WIP-On these iPhone games

I play a couple few games on my iPhone.  They are usually of the match three animals-candies-jewels variety.  I guess they call those "puzzle games" or "matching games."

As I have moved up the levels, the game has gotten substantially tougher, to the point where it can take me *months* to master the level I'm on and move to the next one.  Months!

 I don't know what they're deal is. I don't get their angle.  How is that to treat your customers?  Punish them for being loyal players.  Of course, I want my game to be challenging, don't get me wrong. But down right defeating?  No, thank you.  I don't need my idle pass time to frustrate me.

It'd be one thing if there was a strategy.  If you had to notice what each level calls for.  Like, maybe on level 71 it required you to be more selective with your matches because you got less moves per life.  But on level 103, it calls for you to wait for your candy-animal-gems to accumulate in value before matching them because you only get three toadstools but need to redeemed 10 to pass the level.

If there were some rhyme or reason to each level, that'd be fantastic!  You'd have hopes of learning and getting better.  It might even strengthen your critical thinking skills.  Awesome!

Instead it is all a matter of luck.  Sure, there are things you can do to help yourself and some strategy but it really comes down to luck.

And having a game level defeat me day in and day out with nothing I can do to really achieve leveling up is just infuriating.  If I wanted this frustration I'd try to figure my next month's financial budget.

I think the thing that gets to me is that this is video game following life.  I know we've all had a time in our lives, a season of days, months or years where *nothing* we did really helped.  It might put us in the right place at the right time.  And we had to keep showing up and working our asses off.  Every day.  Day in and day out. And it came down to fate or luck or serendipity for our lives to make the turn for the better, the calmer, the less exhausting.

Knowing life is like this just makes me all the more wanting of a hobby in which I might feel a bit more accomplished and where my efforts are not in vain until luck is also on my side.