Lose Your Marbles

"Lose your marbles but keep your sanity"

I never played with marbles as a kid. Oh sure, I had them. But I kept them horded away in a bag and only took them out every so often to look at. Apparently I was missing out on a lot. Because kids like to play with marbles, according to this game. They’ll play in the dirt, or in the grass that grows through the dirt, or on the tarmac that covers up the grass. And if their tarmac gets bulldozed over with concrete, they’ll
STILL find a way. Marbles are just that important.

Gameplay
Lose Your Marbles lets anyone retroactively enjoy the childhood past-time of playing with marbles, and chances are you’ll be having so much fun playing the game you won’t notice the fact that it’s actually just a heavily disguised falling-block puzzle clone. The idea is to challenge an opponent (either the computer or another human via keyboard sharing or computer network) to a best of 10 tournament in the schoolyard playground. Rectangles are drawn in the dirt and rows of marbles are scattered into them. The goal is to line up marbles of the same color in the center row in combinations of 3, 4 or 5. Doing so clears the marbles from your square and sends them into your opponent’s square. Whoever’s square fills up first loses.

While you’re trying to clear your grid, your opponent is doing the same and is sending more marbles your way. Therefore speed is an important factor in Lose Your Marbles and the gameplay is fast, furious and intense—especially on the highest of the three levels of difficulty. But you are eased into the game gently by a tutorial, and the lowest difficulty level is good to start off with by providing a reasonable yet manageable challenge. After each stage is completed (that is, someone wins 6 games out of 10) there is a bonus challenge where you get a “present” if you can clear a certain number of marbles in a certain amount of time. The surfaces also change from dirt to grass, asphalt, concrete and wood, and different special marbles are introduced in each new stage.

Controls
Marbles are stacked in 5 columns and the idea is to move columns up or down to bring marbles of the same color side by side in the center row (which makes them disappear). Columns are moved with the up and down arrow keys, and you can select different columns with the right and left arrows. Using the spacebar rotates the marbles in the center row. This is a great set-up from a control standpoint. Left hand for spacebar and right for the arrow keys. No wild jabbing all across the keyboard or trying to balance keyboard with mouse; everything you need to do can be accomplished in quick and precise movements.

If you’re playing another person through local-area network, each person retains the controls for single-player mode. However, if two people are sharing the same computer it can be awkward because the second person has to use the A,S,D,W keys. This isn’t the most comfortable arrangement, and unfortunately there is no option to customize the controls.

Graphics
The game came out in 1997 and the graphics hold up very well. There are five different kinds of basic marble, each a different color and very realistic looking. You can see the light reflecting off them and they actually look like spheres, not just circles. The texture on each of the different playing grids was very detailed, so that you could make out individual blades of grass or small chips and imperfections in the concrete. At the beginning of each new stage you actually get to see the grid being “drawn” onto the surface (chalk on tarmac, for example), which is a charming touch.

Sound
From the noise of children laughing to the realistic clink of the marbles as they hit each other, the sound contributes to the enjoyment of the game immensely. The music is light and happy--the kind of stuff you’d expect to see on CDs with titles like “Summer Party Mix 2002.” The rate of the music will speed up when your grid is getting too crowded, to let you know you’re in trouble.

Overall Impression
Lose Your Marbles is fun, entertaining and beautifully presented. Though not quite as smooth in two-player mode, it gives the solo player a range of challenges with simple and logical controls. My only complaint is that of the three difficulty levels, one is rather too easy and another is insanely hard. But nevertheless Lose Your Marbles is one of the few Tetris clones that actually comes close to rivalling its Daddy.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 09/14/02, Updated 05/06/03