Imagine celebrating your birthday on a fancy cruise ship. Not only are there tons of food, drinks, and gifts, but you can gaze at the beautiful open seas for miles on end. Clear, sparkling waters surround you. The cool breeze brushes past your face as if the winds themselves are offering a playful birthday greeting. And best of all, you’ve got your friends and family on this trip organized especially for you. You know that it’s going to be a long party for sure, and you’re excited to see everyone’s smiling faces—and, of course, all the wonderful gifts you’re going to get.
As the celebrations are about to begin, your mom calls you over to pose for some photos. You happily run to her and put on your biggest smile for the cameras. But then you can’t help but feel that something’s off. For one thing, the bright sunny day has quickly turned dark. The clouds overhead look ominously gray and heavy. You notice them on the polaroid shots but you’re too swept up in the festivities to point it out to anyone. Besides, who wants to hear a dour weather report just before a party?
Yet, try as you might, the darkening clouds and the rumor of an impending storm becomes harder and harder to ignore. The once clear, calm, beautiful waters begin raging. The ship starts swaying dangerously over turbulent waters. Instead of posing for the cameras, you find yourself staring straight into a giant wave about to swallow the ship whole.
You hold onto your mother, but the wave is too strong, pulling you apart from each other. You desperately try to reach for her but before you know it, you’re surrounded by the cold waters of the sea. Your body is heavy, submerged in blue. Thoughts of your birthday party are long gone, along with everything and everyone else.
You don’t know how long you’ve drifted but sometime later, you find yourself, fortunately, washed ashore on an island. After collecting yourself and recollecting what had happened, you realize that you’re marooned in a mysterious place, with none of your family in sight. You’re alone but undeterred. Perhaps the worst has happened but you’re still alive and you hold onto the hope that someday, you’ll be able to find your family and your way back home.
But first, you need to survive the island and make the most out of it.
This is how Anna’s Merge Adventure begins.
Released by ZYmobile Limited, Anna’s Merge Adventure starts out with a pretty grim opening but the game is nothing like its introductory sequence. In fact, Anna’s Merge Adventure is quite bright and colorful, with a cheerful tone that’s typical of most merge games on the market. In terms of gameplay, Anna’s Merge Adventure is something you can play at your leisure, but it also caters to those who prefer to play at a faster pace.
As with any merge game, the basic mechanic in Anna’s Merge Adventure is, well, to merge items found in the play area, which is the island Anna’s stranded on. The island is faintly divided into grids where each square can be occupied by a single item. The overall objective of the game is to merge 3 or more of the same items in order to gain points and experience. Each item, upon being merged with duplicates, will result in a new item.
You can discover new items by continuously merging the same items until such time they reach their maximum level. For instance, merging 3 Level 1 Wheat Seedlings will result in 1 Level 2 Wheat Seedling, merging 3 Level 2 Wheat Seedlings will result in 1 Level 3 Wheat Seedling, and so on until such time that you’re able to merge enough to achieve a Wheat plant, which is the maximum level of the Wheat Seedling. Wheat plants can produce Wheat crops that can be harvested. There are tons of things in the game that you can merge, which will result not only in new items but new characters as well.
Additionally, you’ll only see a small part of the island in the beginning as the rest is obscured by fog. To get rid of the fog, you’ll need to gain experience points and level up by continuously merging. Once you’ve reached the required level, you can gain access to another part of the island by using keys to remove the fog. Different parts of the island will require you to spend varying amounts of keys.
Aside from the fog, there will also be obstacles like trees on the island. Fortunately, with the help of workers (aka cute racoons), you can clear these obstacles and reclaim a bit of space. You can only hire 2 workers at a time, though you do have the option to get more workers for a price. Each obstacle has different clearing times depending on what they are. These clearing times can range between a few seconds to a couple of hours. The good news is that once the clearing time falls under 30 seconds, you can instantly complete it for free.
Clearing obstacles will also require you to spend energy. How much energy you spend will depend on the obstacle you’re trying to clear. Upon clicking an obstacle, you’ll see how many attempts it will take to clear it, as indicated by a green bar divided in multiple segments.
