W2P- Wait to play, after I've paid? – Reiner Knizia's Dice Monsters Review

This would be a great title, with some interesting dice play based on increasingly difficult thresholds to meet, but the developer has decided to implement an egregiously bad pay model that prevents me from actually playing the game, even after I've already paid $2 into it. After playing a few levels, I was happy enough with the gameplay to gladly pay the $2 to remove the occasional ad breaks. Okay fine... I don't expect games to be free, and $2 seemed about right for a light dice game of this type, and comparable with other Reiner Knizia dice games, which I've enjoyed. Even $3-4 would be fine considering the quality of the presentation, which is very nice. But then, you discover that there is another wall in the game regarding "lives," of which you only have so many that you can lose from level failures before the game will make you wait before you can play it again (or pay another $1 each time to refill those lives, which can be depleted very quickly - I'm looking at you, Winter level 37). So now, because it would be absurd for this to end up being a $20+ game (I've already had to wait 10+ times for that level 37 to refill my lives), I refuse to pay anything more for this and thus must wait each time to play a game that I've already paid for. How absurd is it to create a game that inspires people to want to continue to play it, and then deny them that opportunity?! There are also offers for people to buy certain power up abilities... That's fine. I still won't do it, but I can appreciate that some might want to opt for that, and in that case, it is their choice and not going to prevent them from actually playing. If the lives thing would be tied to a particular level, so you could keep playing earlier levels to try to build yourself up, that would be acceptable. But that's not the case... You are simply shut out from playing, period. Change that model and this would likely be a 5 star app for me.
Review by Grudunza on Reiner Knizia's Dice Monsters.