be multiple solutions to some levels, most are rather complex, with lines that must be drawn just so to avoid all of the obstacles and any crossed lines. As you make your way through the game's 80 levels, there are some truly difficult levels to complete, as you may be given a bomb power-up star that can destroy some asteroids, but not all of them, or a suction cup star that can be used to manipulate the location of otherwise stationary stars, but you're not told which stars to interact with or how far to "suck them in." You can freely retry each stage as many times as you'd like, and will earn overall score stars for each level (ranging from 1-3) depending on how quickly you finished the stage, but ultimately, your success in each stage may rely on a bit of trial and error as you find the right shape to create amongst the stars. This is especially true since the final shape doesn't need to look perfect, and may be incredibly small or incredibly large depending on how you've manipulated its objects.

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While Space Holiday's simple premise may make the game seem like it's only suited for children, the game is actually fairly challenging and is better suited to those that can easily manipulate objects mentally before making any actions on the screen itself. If you'd like to try Space Holiday, you can download free trial versions on both iPhone and iPad, and can then upgrade to the full game for $0.99 or $1.99, respectively.

Click here to download Space Holiday on iPhone --->

Click here to download Space Holiday on iPad --->

Have you tried Space Holiday on iPhone or iPad? What did you think of this challenging take on the idea of connecting-the-dots? Sound off in the comments!