Logical

"Not too much variety, but still good. Very good."

Well, when I heard about this game, I flipped. I'm a big fan of puzzle games, and someone had stolen my Tetris Blast so I figured I'd go for it. I'm sure glad I did!! It's not really like anything else, and that's a good thing. Puzzle games these days are too generic. The manual is kind of poorly written, but lately all of Nintendo's Game Boy manuals have been kind of bad, so that didn't really surprise me. The game is not all that user-friendly, it gets going from level one, and believe me, it only gets harder. The game has pipes, gears and marbles, but hey, that's not such a bad thing, once you get the hang of the game. There's a pipe at the top, and the next marble comes out into it. Either a gear or a pipe connected to a gear will snatch the marble up, bringing it into play. Then, you take it from there. Depending on the speed level you picked,(there are two) the marbles will move fast or slow along the top and the pipes. You have to shoot the marbles (B+ desired direction) into the other gears. Once you get four of the same color (blue, green, red, or yellow) into a gear, The marbles explode, leaving that gear open for more marbles. One thing the manual doesn't tell you, though, is that once a gear explodes, a circle will appear in the middle of it, showing you which ones you have and haven't blown up. This is very handy, since it can get confusing. Once you've blown them all up once, the level ends. Don't worry about points, they go away when you turn it off, and there's no high score list. Some levels, you'll have to have the speed fast to keep up with the time. If you don't get the present marble in the top pipe down within the time limit, you lose. It's really annoying when you're about to beat the level or get a marble down, and you run out of time. Of course, it's not just you and the gears in the game, there's also different annoyances to make your life (and your game) miserable. There's the color barriers, color locks, traffic lights, directional arrows, and those times when if it would just give you one more green marble...

All of these things hinder or delay you or your marbles. Uggh. It could have used a better reward for beating levels, easier password system, and a "Make your own level" function. The password screen is extremely annoying because it flashes your password and scores really fast in the middle of a kaleidoscope, making it very hard to read, especially in a moving car. Get the game and you'll see what I mean. Oh, I definitely recommend that you get the game, because with 99 levels, this thing's bound to keep you busy, at least for a while, when you rip it out of your Game Boy and chunk it at the wall in frustration. (Just kidding!)

Scores ------

Graphics-7

What? I mean, it's a puzzle game!!

Control--8

Very precise, though I wish you could change speeds in mid-level so you could avoid those annoying incidents where you shoot the marble without rotating the recipient gear, and it bounces off and you have to wait...

Design---6

Like I said, more features and more options.

Fun------9

If puzzle games are your thing, you'll have a ball. If they're not, you'll have a looooooooooooong, bumpy ride through this one.

Sound----6

Some weird tracks, but weird isn't always good^_^ (That is, unless you're Weird Al...

Overall--7

It's a cool game, don't miss out.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 12/01/99, Updated 12/01/99