Each segment is equivalent to 1 clearing attempt. The more segments there are, the more energy you eventually have to spend to clear out an obstacle completely. A minimum of 5 energy is usually needed to clear 1 segment and the amount will gradually rise the more segments you try to eliminate.
These are just some of the things that you have to do to help Anna not only navigate the mysterious island, but also discover what else is in store for her. Whether you want to play to relax or invoke your competitive, completionist side, our beginner’s guide for Anna’s Merge Adventure will tackle how you can level up faster, discover more items and characters, get as much energy as you can, and earn as many rewards as there are to be had!
Merge in Multiples of 5
We’ve mentioned that the basic mechanic of the game is to merge 3 or more items to produce a new item of a higher level. For every 3 items merged, you will get 1 item of a higher level. However, if you merge 5 items at a time, you’ll get 2 items of a higher level. This means you’re able to save on using 1 item to produce 2.
For instance, if you merge 5 logs, you’ll get 2 bundles of logs. If you merge 6 logs, you’ll still get 2 log bundles, but the 6th log will not be merged and will remain a log to be merged with other logs later.
In this case, it’s better to merge in increments of 5 to get twice as many new items for less materials. Basically, if you merge 15 logs, you’ll get 6 bundles of logs instead of merging 18 logs in groups of 3 to get the same result. If you merge 18 logs all at once, you’ll get 7 log bundles, which is 1 bundle more than what you would have obtained in total by merging the same number of logs in increments of 3.
Further to this tip, it follows that you should refrain from merging just 3 items at a time and instead accumulate as many of the same items as the available island space can accommodate. When you have a large batch of items, preferably in multiples of 5, that’s when you can merge them all at once so you can get not only twice as many items but also more experience points.
This way, you also get to level up faster aside from getting more items of a higher level. With more higher level items present, the faster you can also discover the highest level form of a particular item.
Speaking of merging, chests, in particular, can also be merged. From time to time, you’ll get treasure chests as rewards. If you click on these chests, you’ll be able to open them and get a chance to obtain any of the rewards they might yield depending on what type of chest they are. However, if you save a low-level chest first and merge it with others of the same type, you can get a higher level chest with better rewards.
Keep Your Island Organized
Since we recommend accumulating items first before merging them, it goes without saying that keeping your island organized is a rather important aspect of playing the game effectively. Of course, you’ll be unlocking more parcels of land as you go, but for the most part, you’ll have limited space to accommodate items.
You can occasionally merge small groups of items to make space but, as we noted in our previous section, it’s more productive to gather up as many of the same items first then merge them in multiples of 5. If your island is in disarray and items are just randomly situated on the grid, it will be much more difficult to actually keep track of how many of the same items you have.
The basic principle in keeping your island neat and orderly is to place all the same items next to each other. However, be careful when relocating items so as not to accidentally merge them with others if you haven’t achieved your target number yet. Having an organized island will also keep you from constantly browsing the map to locate where some items are.
To effectively and productively keep your island orderly, here are some tips you might want to consider:
- Keep all unlocked characters in one corner and reserve an empty space for the rewards they will give you upon completing their orders (more on this later). The rewards you can get from characters will often be placed near these characters by default so having a small space to accommodate these rewards will allow you to keep easier track of them.
- Place all harvestable crops near each other and leave an empty space next to them. Some examples of harvestable crops are Wheat and Tomatoes. When it comes time for these crop-yielding items to produce crops, they will automatically be placed on the empty space nearby and you can collect these crops easily.
- Further to harvestable crops, don’t place them next to keys. Both crops and keys can be collected simply by clicking on them. If you make a wrong click, you might end up collecting keys instead of the crops. Depending on their level, keys can be merged, but crops cannot, so keep them away from each other to avoid accidents.
- Move trees next to each other. This refers to trees that aren’t obstacles, which can’t be moved. Basically, there are 2 types of trees: trees that are obstacles and have a fixed location until they’re cleared out; and trees that can be acquired by merging potted plants together. The latter are the types of trees that can be moved and relocated to your desired spot on the island.
