Review Insights · App Store
Gambonanza
Stray Fawn Studio · 2,390 ratings · ★ 4.9
4.9
★★★★★
2,390 ratings
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Top complaints - extracted from 9 negative reviews
Recurring phrases mined from 1-2★ reviews. The bigger the percentage, the more users have the same problem. Fix the top 2-3 in your version and you have product-market fit on day one.
1
"game"
7 negative reviews mention this · 78% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Great concept, way too buggy. I was looking for an experience similar to Balatro (I have 600 hours on that game, and this seemed like a cool new take on the roguelite idea). However, it’s obvious how poor quality control was before this game was released. So many bugs t…" - Theion666
2
"play"
4 negative reviews mention this · 44% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Great concept, way too buggy. I was looking for an experience similar to Balatro (I have 600 hours on that game, and this seemed like a cool new take on the roguelite idea). However, it’s obvious how poor quality control was before this game was released. So many bugs t…" - Theion666
3
"gambits"
3 negative reviews mention this · 33% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Great concept, way too buggy. I was looking for an experience similar to Balatro (I have 600 hours on that game, and this seemed like a cool new take on the roguelite idea). However, it’s obvious how poor quality control was before this game was released. So many bugs t…" - Theion666
4
"pieces"
3 negative reviews mention this · 33% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Great concept, way too buggy. I was looking for an experience similar to Balatro (I have 600 hours on that game, and this seemed like a cool new take on the roguelite idea). However, it’s obvious how poor quality control was before this game was released. So many bugs t…" - Theion666
5
"playing"
3 negative reviews mention this · 33% of all complaints
★★★★★ "Great concept, way too buggy. I was looking for an experience similar to Balatro (I have 600 hours on that game, and this seemed like a cool new take on the roguelite idea). However, it’s obvious how poor quality control was before this game was released. So many bugs t…" - Theion666
📋 All 9 negative reviews
Every 1-2★ review we fetched. Use the copy button to grab them all for your own analysis (paste into ChatGPT/Claude with a prompt like "summarize core user problems, group by theme, ignore bugs, focus on missing features").
Broken Settings
there’s a setting to switch touch controls from “On Drag” to “On Touch”, so you just have to tap pieces and their destinations to play. This option doesn’t work, which sucks because I can’t drag my finger on my phone very well due to a disability. I can’t play this game even though I bought it because of this bug. I will change my review if it’s fixed
Temu Balatro.
This game sucks. The animation is nauseating. Stalemate isn’t even a thing here. No real warning of the boss level coming up. Too much text that is easy to ignore.
Great concept, way too buggy
I was looking for an experience similar to Balatro (I have 600 hours on that game, and this seemed like a cool new take on the roguelite idea). However, it’s obvious how poor quality control was before this game was released. So many bugs that lead to you losing runs even if you did everything right - gambits not working properly, enemy being able to capture pieces it’s not supposed to be able to etc. I was enjoying playing this game so much until I experienced these, such a shame.
Too random
Too random to be tactically fun.
Huge sound issue
Why does this game bypass my silent mode on my iPhone? I am forced to turn down all music and sound effects in settings in order to play silently.
Nice
I had the demo on my laptop but the hardware was so fried that it just shut off playing it happy I can play it on mobile
Great idea, meh execution
I really want to like this game. I love the idea, but there are some things about the execution that I found middling. To begin, I really don’t love the combination of chess with randomness. Many of the game elements rely on luck, which in my opinion play against some of the best parts of a strategic game like chess- just it my cup of tea. Second, many of the gambits/play elements are either poorly described or they don’t work as you’d expect (ex: adjacent doesn’t count diagonals). Play mechanics of the gambits feel a bit half baked, few really great synergies, and about 80% feel useless or not worth the money. Lastly, for a single loop soundtrack I’d love something a little catchier. Great idea though.
Absolute battery drain 🧛♂️
Maybe try the desktop version if you can.
This game heats my phone up like a stove top and slows to a crawl every time I make a move, the particle effects bringing my phone to its knees.
The game is good, I’ve been playing the demo on Steam so it’s nice to see the full version but I probably wouldn’t have bought it if I knew how terrible it would perform.
This game heats my phone up like a stove top and slows to a crawl every time I make a move, the particle effects bringing my phone to its knees.
The game is good, I’ve been playing the demo on Steam so it’s nice to see the full version but I probably wouldn’t have bought it if I knew how terrible it would perform.
Not chess, bad roguelite
I really wanted to like this but it’s just not for me. It has nothing to do with chess aside from the movement of the pieces. It’s a tactical roguelite that smells vaguely of chess.
It’s not great as a roguelite either. The gambits aren’t all that fun. The piece economy feels overly punishing. The RNG feels too prevalent.
Gameplay can get very dumb depending on how the AI RNG goes. It makes very poor moves sometimes. It’s an effective strategy to just skip turns until the computer sacrifices its last piece. Or skip turns and let the board crumble underneath an AI that’s happy to jump onto a crumbling square.
You might like this game more if you don’t like chess. I dunno. I can’t recommend it. I gave it the second star because I had some moments of fun in between a lot of irritation.
It’s not great as a roguelite either. The gambits aren’t all that fun. The piece economy feels overly punishing. The RNG feels too prevalent.
Gameplay can get very dumb depending on how the AI RNG goes. It makes very poor moves sometimes. It’s an effective strategy to just skip turns until the computer sacrifices its last piece. Or skip turns and let the board crumble underneath an AI that’s happy to jump onto a crumbling square.
You might like this game more if you don’t like chess. I dunno. I can’t recommend it. I gave it the second star because I had some moments of fun in between a lot of irritation.
Sentiment summary
98%
Positive (4-5★)
1%
Neutral (3★)
1%
Negative (1-2★)