Ghost Hunt - Case Study

Step into the world of the paranormal! Only a few make it out alive!. Match and blast runes and other supernatural artefacts to earn coveted ghost skulls and win!

Ghost hunt is a swap/collapse Match-3 type game that integrates a one on one multiplayer challenge along with a video chat feature.

Swipe and match shapes/artefacts and make vertical/horizontal patterns of 3 or more to collapse and blast the grid. The objective of the game is to collect as many ‘ghost skulls’ by blasting the grid. The player to collect the most amount of ‘ghost skulls’ by the end of the stipulated time wins!

Multiple power-ups are also available to the player.

To collect ‘Ghost Skulls’ and power ups the player needs to blast shapes/artefacts ideally from the bottom to clear space from the grid for the skulls and powerups to travel through to the bottom-most grid. The player will acquire them when they reach the bottom-most grid. That is the objective of the game.

Why a swap/collapse match 3 game?

Looking at the latest Match 3 genre trends from an analysis by GameRefinery, it is apparent that between 2018 and 2020, games with Collapse/Blast mechanics has actually doubled in the top grossing charts.

The rise of collapse based games

• From a mental pattern recognition perspective, it is much easier for our brain to recognise patterns with big blobs of colour that are in close vicinity.
  
• Move predictability – Collapse based games have less randomness, powerups etc are created often to change the tide of play within a few moves.
• Making a move is relatively faster and waiting for the next move takes less time.

Ghost Hunt - UX/UI Flow

A hypothetical app called 'GamePe' was created within which this game could be accessed. Below is a quick, visual journey for user to access and play the game.

Quick UI