Like obstacle trees, you may chop these trees down to get logs for building. Thus, keep them together or even next to obstacle trees so all the logs (or other special items) that both trees will yield will be placed near each other by default. - Reserve a spot for buildings and houses, preferably away from keys. This is because you’re going to have to click on buildings in order for the workers to build them. If they’re next to keys, you might accidentally collect keys instead of asking workers to build houses.
Get Rewarded for Discovering New Items and Characters
One other benefit of merging aside from discovering new items or characters is that you get rewards in the form of coins and experience points every time you discover these new items or characters. You can view which items you need to discover to reach its maximum level in the Discovery section, which can be accessed via the journal icon at the right side of the screen under the baker’s hat icon. The Discovery section is divided into several tabs for characters, crops, buildings, materials, chests, and currencies.
Discovering new characters, in particular, is important in unlocking more parcels of land in the island. As mentioned previously, unlockable parts of the island are obscured by a thick fog, which you can remove by spending keys and reaching a certain level.
However, some parts will also require you to unlock a specific character for the fog to be removed from that part of the island. Until such time you’re able to unlock the required character by merging the necessary items, you’re stuck with the current parcels of land you’ve already acquired.
As an aside as well, keys that have been merged have an equivalent number for unlocking fogged areas upon collection. Depending on its level, a single key will be equivalent to the following values when collected for unlocking fogged areas:
- Level 1 key = 5 keys
- Level 2 key = 15 keys
- Level 3 key = 45 keys
- Level 4 key = 135 keys
- Level 5 key = 405 keys
- Level 6 keys = 1215 keys
With this, we hearken back to our first tip to merge as many of the same items as you can in multiples of 5 so you can discover higher level items quickly, ultimately leading to their highest level form. Along the way, you’ll be able to get coins, experience points for leveling up, and even more island space!
Become a Master Builder
We’ve briefly mentioned buildings like houses, which you need workers to, well, work on. By default, you may employ 2 workers at a time, but you can get an extra worker for 30 minutes by watching an ad.
Similar to other items, building houses will have to begin with a Level 1 base item. In the case of a Wood House, for example, logs are considered a Level 1 Wood House. Upon merging 3 logs, you get a bundle of logs (Level 2), which can be merged to produce a Level 3 Wood House. Before completing a Level 3 Wood House, you’ll need to employ a worker to finish the building. From hereon, succeeding levels of the Wood House until you reach its max level will require the aid of workers. The higher the level of the Wood House you’re making, the longer it takes for workers to finish building them.
The good news is that when the building timer hits 30 seconds or less, you can instantly let the workers finish their job by clicking the blue Free button that pops up above a building.
What’s the importance of building houses, you might ask? For one, there’s a spot on the island where you can put 4 top level houses on the landscape. Upon doing so, you’ll be able to rebuild this spot and activate it to claim daily rewards.
Additionally, you might catch the Master Builder event, wherein you can unlock chests and other rewards simply building houses during the time-limited event.
That said, keep harvesting logs to merge them and make houses. As you go higher in level, you’ll eventually be able to make other types of buildings like Stone Houses, Tents, Bamboo Houses, Carriages, Flower Rooms, and Straw Houses.
Divide the Workload
Given that you can only hire 2 workers at a time (unless you get an extra worker by watching an ad or paying for one with real money), you may choose to divide the workload between them. Workers’ tasks mostly involve clearing out obstacles and building so you can choose to have 1 worker assigned to clearing tasks and the other worker assigned to building tasks.
On the other hand, you may also choose to get workers to focus on either a clearing task or a building task. We recommend doing clearing tasks first, especially if you’ll be clearing trees to collect logs. Once you’ve collected as many logs or have cleared out all obstacles and spent all your energy, you can now hire workers to accomplish building tasks.
Max level houses take pretty long to complete, but there will be instances when you’d be offered to watch an ad to instantly finish a building. Usually, when a yellow clapperboard appears on top of a building being constructed, there’s an ad you can watch to instantly finish the process.
