Tetris Axis

Genre: Falling Block Puzzle

Players: 1-8 Competitive (Local Wireless), Download Play Supported

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Review:

Tetris Axis is an entry in the Falling Block Puzzle game series released on Nintendo 3DS in 2011. This game provides players with 20 various game modes that each give a different spin on the classic Falling-Block Puzzle Game.

This game’s presentation makes use of 3D visuals for both backgrounds and the Tetris pieces themselves. These look nice, but aren’t as visually stunning as what we’ve seen in The Tetris Effect. Throughout the game you’ll also see Miis and Bomberman series characters, which don’t really seem to fit the more abstract visuals of the rest of the game. Backing these visuals are remixes of classical music, which are quite excellent and fit Tetris perfectly… but still aren’t as achingly beautiful as what was in The Tetris Effect. Sorry, it’s just hard to beat The Tetris Effect.

I should also note that a few of this game’s modes support AR mode visuals, which is gimmicky, but it’s a fun addition, regardless.

As for the gameplay itself, of course the core of the experience is Tetris, but what really makes this game interesting is the huge wealth of game modes. It kinda’ feels like this game’s creators threw a bunch of stuff at the wall to see what stuck, and thankfully much of it does… though not all of it.

On the good side of things, you have traditional Marathon mode, Master mode (a top-speed mode for experts), and Sprint mode where you try to complete 40 lines ASAP. There’s also more creative game modes such as Fever and Survival modes that have players playing in a narrow gameplay field, Shadow Wide mode where you try to fill in only the designated areas to create a picture, Fit mode which is a top-down puzzle, Tower Climber mode where you help a stick figure walk up to the top of a rotating tower, Capture mode where you try and have matching-colored blocks on both “sides” of designated spaces. There’s a lot of good variety in these game modes, and the gameplay ranges from fast-paced to more slow and contemplative.

However, on the bad side, I have to start by saying the default options for Computer battle are terrible, as it includes new special attacks that are extremely uneven – one attack in particular can be abused by junking up your entire screen than trading it with your opponent’s screen. In addition, there’s Jigsaw mode (a simple “match the picture” puzzle), Bombliss Plus (Tetris with bombs, with unclear rules), and Stage Racer (get a block to the bottom of a long corridor, cute but kinda’ pointless).

There is one other negative point I need to mention here, though this isn’t so much the game’s fault. At this point, there are no longer any online players in this game’s lobbies, meaning that if you want to play against a human opponent, you’ll need to arrange that yourself.

Still, as much as Tetris Axis gets wrong, it does so very much that it still does plenty of stuff right, and there’s enough good worthwhile content here to please any Puzzle game fan. Even possibly some of those who aren’t big fans of Tetris in the first place. And while I think this game still falls short of the multitude of options and great audiovisual presentation of The Tetris Effect, it’s still a superb version of Tetris, and one Nintendo 3DS owners should absolutely consider getting.

tl;dr – Tetris Axis is a take on the classic Falling-Block Puzzle that includes 20 different game modes, including some wildly inventive takes on the Tetris formula. Not all of these experiments work, but enough of them do to provide some healthy variety to make for some really fun Puzzle gameplay, and any fan of the genre with a Nintendo 3DS would do well to get a copy of this game.

Grade: B+

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