App Army Assemble: Eco Power Towns - "Should you try this environmentally conscious puzzler?"

Eco Power Towns is the latest effort from indie developer Tepes Ovidiu. It's a puzzler where the goal is to create towns that make use of renewable and sustainable energy. Our App Army is well-versed in mobile puzzlers, so we handed it over to them to get their thoughts.

Here's what they said:

I started this one very anxiously, and after a few minutes, I put it down. Not a great start, I must confess. I gave it another go, but was still frustrated because there were no real instructions, and I wasn't really getting it. But such a nice soundtrack, a super nice minimalistic design, and a puzzler, a genre that I love so much. Something must be wrong. Is it me? So I gave it another go, and then it started to click. It's not the greatest of starts, so I have to say that maybe this game is not for everyone. I digress. 

My objective is to power the houses of the town, using all the green energy I can get from wind, solar, and water. You have some credits to use to buy the solar panels and wind turbines, and there's a quota of energy you need to get to, so that all the houses are powered up. Spend all your credits before getting to the energy quota needed? You lose. So you need to balance all these structures you buy very well, because they have different energy points, and to make matters worse, you need to keep checking your encyclopedia (which I hated) for the modifiers each structure has, depending on what type of land they were built on.

I would prefer a little tutorial, or some story or label behind the structures and terrain types in the encyclopedia. That could work better to keep my memory fresh. This way, you'll just have to memorise all the modifiers, or keep checking the encyclopedia each level over and over again. I guess eventually you would memorise it. That said, there are nice puzzles to be solved, and I would recommend it with a little update to the instructions that are practically non-existent. In the end, I liked it, but it sure wasn't a great start.

Eco Power Towns is a puzzler where the objective is to use limited resources to sustainably power towns. The game consists of a grid of squares; some can generate resources, some can be built on, and some cannot be built upon at all. As you progress through the levels, you get upgrades as the difficulty of the puzzles increases.

There are no instructions with this game; you are thrown in at the deep end from the first puzzle. So I had no real idea what I had to do, and every puzzle I completed was by trying every possible combination till I got it right. Not helped by the tip option being fairly useless. This soon becomes frustrating, and I cannot recommend the game.

Eco Power Towns is a minimalist puzzle and logic game where you provide enough energy to make the town thrive. They need a certain amount of energy on each Map/level. To do so, you must convert tiles to farms or other entities. I preferred the word entities over other words because the game, as minimal as it is, lacks proper labelling.

You have two resources you have to deal with to give enough power to the towns
For energy, you hand in "food" to build the structures you need. However, there is another twist because the structures do not balance each other. Sometimes you get 1:1 ratios, but in many cases you don't. That makes it exciting but also frustrating at times.

Besides the trial-and-error method, you need to check the encyclopedia and tip buttons at the bottom to get valuable tips about structure types and how they give benefits depending on their environments. The music is nice, and the minimalist graphic style is also pleasant. The only negative is the lack of labelling. For $1.99, it's definitely worth a shot!

Subscribe to Pocket Gamer on

This is a game that entails equipping the town with utilities and food, in a combination that is best for each particular level. There are options for where you can place your crops and equipment to their best advantage, and there is a clue button to help if you get stuck. The graphics are very basic and gameplay is easy, but there are no real instructions, except for a chart that shows which tiles can be accessed by which items available. I found a couple of levels difficult, and some were won more by luck than strategy and on the whole, it was a game that needed concentration. For the price, I’d say to give it a go.

The goal of the game Eco Power Towns is to transform natural energy into the energy that humans require on a daily basis. The game is entirely reliant on images with designs such as grass, ponds, mountains, rivers, and stones as natural sources. Each image is linked to energy-related objects that humans require, such as solar panels, windmills, and plant pots, which have resource points.

During gameplay, we have to click on the available tiles with natural image elements, select one, and then convert that into human usage energy at each stage using a new combination of tiles. All of those combinations either generate or deduct the points assigned to their category. Very unhelpful, making it one of the worst hint systems. Additionally, there is a lot of uncertainty at first because the game appears to be extremely simple and straightforward, but without any assistance, it becomes annoying in the early stages until you figure out how things operate on your own.

I try to live an eco-friendly life. I commute to work on my bicycle all year round, even when there is 50 cm of snow or minus 25 degrees Celsius. Haven’t driven a car for years. So yeah, I like thinking of my environmental effects. EcoPower Towns is a game aimed at increasing this mindset. It makes it in the most boring way imaginable, though. Get a village or town ecopowered by selecting the abilities of a few tiles. If wrong, try again. Sadly, a very boring game on a very important topic. Just recycle and leave the car at home instead.

Eco Power Towns is a strategy puzzler that gives some thought to making eco-friendly decisions. Using power sources that exist in the real world: wind, solar, and water, you’re tasked with creating clean energy with limited resources. The simple graphics look sharp on your mobile screen, all while pairing well with some relaxing rhythmic beats. I found myself having fun while admittedly not really knowing what was going on at times, at least initially. I seemed to learn more and more bits of information through trial and error as I progressed level by level with the help of Eco’s hint button. I felt a sense of accomplishment when I solved puzzles as the difficulty ramped up; seeing the power I had generated felt pretty good. An added tutorial or quick explanation would really help to polish up an otherwise well-made puzzler.

This is a very simple and basic game of combining different elements to build structures to make your town eco-friendly. The idea is interesting and timely, and I like that it is played in short bursts. Not something that you have to think several moves ahead or anything like that, or invest a lot of time into completing a round. At the same time, I felt that you couldn’t really use the same strategy each time- and until I started exploring the UI, I really had no idea what the different symbols meant or why they affected the shifting balance.

There are onscreen buttons to explain all of this, but I kind of blundered my way through a few plays before picking up on this. A round or two of tutorials could streamline that nicely. The graphics were appealing, if rather basic. Overall, a pleasant game highlighting an important subject, which I think would benefit from an update. But for $1.99, it’s worth trying if you’re eco-conscious and enjoy these kinds of games.

The App Army is Pocket Gamer's lovely community of mobile game experts. As often as possible, we ask them for their thoughts on the latest games and share them with you.

To join, simply head over to either our Discord Channel or Facebook Group and request access by answering the three questions. We'll then get you in right away.

Download now!

Eco Power Towns