App of the day: Fill More! review (iPhone)

If you've played the classic game Filler then Fill More! will be familiar territory. This modern-day mobile device adaptation is based loosely around a command and conquer theme that feels like playing a digital board game. Fill More! is a strategic turn-based game that will have you plugging away at coloured hexagons till you're blue in the face.

Fill More!

Format

iOS

Price

£1.49

We're not sure what it is about Fill More! that makes it fun to play. At times frustrating, at others a dazzling bewilderment of colour that crosses wires in the brain, the premise of the game is simple: invade the most hexagonal spaces and once all are conquered - it's turn-based play until the last is captured - the winner is the one with the highest percentage of possession.

There's a star emblem which is generated at random each game and this represents your start position - we think of it as your Commander General - and any colours in immediate proximity to this point are up for the taking. If the same colours sit side by side then these arms can be captured all in one. You'll want to get the combinations that reach the furthest across the board as once a complete edge-to-edge collection is made the surrounding hexagons - irrelevant of colour - are automatically conquered.

If a game has, say, six colours available in play - there can be more - then you will always have one in play, while your opponent will have another. It's not possible for both to occupy the same colour at once. And here's where it gets tactical: if you can see a decent turn your opponent can make using, say, orange then you can steal the orange move to block their potential advance, even if it doesn't gain you much more ground.

A to-and-fro between most occupation and thinking about where your opponent sits in the mix can see large final scores, up into the high 70-something per cents. At least at the beginning. See, as you advance through the various levels the number of hexagons and the number of colours increase and your opponent gets brighter artificial intelligence. Some levels can prove tough and take several attempts - though, a bit like Solitaire, we found the random start position can benefit or hinder performance depending on where it is. There we go, blaming the game for our failures.

Play against the computer or play against a real person - whether by passing your Apple device around or using Game Center to connect with a random opponent - and you'll soon be deep in colour-tapping fun.