You may avail of this offer to complete the building immediately and free up your workers for other pending tasks. This will also save you time as you can skirt the lengthy building period.
Complete Orders and Unlock New Recipes
As the game progresses, Anna will eventually discover other people on the island. You can do this by merging items that a particular character owns. For instance, unlocking Yoka, a native of the island, will require you to continuously merge masks.
Reaching the max level of this item will let you unlock Yoka. The same principle applies to other characters, though every character will need different items and some characters will require more items to be merged before reaching their max level.
Since you’ll be unlocking new people on the island, you’re going to have to feed them. This is why you’re given crops to harvest. Each character will want a specific type of food, which they will order from you. These orders may require more than one type of crop to make and will have varying waiting periods before the order is completed. Getting new types of crops is what will essentially allow you to unlock new recipes.
New crop types will be available upon unlocking more characters and gaining access to more areas in the island. However, keep in mind that harvesting cycles take a long while so it’s always a good idea to merge as many crop-yielding items as you can to ensure that you don’t run out of crops.
Whenever a character has an order, make an effort to complete them. The benefit of completing character orders is that this is the easiest way to earn not just coins and experience points, but also keys. As we’ve mentioned earlier, keys are important in unlocking areas in the island. For every order completed, you’ll gain at least 1 Level 1 key alongside other rewards.
Basically, the more orders you complete, the more keys you can get to either merge or use to unlock parts of the island, provided you’ve reached unlocking requirements. By completing orders and feeding the inhabitants of the island, you’ll be able to unlock more areas and earn some money and experience on the side. It’s a win-win!
Check and Complete Quests
Earning rewards isn’t just confined to building houses, clearing obstacles, or completing orders. Other things you do in the game such as merging items, collecting resources, spending energy, assigning tasks to workers, and a whole gamut of activities may also earn you a small amount of rewards through the different quest modes you accomplish. Though the rewards are small, it’s no reason to scoff at completing quests as these small bonuses can eventually be saved up to a significant amount.
There are 3 types of quests you can check by clicking the thick notepad icon at the bottom left-hand corner of the screen. Some tasks in these quest lists can only be completed by accomplishing them multiple times. The 3 types of quests include the following:
- Novice Quests: These are long-term quests where tasks under this list will only be unlocked when you reach a certain level. Novice Quests will be available when you reach Level 2 and can be completed until you reach Level 8. Each level will have a tab of its own, and each tab has its own list of tasks that you can check and complete.
All in all there are 40 Novice Quest tasks. When you’ve completed all these tasks, you’ll be able to receive a gift box containing numerous rewards such as energy, coins, gems, seedling bags, and chests.
- Daily Quests: These are quests that you can do daily and the list will reset each day. If you manage to complete the quest list for the day, you’ll be able to receive an extra reward. Complete all the tasks indicated in the list for 5 consecutive days and you’ll be able to receive a chest by the end of the week.
- Weekly Quests: Similar to Daily Quests, Weekly Quests also have a time limit to complete, but the tasks under this tab take longer to finish. The difference is that tasks completed in the Weekly Quest list will have point equivalents. Upon reaching a certain point value, you’ll be able to get extra rewards and you don’t necessarily have to spend the entire week getting these prizes when you can do so more quickly.
Playing the game consistently and continuously will help you finish quest lines faster. Just be aware of how much time you have to complete them so you’ll be able to get as many rewards as you can.
Pop Those Seagulls and Balloons
Once in a while, seagulls and balloons will float over the island with rewards in tow. In the case of seagulls, you’ll often see 3 or 4 seagulls flying randomly across the island. If you click on any of the white seagulls, they’ll give you a random item or reward.
If you happen to see a golden seagull, you’ll notice that it usually carries a yellow clapperboard. When you click on a golden seagull, you’ll be able to choose 1 of 3 random rewards. To claim the reward of your choice, you need to watch an ad.
Any item can appear in the selection from golden seagulls, and we recommend choosing rewards such as character items, crops, or high-level items that aren’t commonly found or may take a while to merge to reach that level. Choose wisely to make the ad watch worth it!
