This scrolling line also has a variety of effects on the actual game. Not only are your connected shapes cleared when the scrolling line passes through them, but the line's speed changes, depending on the style and pace of the music. Thus on the slower, more laidback tracks, it's a good idea to fill the screen quickly, to make the most of the increased combo advantage a slower scroll line gives you. Alternatively, combos are much harder to produce on the faster, high-tempo tunes, so simply surviving is of most importance.
There are also random ‘magic’ blocks that appear at random. These will automatically connect any touching block of the same colour into a combo. Using these wisely and strategically is the key to generating huge combos, high scores and general survival. With clever planning and placement, it’s possible to clear a large chunk of the screen with a single magic block.
’Shinin’ is the first skin. You’ll be seeing this a lot.
Outside of the single player game, Lumines has a few modes to muck around with. There's Time Attack modes, where you must aim to achieve the highest score you possibly can within a set time limit. There’s a strangely compelling Puzzle mode, where you have to make particular shapes before the time line passes in order to progress. And joyously, there's a Vs. mode, allowing you to square up to both CPU and human opposition. Here, you share the playing field and the game becomes a tug-of-war with your own playing area increasing or decreasing in size, depending on how well you're playing.
The main setting however is the Challenge mode, an endless marathon of Lumines and the primary way of obtaining skins. Skins determine the look of the game, the music that accompanies it and the speed of the vertical passing line. As you earn points in Challenge mode, you’ll move up ‘levels’. After every four levels, the skin will change giving the game a whole different look and feel within seconds.
Visually, Lumines is slick and stylish from top to bottom. Menus are attractive and are kept simple, whilst an array of quirky unlockable avatars give the game a personal touch here and there. The game relies heavily on its visual and audio presentation - infact, we'd would go as far to say that if you stripped away the sleek graphics and the sexy soundtrack, it wouldn’t be half the game it is. As with Tetsuya Mizuguchi‘s previous game Rez, Lumines is all about getting in ‘the zone’, so to speak. Such is the clever design of sound and visuals, that they feel inter-connected to the gameplay. As you do well, the music comes alive with extra beats and sounds, the screen filling with a vibrant mix of lights and colours. Without really giving you anything in the way of goals to achieve or medals to obtain, Lumines rewards you without you even knowing about it.
The game is packed full with a large collection of fantastic techno and house music. Artists such as Mondo Grosso (a favourite of Mizuguchi-san) and Nobuchika lend their musical talent, and blend in flawlessly with the in-house created tunes. Despite not even being a fan of this music genre, it’s impossible not to adore this soundtrack - the title track, 'Shinin', is especially memorable. Not just because of the fact you’ll start with this tune every time you play, but because it’s genuinely a catchy tune with its acoustic guitars, all beautifully woven between drum beats. And as PALGN mentioned earlier, the speed of the game is dependent on the pace of the music, meaning the music isn't just there superficially - it actively affects the gameplay also.
The surprisingly addictive multiplayer mode in action
Primarily, there are a few minor flaws that prevent the game obtaining true legendary status. The biggest problem rears it's head when you start getting really good at the game, as this is definitely a title which is at it's best while your learning it, rather than when you’re a master of it. The first few days and weeks of play provide reasonably timed games, but once you start getting to a certain skill level, it’s not uncommon for single games to last around the two-hour mark and beyond. For a handheld puzzle game where quick bursts of play are important, this is something worth mentioning. Sure, you could just put the PSP in ‘sleep’ mode during a game, but given how Lumines is all about getting into that ‘zone’, it’s hard to get back into a game halfway through.
Of course, you can just do the shorter Time Attack games when you’re only looking for a quick blast, but there just isn’t enough variety with the time limits that you can set yourself. With 200 seconds being the longest, this brings us to our next gripe: why not include 10, 20 and 30-minute Time Attack modes? Some kind of balance between 200 seconds or two-hour games could and should have been found, but unfortunately we're left to choose between two extremes. A different mode where you could set the order of skins would have been nice too. In Challenge mode, we can fully understand why the skins are in a certain order (because they’re constructed to offer different types and speeds of music), but you’ll play through the earlier skins over and over, and only ever see the later ones a few times. It's a shame that you couldn’t work through them in a custom/random order once you’ve unlocked them all, for example.
Despite our moans though, Lumines is ultimately a superb title that all PSP owners should seriously consider upon release. The gameplay is a unique experience that's both strangely addictive and, along with it's distinctive blend of artistic visuals and pumping soundtrack, one of the most technically polished PSP games at launch. Sure, it may not have the lasting appeal of a Tetris, or the wealth of unlockables and modes found in Q Entertainment’s upcoming Meteos, but sit yourself in a dark room with a decent pair of earphones you’ll be dragged in a world of your own. And let’s be honest, who ever expected that a simple puzzle game could do that? Highly recommended.
wait to you get to some of the end ones, just amazing.
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