• Add Review
  • Subscribe
  • Nominate
  • Submit Media
  • RSS

It's Tetris with a story. What story?

  • calunio
  • 05/20/2010 01:56 PM
  • 480 views
As the header of this game says, it's Tetris with a story mode.

I am a huge fan of the "remake an old puzzle with a twist" genre, especially when that twist is a story.
See also Professor McLogic Saves the Day, Push!, and possibly some obscure RM tic-tac-toe version.

When reviewing a game like this, I think it's fair to judge the quality of the game mainly on that twist, on what the game brings in addition to the original puzzle, as opposed to judging the puzzle itself.

I mean, Tetris is THE best, most addicting, classiest videogame puzzle ever, so if I were to rate this game based on that, it would be an immediate 5 stars. But the fact that Tetris is so good is not a merit of this game, of course.

What is a merit of this game is that Tetris was very nicely constructed. It's an exact copy of the game. Controls are smooth, graphics are simple, clear and pleasant, there are difficulty levels... so it's a good Tetris game. Unlike Shinan said in his review, I would take this as a Tetris replacement, no problem.

My only issue with presentation is the music. It's a good one, but gets annoying quickly. Everybody knows that the background music for a puzzle game has to be something soft, soothing and relaxing, not an epic final-boss-like theme.

Now... about the story.

Tetris is a puzzle game. If you're a Tetris addict, you probably don't care much about dialogs or a story when playing it. So if you add a story to Tetris, you're turning it into a slightly different genre. You would only bother about having a story in Tetris if you care about stories. And if you care about a story, you probably expect it to be a good one. And in that department, I believe Boxley fails to deliver.

I won't go into much detail about the story because if I do, I could tell the whole of it, since it's so short. Basically you're a box, and you face other boxes in a Tetris tournament. Before each round you're introduced to your opponent, and each one has some sort of different personality, reflected in his color, facial expression and talk style. But they basically all say "I'm gonna kick your ass!". It's midly funny, and there's actually a story twist at the end. But it's one I couldn't care less.

So, my point is: adding a story to Tetris doesn't automatically make it better. It makes it worse, actually, because it's distraction. So if you're going to do it, make it a good one, not any one.

I would really like to see something like an RPG with Tetris matches instead of battles, or an adventure game with more elaborate dialogs and dialog choices, or something that made sense adding a story to Tetris.

Besides story mode, there's an "endless mode", which is traditional no-story Tetris. I'm giving this game 2 stars because, despite the not-so-successful story mode, it's a well made Tetris game.