What Lumines lacks in variety it more than makes up for in the gameplay, audio and visual departments.

User Rating: 9.3 | Lumines: Oto to Hikari no Denshoku Puzzle PSP
Lumines was recomended to me by 2 dozen people before I bought my PSP so I decided that would be the first game I pick up. Having played Meteos, I was familiar with Q?'s work and was excited to play it. The first time you boot it up you realize that there isn't anything else quite like it. The widescreen display of the PSP lends itself to this block dropper and really shows of the capabilities of the beautiful screen. You will pick up on the gameplay very quickly and find that it's very simplistic, but not easy. In the work of Puzzle games, you have several staples that never get old I.E. Tetris, Bust-a-Move, Puzzle League, and Puyo Puyo. Lumines is the next name to be added to this list. The clean physics and strong musical influence make it a truly unique experience. Now for the downsides. There really isn't any variety to Lumines' gameplay. Every level is the same, just with different songs and rhythms (while these make the difficultly variable, it makes the game feel repetative. There are very few ways to unlock new skins, and once you play until you lose it's hard to beat your high score and open the higher skins. If you are a completion gamer like my self, you will find it hard to sit down for over an hour with your PSP just to unlock 1 or 2 skins. Also the Multiplayer experience, while innovative, is absolutely retarded. By dividing the same play screen in two and lettting the players fight over who has control over the majority of the level, it effectively criples the lossing player causing them to crash and burn way to quickly. Overall, Lumines is a modern classic that has set a new bar for quality of puzzle games. I can't wait to play the sequel.