Tetris Attack

I can still remember the first time I sat down to give Tetris Attack a try with my buddy. Both of us thought the game would be identical to Tetris proper, so we were surprised when the "switch-n-match" game mechanic was introduced in one of the game's invaluable tutorials. Things were never the same after that point - we had found a new game to occupy hours upon hours of our time.

While the standard Tetris games focus on standardized block formations dropping down while you plan out how to best utilize them to complete whole horizonal lines, Tetris Attack simply pushes rows filled with randomized colored blocks up from below, and your job is to swap pairs of blocks in order to get 3 blocks of the same color in a row to clear them. This mechanic sounds simple and boring at first, but once you get a bit quicker with your swapping, the game opens up to an exciting and challenging new level.

Eventually the focus of the game becomes chaining your clears together in order to get bonus points, or to attack the other player when engaged in multiplayer action. Sometimes it can be beneficial to hurry the progression of new rows from below so that you can arrange the blocks so a single clear will kick off a chain progression. When done correctly, this will not only clear your screen of the pesky colored blocks but will also assault your opponent with new sets of blocks from above. To watch two skilled players battle it out in Tetris Attack is something that can't be described - the blistering pace and strategic planning required to stay alive must be experienced first-hand.

If you're a fan of puzzle games, you owe it to yourself to give this game a try. But be warned: just because you like Tetris doesn't mean you will like this game - the two may share the Tetris namesake in the title, though the only real similarity between the two is that they both use square blocks.