Royal Match vs Strange Horticulture

How do Royal Match and Strange Horticulture compare on difficulty, ad pressure, in-app-purchase pressure and what real reviewers say? A side-by-side look, grounded in App Store data.

	Royal Match	Strange Horticulture
Genre	Puzzle	Puzzle
Price	Free	Paid
Difficulty	hard	easy
Ad intensity	high	none
In-app-purchase pressure	high	none
Typical session	medium	variable
Rating	4.7 / 5	4.9 / 5
Ratings count	3,787,192	1,387
Reviews say	What players like Entertaining and addictive gameplay loop Progression system unlocks new castle areas Powerful boosters and collectible rewards Common complaints Levels become impossible without in-app purchases Difficulty spike designed to pressure spending Pay-to-win mechanics targeting spenders with easier levels	What players like Atmospheric story with meaningful player choices Beautiful, cozy-yet-eerie art and visuals Well-designed puzzles grounded in logical clues Common complaints Apple Pencil not supported on iPad Short playtime relative to price Inventory management awkward on iPad

Royal Match — Match-3 puzzle game where you restore a royal castle by breaking obstacles and combining power-ups to beat challenging levels. (rated hard difficulty, high ad pressure) Strange Horticulture — Uncover dark occult mysteries by identifying rare plants in your cozy-yet-eerie puzzle shop in Undermere. (rated easy difficulty, none ad pressure)

Data: Apple App Store, as of 2026-08-24. Last updated 2026-08-24.