Basics of a match 3 game

For those that have lived under a rock since the late 90’s, here is a refresher on match 3 games. Basically, you are presented with a screen filled with something, gems, rocks, whatever. There is a preset color/design to these objects and your job is to match them. When matching three or more, hence the name of the category, they disappear. Once matches are made, the rest of the objects fall and fill in the empty space.

This continues for a predetermined number of rounds, points are scored, etc. Much like Tetris, match 3 games are designed for you to lose at some point. How far you make it has just as much to do with skill as luck here.

Don’t call it a clone

While Vegetables and Bejeweled are quite similar, there are a few differences. Those differences are not as drastic as Columns versus Tetris though. They are mostly game management differences.

Bejeweled had a score system while Vegetables does not. Instead, here your total matches are kept track of. I prefer this method when playing these types of games unless there is a quest option. It is easy to play the scoreboard but no so much when matches are the score. You are either good or not.

History of the programmer

According to our friends over at Indie Retro News, Vegetables is programmed by Mike Richmond. This is Richmond’s first foray into Assembly programming, created for the RGCD 16k competition 2019.

Interestingly, Richmond apparently has not programmed anything in the last 25 years. That makes Vegetables for the Commodore 64 his return to game development. Quite cool. Indie Retro News has a plethora of information on others that helped make Vegetables a reality. Please show them some support as we are all in this together.

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