Game Details
- Publisher: God As A Cucumber
- Developer: God As A Cucumber
- ESRB Rating: “E” for Everyone
- Genre: Puzzle
- Pros: Addictive gameplay; fresh take on old classic; nice presentation
- Cons: Some graphical options would be nice
- MSRP: $5
Quatros Origins is a classic oldschool-style puzzle game
that takes the Tetris gameplay and turns it into something new. It features a normal endless mode where you
chase high scores along with a hardcore mode that is a little more challenging,
a raid mode where you only have 40 pieces to score as many points as possible,
and a fixate mode where you can’t rotate the blocks and have to place them in
whatever position they dropped in. The
normal mode is the one you’ll likely spend the most time in, but it is nice to
have some other options as well. You
can also play local multiplayer as well.
And you get all this for just $5!
What sets Quatros Origins apart from other Tetris clones is
that you aren’t just dropping pieces into one well, you’re actually dropping
them into 4. Each time you place a
block the entire playing field spins (imagine it like playing on 4 sides of a
building), but the pieces from the other sides are still in play because you’re
actually seeing the silhouettes of the pieces.
What this means is that one side might have a big gap or something, but
when the field rotates pieces from the other side might fill in that gap to let
you complete that line. And when you
clear a line on one side, it clears the pieces from that line on the other
sides as well. Does that make sense? If not, check out our video quick look below,
which will make things more clear.
What all of this means is that Quatros Origins has a very
familiar feel when you start playing it, but a lot of extra depth, too. You not only have to focus on placing blocks
like a normal Tetris game, but also think about what the other sides are
looking like and what placing a piece on the current side will do to the other
sides as well. Something else that I
like is that while the game has “levels” like Tetris, instead of just getting
faster and faster and faster as you advance through the levels, Quatros Origins
simply gives you less time to position your blocks (you have a little countdown
timer for each piece). This makes you
commit to placing blocks quickly, but doesn’t just make the game unplayably
fast. I like it a lot.
The only thing that I feel would make Quatros Origins better
is some more presentation options. More
music tracks and graphical options – like a dark theme instead of the bright
white – would make it just about perfect.
Not that the presentation isn’t already good – it looks very very clean
and nice – but more options are always better.
Aesthetic preferences aside, though, Quatros Origins is just
about a perfect puzzle game and easily the best puzzle game on Xbox One. The gameplay is that perfect blend of “easy
to learn, hard to master” that made Tetris so addictive, but it adds a whole
new dimension to the classic gameplay to give it extra depth and strategy. This makes Quatros Origins feel fresh and
new, but also familiar and easy to get into.
I love it. I really, really love
it. And for just $5 you can’t beat the
price. Buy it.
