bittos+ Review: On The Heels Of Giants

If you’ve ever wondered what would happen if two of the greatest puzzle games of all time have an illegitimate child, you can stop trying to figure it out, because the world now has an answer. “bittos+” is the latest block dropping puzzle game to find its way to WiiWare, and it’s very clearly inspired by the grand-daddy of any block-based game, Alexey Pazhitnov’s masterpiece, “Tetris” and a modern day reinvention of virtually the same formula, “Lumines.” Pulling from such impressive (and addictive) source material, it seems like “bittos+” has lofty aspirations to keep gamers playing for hours on end with its simplistic and familiar look and feel, but can it satisfy gamers’ need for yet another block-based puzzle game?

Yeah, it can.

Sure, both the look and feel of the game are familiar, but that doesn’t mean the gameplay isn’t unique. Instead of blocks falling from the top of the screen, “bittos+” challenges the player to basically work from the center out. Pieces similar in size and shape to tetrominoes appear in the middle of the board, and the players need to shift and spin the blocks to form squares which are cleared a few seconds after being constructed. As those boxes are formed, they can then be built out in chains by adding more blocks, and creating additional squares for bonus points. As the game progresses the size requirement for a box gets bigger and bigger, making them more challenging to create, as well as chain together. While that’s all pretty straightforward, that’s not the challenging part. Any stray blocks that are left on the board, that aren’t grouped within a square, eventually turn red, making them unusable. In addition to that, they quickly start to duplicate and spread like a virus across your game board until you create a square chain adjacent to them, which will clear it away.

That may seem like a complicated explanation, but “bittos+” is actually really simple to pick up and understand. It helps that the shapes and gameplay are both familiar, but that doesn’t go so far as to feel like the game is stale and derivative (okay, it feels a little derivative). However you look at it the gameplay is infectious and you’ll have trouble putting down the controller.

One of the reasons that it will be so difficult is because of “bittos+”‘s different modes. The standard adventure mode will keep you going for hours on end, but it’s essentially the same gameplay over and over, just with an increasing speed and larger square requirements. Time attack is a much more condensed version of the game, allowing you to play in 60, 180, 300 second increments, testing you to score as many points and create as many boxes as possible in the given amount of time. However, it’s survival mode that really puts on the pressure forcing the player to create boxes within a square of continually encroaching red blocks. As time passes they quickly take up more and more of the screen, and you have to be a master of the board to keep from ending you game quickly.

The game also takes advantage of the Wii controller’s options, allowing you to play however you’d like. If you prefer point and click you can use the pointer to drop you blocks. But, if you’re more used to placing them with a d-pad then you can opt to use either the sideways Wii remote, or the classic controller. Personally, I’d recommend one of the control schemes with a d-pad, but that’s just because it offers a bit more precision. Using the pointer may result in some unintentional block drops.

For 800 Wii Points “bittos+” is a solid puzzle game, but it does seem a little light in the bells and whistles department. For example, there’s no multiplayer, or online options. Both of which would have really made this a more well rounded release. However, if you’re okay playing puzzle games by yourself, “bittos+” is worth checking out. Just be careful once you start playing, time really starts to fly when you dive into the endless mode, and it’ll be 3 AM before you know it.

Rating:

“bittos+” was developed by Unconditional Studios LLC, and published by Machine for the Nintendo Wii, via WiiWare, and PC on January 25, 2010. This review is based on the WiiWare version of the game.

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