Find the Balance

Genre: Puzzle

Players: 1-2 Competitive (Local / Local Split-Screen)

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Review:

Find the Balance is a family-friendly physics-based Puzzle game where players must balance various-shaped objects so that they don’t fall. This game was originally released on iOS in 2017 and ported to PC and Nintendo Switch in 2018. And due to the similarity to Art of Balance (ported to the Nintendo Switch a mere month later, no less), this review will inevitably be filled with comparisons between the two.

The presentation for this game is fairly simple, with cartoonish 2D art for the various objects being balanced, and a black and white line art animation of some sort of threat like a buzzsaw at the bottom of the screen. This is paired with a simple, repetitive soundtrack that, while fitting, can get a bit annoying before long.

Find the Balance’s single-player gameplay is spread between multiple game modes – Classic mode, which includes 88 levels that are like puzzles to solve, Stars mode, which is like Classic mode but also tasks players with having objects placed to cover three stars on-screen, Auto Fall mode, which has an endless series of objects falling and limits the player’s time to place them, and Endless mode, which lets players keep placing items without a time limit until an object drops.

There are also a few different modes available for two-player competitive play. Adding Blocks mode has players alternating adding various blocks to a growing stack until someone fails, Speed Stack has each player trying to place the same set of pieces faster than their opponent, and Auto Fall mode works similarly to the single-player version of the mode, with the first player to fail losing.

Overall, comparing Find the Balance with Art of Balance, each has its own area where it shines. Art of Balance absolutely wins when it comes to presentation and polish, as well as its support for 4 players (Find the Balance only supports 2) and its touchscreen support (Find the Balance doesn’t use the touchscreen). However, Find the Balance offers players a much wider array of game modes to play, and the inclusion of multiple Endless modes in particular is quite nice. Find the Balance also has a nicer price point, at only $5 to Art of Balance’s $9.

In the end, if you’re looking for a decent physics-based Puzzle game, you really can’t go wrong with either – they’re both solid games with their own fine qualities that set them apart. I would say that Find the Balance is definitely the game you want between the two if what you’re looking for is an endless challenge where you can try to beat your previous record, or a good variety of ways to play the game. If you’re looking for a fun, inexpensive Puzzle game on the Nintendo Switch, this is an excellent choice.

tl;dr – Find the Balance is a family-friendly physics-based Puzzle game where players must stack numerous objects without them falling. While this game doesn’t have the nice presentation or some of the features of Art of Balance, it makes up for it with a good variety of game modes, including an excellent Endless mode. If you’re looking for a good, inexpensive Puzzle game, this is well worth trying.

Grade: B+

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