You’d be hard pressed to find a game that plays as good – and will last you as long – as this one.
Basically, the premise of Lumines is this: square blocks composed of four different smaller squares fall from the top of the screen. These blocks are made up of any composition of two different colors – it may be all one color, half-and-half, or three-to-one. You can rotate and move these blocks from side-to-side until the hit the bottom of the screen. The goal is to arrange the blocks so that clusters of same-colored squares are together, wherein they’ll materialize into glowing shapes. A ‘timeline’ is constantly running across the screen, which will remove these shapes. So you’ll need to consistently pull of the largest and most elaborate shapes you can in order to prevent the screen from filling to the brim.
A couple variables substantially add to the game and make playing it equal parts pleasantly unpredictable and surprisingly exciting for a game of its type. The first is the aforementioned timeline, which perpetually travels across the screen. The trick with the timeline, though, is that it occasionally changes speed. Sometimes it will move very fast, forcing you to slap together some shapes as quickly as you can to get some breathing room. On the other hand, it can occasionally move very slowly as well, giving you ample time to set up long strings of shapes but forcing you to work carefully so as not to fill up the screen and end the game.
The other wild card in Lumines are the ‘special blocks,’ which contains one colored square with a special graphic laid over top. Basically, if you make a square containing this special block, any blocks of the same color that are connected to that block will also be eliminated by the timeline. If you orchestrate this correctly, it’s entirely possible to almost completely wipe all of the blocks off the screen, and it’s both a lifesaver and just generally extremely satisfying to use.
The main game mode in Lumines is what’s known as Challenge Mode. This is the most dynamic mode in the game, and also where you’ll be unlocking many of the goodies in store. As you play Challenge Mode, you’ll naturally shift between different ‘skins,’ which will lend the game a new visual look and music, as well as having inherent timeline properties. When it’s game over, you’ll unlock all of the skins you played on up to that point. It’s a great, organic way to unlock new content, and the only downside is that the skins progress in the same order every time you play, so aggressively playing solely to unlock new stuff can get a touch repetitive at times.
In addition to the Challenge Mode, there is Single Skin mode, which as you might expect allows you to choose a skin you’ve unlocked and play on it for as long as you like; Puzzle Mode gives you shape overlays traced over the screen and tasks you with using your blocks to build them, a devious and challenging distraction indeed.
Finally, there is the two-player versus mode, which has both players co-existing on the same amount of space as the single-player game affords you, split down the middle. Each player must try their best to wipe away as many shapes as possible, as whomever is more successful in a single timeline pass gains one row of extra space at the expense of the other player. The final goal is to wipe the other player off the screen. This mode can also be played against the CPU, where you’ll earn some additional skins.
In all, Lumines’ simple nature really cannot properly convey how completely and utterly consuming it can be to play. It’s one of those games where ‘just one more game’ means you’re spending at least another hour or two trying to collect skins and beat your high score. Topped with colorful, animated visuals that are vibrant but don’t get in the way and a spectacular techno soundtrack from well-known DJs around the globe, Lumines is a polished, completely addictive, and damn-near flawless product that is absolutely worth your time and money.