Tetris Plus

"Help get the little guy out of the Tetris tomb"

I wasn't into puzzle games until a few years ago, when Nintendo first released the Gameboy. A department store was displaying it and one of the games in it was Tetris. I played it and was impressed by it. I was hooked to the game, but not enough to make me it because I prefer color to my video games. It did, however, made me play the first coin arcade and buy TETRIS PLUS later on from another store that went out of business. I bought that along with 4 other Saturn games for $44.00. I am happy for getting TETRIS PLUS then and there, for the price and what it contains.

Everyone knows the game, Tetris by now, or at least should. A puzzle game created by Alexey Pajitnov. You have to form a horizontal line to eliminate the different shape blocks that fall down before they pile up to the top. That's in the Classic mode. In the Puzzle Mode, they added something to it. The story is this: A curious little professor and his lovely assistant are in search of fortune and adventure. Anxious to impress her, the little man gets trapped inside the chambers of ancient ruins. As the chamber fills up with blocks from above, a spiked ceiling descends upon the professor. When the blocks begin to pile, the professor tries to climb up to the top. The chamber is already filled with blocks, so a path must be cleared in order to find a way to the treasure hidden below.

In short, they added a descending ceiling, a little man and blocks already placed in a Tetris platform. There is a little change in strategy as you have to get the little down to the bottom. The puzzle game increases in difficulty as the stages progress. It's different, but not by much.

The graphics are simple and a bit colorful, not flashy, like in SUPER PUZZLE FIGHTER II TURBO. The background scenes show photos of pyramids and catacombs in the Classic Mode and drawings of the Sphinx, Columns, hieroglyphics and others in the Puzzle Mode. The animation is a bit slow and you have to rapidly press the D-Pad in order to move the block piece across the screen quickly. Holding down a direction won't nearly move fast enough.

The sound effects are limited as well. All you hear is the professor's echo grunts and moans in the Puzzle Mode and the announcer shouting, ''Single!'' to ''TETRIS!!!'' among the blocks sounds in both modes. There is an option choosing what kind of music to play, the Arcade or Console versions. They sound upbeat and cheerful for my taste, much like game show music, but I prefer the console because it provides more music and I don't like the organ only music arcade version that much. There are 50 tracks on the CD that you can listen outside the game.

There are many options and modes in this game. You can play two player Puzzle Version in competitive, in which any multi lines of blocks you eliminated will be sent to your opponent, or non-competitive. You can also construct a puzzle game of your own in the Edit Mode and save it along with your high score and levels in all games, but it's one player only. The Classic Tetris can be played with two non-competitive players and the level advance is different than other Tetris games. There is a gauge that runs runs up on both sides of the play area. It goes at a constant rate, faster if you eliminate lines of blocks. You go to the next level when it reaches the top. As you pass levels, the pace speeds up, then at it's fastest, it goes back to slow mode on the next level. It's speeds up again afterwards. Some might not enjoy that and prefer the regular slowly speed build up (like me).

This is the only Tetris game I've found for the Saturn, unless you count the import game TETRIS-S. It's good game for the Saturn console, for you don't need the password like in the Playstation version, and it's in color, unlike the Gameboy version. Some Tetris fans might like the creative idea of a little man in the Tetris platform while others will not. You can get this game cheap not and if possible rent it to see you like it.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 05/08/03, Updated 05/08/03