Review: Tetraminos (Wii U eShop)

This review was written by PN contributor, James Colozzi.

Though nothing to write home to mom about, Tetraminos is a very well put together game. It’s Tetris with some twists.

Ahhhhh the dreaded cross block

For instance, what I like to call the dreaded cross block – the piece always wanted, til you get it and realize you can’t use it! It also has a somewhat useful tracer system that helps line up your blocks and see how they will fit when you drop them. While at first I found this to be a cool feature, it totally distracts and clutters the screen when the speed is on. With it I found I had a very hard time tracking my pieces as, coupled with the interesting lighting effect on the blocks, I found they had a tendency to blur and obscure where and what I was doing.

I really enjoyed the different modes of gameplay. Endless was by far the most fun, and most like the original. This mode puts you in the classic Tetris feel, minus the nifty 80’s NES music in the original. Puzzle mode helps you learn how to get out of some tight spots. This mode gives you those irritating mistakes you make when moving pieces at top speed, and teaches you how to fix them by throwing you in the thick of it! The difficulty increases with each puzzle and it rates you on how fast you complete it with a rating of 1 to 3 stars. Challenge mode teaches you speed. With this mode you are given a set number of lines to clear in a set amount of time, which  sounds simple at first but can quickly get out of hand if you try to make clean lines. The object is to clear the lines as fast as you can; no combos needed just keep the screen clean.

Oh man, speed 7! Yikes, argggggghhhhh

This Tetris clone is very challenging! While you progress and eliminate lines with combos in Endless, the challenge increases. By the time I got to 7 my eyes and hands where melting from the drastic ramp in speed and the intense gameplay! The Challenge mode I found harder than I thought it would be and frustrating.

The controls are superb when using the GamePad, however the control sticks have a tendency to move your piece if you let it spring back to center position. Sadly I didn’t get to use the multiplayer features with anyone, as the dogs just try to eat my controllers!

All in all I would rate Tetraminos a 8 out of 10 for the simple fact that it’s very challenging, and honestly a well put together game!