Tetris Attack

In the summer of 1985, Russian mathematician and programmer Alexei Pajitnov created a puzzle game which would come to be called Tetris. After licensing troubles, sequels, the fall of Soviet Communism, and over ten years, the Tetris name still managed to prove it had more steam in it yet.

Based on a Japanese game called Panel de Pon, Tetris Attack revived the heart and soul of Tetris - a simple but challenging (and fun) puzzle game - and became arguably one of the most addictive games ever made. While Tetris Attack was also ported to Game Boy, and even remade and rebranded as Pokémon Puzzle League for the Nintendo 64, the original Super NES version remains in many ways the greatest.

The premise: rainclouds hover over the lands of Yoshi's friends, making them brainwashed and evil. Yoshi, free from this curse, takes it upon himself to rescue his pals - by defeating them in Tetris Attack. This quest will bring the noble dinosaur to the Cave of Wickedness, fighting Koopa's minions and (depending on difficulty level) King Bowser himself - again, in Tetris Attack. Sound stupid? It is. But it's nothing more than an excuse to play one of gaming's most brilliant creations.

As with the Tetris we all know and love, the ultimate goal of Attack is to keep a stack of tiles from reaching the top of the screen; however, the gameplay similarities end there. Tetris Attack tiles appear from the bottom of the screen, and push your stack upwards. How do you get rid of them? Not by making a straight horizontal line, since that's how they appear, but by matching up tiles of like color. Your control over the tiles is limited to a two-tile-wide reticle, which you can move around the screen as you wish: when you push the A (or B) button, the tiles in either side of the reticle switch places. Using this switching method, you must line up at least three tiles of the same color - then they'll disappear.

You can also pull off combos by matching more than three tiles at once, and chains by having tiles drop into place sequentially (but save that for when you've become familiar with the game); every time you pull off a combo or chain, "garbage" blocks, large blocks with no inherent color, are dropped on your opponent's stack. There's also a special color of tile that always drops a garbage block, but that's all there is to the gameplay mechanics. The genius of Tetris Attack is that as the difficulty levels increase, the tiles move faster, and your enemies become smarter. Higher settings will require all the wits and adrenaline you have to spare. Of course, if this kind of mental strain isn't for you, you can also try Puzzle Mode, which challenges you to eliminate a set of tiles with a rationed number of moves.

Aside from some slowdown in the heat of an intense battle, nothing stands out as wrong with Tetris Attack's graphics. The colors are bright, crisp, and clean - perfect for the game's settings and play. Sound effects also fit the bill quite well. The music is crafted perfectly: most tracks start out with a peaceful melody, but become more urgent and fast-paced as the tiles rise.

Being of the puzzle genre, Tetris Attack has near-infinite replay value simply by virtue of besting yourself. The game offers such a wide range of difficulty levels and skill tests, there's virtually no limit to how good you can get. If you just want to complete stages, between a number of story mode difficulties, dozens of puzzle screens, and some other modes besides, it's hard to run out of things to do. And that's just by yourself (Tetris Attack also has a two-player versus mode).

Attack isn't just a fun puzzle game. It has the capacity to push you to the limit, to the very edge of your sanity - all for the sake of grouping colored tiles. Cocaine? Heroin? LSD? They got nothin' on Tetris Attack.

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