As for balloons, you might see a bundle of colorful balloons floating over the island similar to seagulls. These balloons carry special offers wherein you may either watch an ad or pay gems at a discounted price to get the item these balloons are offering.
Sometimes, balloons may also spring up after you’ve merged 5 or more items, wherein you’ll be offered the same item you’ve just merged.
Usually, you’d also have to watch an ad to receive this extra item but, sometimes, you’ll be asked to pay gems instead. Gems are hard to earn and can be considered premium currency so we don’t really recommend spending gems for special offers unless you’re getting a very rare or high-level item.
On the whole, whenever seagulls and balloons float across the island, check out what they have to offer as rewards and if it’s just watching an ad that you need to do to obtain them, then you might as well grab the chance!
Go Shopping from Time to Time
When it comes to rewards, we’ve often mentioned that coins are the most common that you can get simply by accomplishing various activities in the game. But what are coins used for? For the shop, of course!
The shop can be helpful in getting you some of the items you’re missing. The shop is divided into 3 tabs:
- Magical items
- Building items
- Crops
However, the shop doesn’t sell the same things all the time. Instead, the selection is limited to a maximum of 4 random items under each tab. The selection refreshes every 6 hours and you can only purchase a limited amount per item.
Some items may be sold for gems, which is the premium currency, but other items, typically the lower-level ones, are purchased in exchange for coins. The good news is that the shop occasionally gives discounts and, specifically in the Magical items tab, you’ll be able to get a free chest.
The free chest offer will be available 3 more times, although you’ll have to watch an ad each time you want to get a free chest this way after claiming the first one.
To get the best bang for your buck in the shop, we recommend regularly checking out the shops’ selections and purchasing those that are sold for coins. You may decide to buy items for gems but, again, this type of currency is much harder to earn and you just need to play the game to get many of these items without spending an exorbitant amount of gems on them.
If you’re trying to be frugal with coin purchases, we recommend reserving your resources for either crops or character items. Crops take a long time to be harvested so getting some from the shop will help complete character orders. Character items, on the other hand, are also worth the purchase since you can typically get them at random when clearing obstacles or opening chests. At least in the shop, you’ll be able to get that specific character item for just a handful of coins.
That said, it’s a good idea to go shopping once in a while and you might just find something good in the shop for bargain bin prices!
Spin the Roulette to Stock Up on Energy
As you progress with the game, you’ll be clearing lots of obstacles on the island, which won’t just give you more items, but also more space to move them around if you aren’t ready to merge them yet. To accomplish clearing tasks, though, you’re going to need energy—and lots of it.
Extra energy can be obtained by completing tasks in the 3 different quest types we’ve discussed earlier, by finishing main story quests found on the left side of the screen, or as rewards from other activities in the game. However, there’s another way you can get a significant amount of extra energy, and that’s by spinning the roulette at the Energy Shop.
To access the Energy Shop, just click on the energy bar at the top of the screen. Upon opening the Energy Shop, you’ll be able to choose from 3 options that will allow you to stock up on energy. One option is to, of course, get an energy pack in exchange for coins. Another option is to watch an ad to gain a smaller energy pack. You can do this 3 times until the offer is refreshed.
The third option is to spin the energy roulette, which will give you a significant amount of energy depending on how lucky you are. You can spin the roulette once and the offer will be reset during specific times of the day, particularly at 8 in the morning, 1 in the afternoon, and 9 in the evening based on your device’s clock.
These free attempts won’t accumulate so make an effort to spin the roulette within those timeframes. Even if you don’t get a huge amount of energy from spinning, this will certainly help you stock up energy for use later.
With that, we conclude our beginner’s guide for Anna’s Merge Adventure! How many characters have you unlocked on the island? What’s the farthest level you were able to achieve for an item? Do you think the island is actually an island, or does it represent heaven because Anna didn’t survive the tragedy? Food for thought! Speaking of thoughts, don’t forget to share your thoughts and more tips in our comment section below!
Tania
Tuesday 30th of April 2024
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