Magic Jewelry II

"Addictive gameplay Columns-style, and better than its prequel"

Magic Jewelry II

Hey, are you really interested in the game or are you just skimming my reviews? Well, either is fine with me, but I guess you'll be less disappointed if you come for the game itself. Magic Jewelry II is the long-awaited successor to the top hit Magic Jewelry... umh, the first one. Ack, who am I kidding - if you really do happen to have heard of the game before, you're a rare breed.

Hwang Shinwei's Magic Jewelry II is a Columns clone published - as far as I know without the official license from Nintendo - by RCM for Big N's 8-bit home console in 1991. After the first installment, which was solid but nothing more, they must have heeded the millions of fans' cries for at least some variation. The proper realization, however, is quite disputable.

The good thing is, they left the basic concept and mechanics of the game completely unchanged. Blocks consisting of three jewels of which each can have one of six different colors fall down from the top of the screen. Well, fall is not entirely correct, they follow the concept of the universe showing quantized movement... But anyway, your goal is to arrange these blocks such that at least three jewels of the same color get to be in a row. This causes part of the universe to collapse and makes that row disappear, leaving some points for your highscore, making place for the above blocks to fall into the hole and eventually even cause a chain reaction. But be aware - the universe will strike back! At every multiple of 70 jewels that you make disappear, a triple-X block will show up. This one even helps you so far as it makes all jewels of the same color it lands on vanish and can thus cause quite a few chain reactions. However, behind its helpful mask, this XXX-block is also the sign for an increase of the game speed and the blocks start falling faster and faster until, eventually, you are too slow and they pile up way to the top of the screen. At that point the game wins and it's Game Over for you - you're now free to go eat some chocolate.

The bad thing of the sequel is that they not only took over the basics of the first one, but also the entire appearance AND the game music. Aaarrgggh! Well, the optical presentation is something one can halfway live with. While the dull black background doesn't disturb the bright and colorful mess of pixels representing Lady Liberty or simply the play field where the blocks fall down, at least everything is well recognizable and well structured. But the worst thing is the perpetual beeping that is supposed to be the game's sound. It's exactly the same melodies and sound effects in the same 'quality' that could fend off a whole alien invasion by itself... so you'd best bring your own music when playing the game. I really think this is why the developers even gave you the option to turn the music off directly in the menu! Lazy bums - instead of improving the quality...

The rather good than bad but still a bit disappointing things are the new implementations. For once, you no longer have to fight with your friend/sister/significant other about who's allowed to play now - because there's the new 2-player mode! And there's not only the normal mode with open play for the highscore, but with Flash mode you can duke it out in a fight against time. This is - honestly - the most interesting improvement... given you have a partner to use the feature.

All other new things can be found in a new options menu. You can now choose a stage from 0 - 8, corresponding to a number of filled lines at the bottom of the play field and to the game speed at the start. This gives you the new possibility to skip the slow start phase of the game. Great, why give away easy points...? Ok ok, it's good for training purposes, I should admit that, as I criticized this point in the predecessor. Then you have new alternative designs for your blocks (of which most are not well distinguishable while playing), a new option to turn off the music (thank God!) and a new option to not count certain jewels. And for those completely lost there's the new and exciting 'Read Me' screen explaining step by step what you have to do to start playing the game. How nice of the creators to do so for this extreeeeemely complex new game... except for the fact that the slightly more complicated things are not even explained in an understandable way. >_<

Enough news? Yes, that was it. To be quite honest, this game is almost a rip-off of the customers if they really buy the game considering what's new since part 1. Nevertheless, the game itself guarantees a lot of puzzle fun and the addition of the 2-player mode, especially combined with Flash, makes Magic Jewelry II well worth getting if you have no other version of Columns or Magic Jewelry already. And if you ever get tired of jewels but are still addicted to the game, just switch to arranging bananas, apples, hats or Mahjong tiles. Or you can have fun constructing a story surrounding the game, even if none is needed. If you should even come up with a good one, e-mail it to me, ok? Have fun!

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 06/08/07