Platformers, made for people who enjoy being able to run, jump and defeat foes to get to their goals.
Fighters, made for people who have the tendency to accidentally release their anger and are fond of beating up their opponents for fun.
Racers, made for people who wants to drive as fast as their heart desires without worrying about attending a court hearing because you blew up an enemy's car during one of your races.
RPGs, made for people who enjoy deep plots and fighting the same enemies in one area for hours at a time (jk, I love RPGs :) )

Whatever type of genre you liked, you had your reasons. Many developers took these simple ideas and expanded on them, changed their formula, usually for the better. Of course, what about a genre for fast thinkers, people who want to challenge their minds rather than their platforming abilities? There are various games for these people but no, I'm not talking about any of those games. So we'll instead about the puzzle game genre and maybe how much this genre has changed and stuff.

The year is 1985, the puzzle game genre is born and becomes a worldwide sensation. This game is none other than Tetris. It had one simple idea: Take these tetrads and form a horizontal line. And if you stack too high, get out of here, you're a loser and don't bother coming back...or try again. There was nothing complicated about it, it's just stack, stack, stack. It helped provide a challenge to intellectuals to try and get the high score, and how many horizontal lines they can get at once. Ever tried taking out four horizontal lines at once? Easier said than done, chums.

With how well Tetris was doing, and this is just an estimation, ten million other places decided to try and cash in on Tetris' success. Many tried doing their own versions of Tetris whether it was a different theme or different backgrounds, but you aren't fooled, it's still the same game. Of course, some places didn't get it through their head on how tetrads should work. They should be connected in some way, not just three pieces connected in some way and the last block floating in midair with the feeling of not being wanted. I've played a handheld version of something like this when I was ten years old. Even if I was young and juvenile at the time, I still knew it sucked hard. Here's a picture of what the blocks were like if you were one of the prosperous souls to have not been tainted by this tripe.



Tetris still has its share of fans today, but that doesn't mean it wasn't out looking for a new way to get gamers to get their puzzle fix. 1996 marked the year Tetris Attack was released. Instead trying to get a horizontal line created to make room for your falling blocks, you had to do this...thing where you swap two touching blocks in order to form a line of 3-5 blocks to make them disappear. Also, you can only swap blocks horizontally...and the blocks were rising from below...and a lot of crap fell from the sky. Okay, this was actually a weird game but it was another welcome entry into the scene.

And just like Tetris, Tetris Attack had, again, another rough estimation, a billion reiterations. You saw this game, you knew what it was, you can't disguise Tetris Attack, your efforts are futile.

Anyway, it seemed like Tetris was finally ready to step off its throne and let a new wave of puzzle games try to take that throne. Dr. Mario? That's just Tetris with a little bit of Tetris Attack in there and a Mario theme. Also, I dislike Dr. Mario because of his methods to jam medication down your throat. I don't trust the man. Columns? Being given a piece of three items in a vertical row, I can have the items move up or down if I want but I can't rotate my pieces. Not too much fun, personally. Meteos? A vertical form of Tetris Attack. Lumines? Uh...I actually never played this and it looked weird so I'm going with that.

I am aware that there are some puzzles games that I am missing, and minus of my personal bias from the games I mentioned in the last paragraph, they met their share of success. But with so many various puzzle games with a different formula, what's the next step? After I played Henry Hatsworth, it was an interesting way to see platforming and puzzle come together. But at the same time, does this mean that the puzzle genre will never had a game to stand on its own again? Will puzzles have to join with other genres just to get by? What's next, an FPS/puzzle game? If I get a headshot on a guy, do the guys around him explode if I can form a horizontal line in a quick game of Tetris?

Puzzle games, don't die out on us. We need games to keep us on our toes. We need a way to commit ourselves to get a high score. You control where the next tetrad goes. Let's just hope you place that piece in the right spot.