My Super Puzzle Fighter Review

I dove in and bought Puzzle Fighter on XBL for 800 points. It's as good as it has ever been. Played it for about an hour online and had no hiccups or lag at all. It was just like the guy was right next to me. It has the same online setup as Street Fighter Hyper Fighting does, so you can create a room with up to 4 people and watch as your friends duke it out until your turn comes up.

After some firsthand experience with the new drop patterns...it feels much the same to me. I am not claiming to be some Puzzle Fighter god, however, so that is probably why. A few characters had a notable difference: I couldn't lay out break gems the same way as I always had. Chun Li definitely dropped a lot more gems than I ever remember her doing in previous versions. So the changes are definitely there, I'm just not good enough to notice the many nuances that the developers have implemented.

The two new (to some people) modes are not all that, though.

Y Mode

Y mode plays much like Columns did back in the day. The point here is to build stacks of 3 or more like colored gems. Unlike in the normal or Z modes (in a minute, I'm going alphabetically), once you have the requisite stacks they will break automatically. The problem here is that Puzzle Fighter's system was not built around gems breaking automatically. Many characters have drop patterns that will instantly result in many, many, many gems being shattered once the timer counts to zero. Meaning with little to no work on the opponent's end, the gems you drop will be sent right back to your side in short order. I managed to defeat a friend several times by simply waiting out the attacks he dropped on my side.

Unique to this mode is a type of "Super" meter. As you break gems the super meter fills up. Once it does you can press the Right Bumper (or Right Trigger, I'm playing on 360) to summon yourself a diamond. The diamond comes down a certain color, it will turn every gem of a certain color to the color of the diamond. So if you get a blue diamond, place it on a yellow, it will then turn every yellow on y our board into a blue gem. It's pretty cool and saved my ass more than once.

Z mode

This mode is reminiscent of Tetris Attack. Instead of gems falling like Chocolate Rain, they rise from the ground one row at a time. Your job is to rotate the gems two at a time in order to form the squares of power that you normally would with gems from above. Any attacks you send cause your opponent's screen to lift suddenly. It's a much slower paced game, but it works much better in this system than Y mode does. The goal in this mode is pretty much the same as X (default, normal) mode, it's just going about getting it done differently.

There are some things suspiciously missing. I seem to remember a challenge mode in the PSX version of this game that allowed you to unlock colors and things. The game features a remixed soundtrack that I'm not particularly fond of. When playing online you have to hold the left or right trigger in order to talk. I'm sure there's a reason behind this, but it was annoying to me. For 10 bucks there's plenty that you do get and online play is where it is at. This is one of the best puzzle games ever, so if you have a console that can play it (and it's been released on EVERYTHING, even gba), go grab it. Single or multi, this game is tons of fun.

What is a ninja?

Gametrailers has recently "honored" us with their top 10 ninjas. In order to properly express exactly how inept, inaccurate, and incredibly stupid this list is I would have to the latin origins of the word fallacy and explain how it has evolved throughout time to get to what Gametrailers has shown us. After that "Gametrailers" would then be used to describe deception.

Their top 10:

10. Jago. Seriously? Jago? The dude looks like he just bought a bandito kit from Toys "R" Us and got challenged to a street fight. I wouldn't even know this dude was a ninja if somebody hadn't told me. Suffice it to say, I was shocked and appalled that people continued to function under this misconception. Not only is he NOT a ninja, he doesn't even do anything REMOTELY ninja-esque. Protip: Ninjas in fighters can never be shoto clones.

9. Thomas from Kung Fu. What? It says in the title "Kung Fu". How is that ninja? What part of Thomas' outfit, martial arts style and game title says "Ninja"? I'm seriously confused at how this dude was even put into consideration. It's just a bold faced Gametrailers.

8. Joe Musashi from Shinobi. This wouldn't be so bad if the two newer ninjas (Hotsuma and Hibana) from the newer shinobi games didn't make Joe (don't even get me started on how that IS NOT A NAME FOR A NINJA) look like Thomas from Kung Fu. I won't be too upset though, since he is pretty cool. Not ninja, but ninjaesque. And Gametrailers, Joe IS in Shinobi on ps2. Your weak ass gaming skills were not sufficiently adequate to unlock him.

7. Goemon from Goemon. If you look and sound like you should be in pokemon, you aren't a ninja.

6. I-ninja from I-ninja. At this point, I'm just tired of this tomfoolery. It should be obvious that these people shouldn't be allowed to make a top 10 list of the top 10 numbers from 1-10.

5. Sub-zero from MK. Let's ignore the fact that he looks like the Shredder (who was not a ninja), let's ignore the fact that EVERY SINGLE MK "ninja" was played by some hispanic dude named Carlos Pesini. What we can not ignore is the fact that he is whack, and rule #1 of being a ninja is: You can't be whack.

4. Strider Hiryu from random capcom games. I have no issues with this listing.

3. TMNT A case could certainly be made for the turtles, I won't here. I will just say that top 10 material, no matter the argument, they are not.

2. Gray Fox from MGS1 - I have no issues with this listing.

1. Ryu Hayabusa from Ninja Gaiden/DoA - I have no issues with this listing.

I will compose my own list of the top 10 ninjas when I have the proper time, consideration and respect such an endeavor deserves. This list, however, is a travesty and should not be taken seriously by anybody that can spell ninja.

If you want to see this bogus listings, click this.

FF7 Crisis Core

Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo Remix (Test)

This week will see the release of (deep breath) Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo HD Remix on the PSN and XBLA services. What I've heard of this (re-re-re) rerelase has me pretty excited. It sounds like the developers have put a lot of thought into rebalancing the game which should make it a lot more fun online. Previously, for competitive play, the only characters that could be played with any hope of winning were Donovan and Ken because of their strange and overpowered drop patterns. This doesn't seem to be the case anymore, but until we plebians get the game there is no knowing for sure. Color me optimistic. Whatever the case, for casual play there isn't a better Street Fighter puzzle game on the market and with the addition of online play and lobbies for up to 4 players, I foresee many hours spent dropping gems on my friends.

The Graphics have received an upgrade as well. More accurately the gems themselves and the backgrounds. The gems seem to be 3d and feature an awesome new animation when asploding them. The backgrounds have all been redrawn to fit fancy-shmancy HD televisions and they look super crisp from screenshots. There is at least one new background as well, which looks like Udon created it just for fanservice as several chibi Street Fighter characters can be seen involved in various recreational activities. Unfortunately the characters themselves have received no such treatment and as a result look blurry sitting next to these new and shiny gems and backgrounds. It's nothing that affects gameplay, but it is jarring at first and takes away from the overall presentation of the game.

The game comes out August 29th on XBLA for 800 points (10 bucks) and August 30th on PSN for 10 bucks (10 bucks). The staggered releasing is because of the respective networks own release schedule: XBLA games are released Wednesdays, PSN games Thursday.


Visit the official Capcom blog for this game here: http://blogs.capcomusa.com/blogs/digital.php