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A long time ago in a place far far away a man by the name of Alexey Pajitnov created one of the best selling games of all time, Tetris.
I first encountered Tetris on the Gameboy and like many was on the sucker for hours. I was addicted and so were all my friends. Since then, there's not been a puzzle game like it and I doubted there ever would be, until now.
It's been many years since Alexey Pajitnov created Tetris and now he's created another classic in the name of Hexic HD for the Xbox 360.
If you were lucky enough to grab a premium system you got this gem of a game free on your HDD.
The basic idea of the game is to rotate three pieces of the same colour in order to create a cluster.Once a cluster is created, it disappear's and all the pieces above fall down. Pretty simple? Well yes, but it's a little more complicated than that.
Hexic HD is a single player puzzle game. It has three game modes; Marathon, Timed, and Survival, as well as Xbox Live leaderboards and a great ambient soundtrack.
Gameplay
The basics of the game are easy to understand. You rotate three blocks at a time, clockwise (A) or counterclockwise (B) to create clusters of a single colour. Bonus blocks sometimes appear and these act as multipliers on normal clusters. If you match three bonus blocks of any colour into a cluster, you eliminate all blocks in the surrounding area. Surrounding any block with six same colour pieces creates a starflower. These are a little trickier to create however and a little thought is needed.You can use these star blocks to rotate in a different way (see pic) Surrounding any block with six starflower’s creates a Black Pearl. This is ultra hard; I’ve only managed to create 2 in all my attempts so far.
Bomb blocks. These need to be cleared the same way as normal blocks but before their counters reach zero. Every rotation you make on the board by pressing A or B will make the bombs timer go down by one.
The bombs need to be removed from the board fast. Fail to remove them before their timer reaches zero and your games over. At first you will find yourself scratching your head wondering how to move the pieces about to disarm the bombs. Once mastered they shouldn't cause you too much trouble until later in the game. There is one great feature the bombs bring into the game however. Take out a bomb using at least one bonus piece and all the blocks of that colour get removed from the board.
Game modes
Marathon:
The aim of this mode is to complete a set number of clusters; doing so will open the next level. When you reach the final level you need to create a final cluster of Black Pearls to win the game.
On level one you start out with only four colours on the board, each level up another colour block is added. My advice is to try to get the starflower pieces as early in the game as possible. Later levels get rather cluttered and it becomes alot harder.
Timed:
Exactly the same as marathon mode except there’s a timer. If the timer reaches zero before you create the correct number of clusters, your game is over. Creating clusters adds to your time but in later levels the timer decreases faster, so be quick.
Survival:
This mode is virtually the same as the previous two except there is no timer and no ending until a bomb's timer expires. I found this mode the best for practicing on apart from that
Score (gameplay) 8.5/10
There are 12 Achievements in Hexic HD for a total of 200 GamerPoints.
Cluster Buster - 25 Total Combos - 5 gamer points
Star Gazer - Bonus-Star Cluster - 5 gamer points
Flower Child - Starflower - 15 gamer points
Survivalist - Beat Survival - 15 gamer points
Collapse Master - 5000 Total Combos - 10 gamer points
Marathon Mogul - 150,000 Points in Marathon - 20 gamer points
Oyster-meister - Black Pearl - 15 gamer points
Millionaire Extraordinaire - 1,000,000 Total Points - 25 gamer points
Tick-Tock Doc - 75,000 Points in Timed - 20gamer points
Big Cheese of the South Seas - Black-Pearl Cluster - 20 gamer points
Grand Pearl Pooh-Bah - Black-Pearl Flower - 25 gamer points
Hexic Addict - 100 Games - 25 gamer pointsGraphics
The graphics are simplistic but that really doesn't matter. The side panels are animated and the boards’ primary colour scheme makes it easy on the eye. I would like to warn Plasma screen owners to be careful with games like this though. Static images on screen for prolonged periods of time can damage your screen badly. Make sure you take a break hourly and either turn the screen off or switch to a television programme for five minutes. Turning your brightness and contrast down is a good idea to help elevate the worry of screen burn.
Score: 5/10
Sound
The background music fits great. I was playing for 4 hours and it didn't annoy me in the slightest. I do have one slight nag though; the volume seems to jump about quite a bit. You set the volume just right then five minutes later you can hardly hear it.
The SoundFX are fine, very basic but thankfully not annoying
Score: 8/10 (I like the music but I doubt everyone will)
Conclusion
This games like Marmite; you either love it or hate it. I first tried this game the day I got my 360, got bored after ten minutes and didn't try it again until a week or so ago. I’m really glad I did!
Once you get the hang of rotating the pieces, dealing with the bombs and have got the hang of creating starflowers it becomes a fantastic challenge. I’m hooked and so is everyone else in my house. I’ve been playing this game for hours each day for the last week and I’m not bored of it in the slightest. I’ve bought nearly all the 360 launch titles and got bored of them all except Project Gotham Racing 3. For those that have tried it and gave up, give it another whirl, take your time and I’m sure it will grow on you. Those that haven't tried this game yet, what are you waiting for? Jump on it for an hour and watch time fly.
Overall score : 7.2/10
Well thats my first review, comments would be nice so i know where im going wrong :)
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