Lumines Remastered

Lumines Remastered is a luminary of the puzzle genre and feels perfectly at home on the Switch. Intense and immersive puzzle action, psychedelic visuals, a killer soundtrack, and a bevy of content and modes make for a premier puzzle experience that should not be missed. Lumines is an addictive experience that is positively a delight to play, and we would highly recommend it to both veterans and newcomers to the puzzle genre. There’s something here for everyone, and considering the relatively low price tag, Lumines Remastered is very much ‘required playing’ for any Switch owner.

Even without online play though, Lumines Remastered is a great value for money package that’s not to be missed. Its rewarding gameplay is bolstered by its attractive visual presentation. And each and every one of its music tracks will have you tapping a foot on the floor as you play. But what really makes it stand out from the crowd is its variety. When you’ve grown tired of one mode, which will take awhile, you’ll simply move onto another. Ultimately, Lumines Remastered is just fun, fun and more fun.

Tetsuya Mizuguchi's addictive puzzle series is back with a brand new take on the original game. It's been over a dozen years since it first debuted so is Lumines Remastered worth playing in 2018?

Very few puzzle games fit the cliche “easy to learn, hard to master” quite like Lumines Remastered. When the original game first released on PSP in North America more than 13 years ago, it was a deceptively deep puzzler, and the remaster is mostly the same experience, polished and refined for modern systems.

Lumines didn’t need to reinvent the wheel for its remaster as it already had its base down pat. If you already own it you likely don’t need to revisit it on a modern machine as the re-release doesn’t really add anything you haven’t seen before, but this is a great way to discover the magic for the first time.

Having the original Lumines soundtrack on modern consoles is a nostalgia trip for fans of the 14-year-old PSP puzzler, but the core block-dropping gameplay hasn’t aged a day. It’s still just as addictive now as it was back then, but it’s a shame that as a remaster it ignores some of the game modes introduced in later games. As remasters go, Lumines is impeccable, but then it was always going to be.

For those who have never played a Lumines game before, Lumines Remastered is a must buy. However, though the HD upgrade adds to its audiovisual splendor, don’t be surprised if it feels a little too by the books.

Lumines Remastered is a welcome dive back into this series, even if your favorite skin may have been left out. If anything, it left me wanting more.

New to Lumines Remastered is a feature that Lumines creator Tetsuya Mizuguchi (Lumines, REZ, Every Extend Extra Extreme…) has been known to have in : “Trance Vibration.” The thought behind this is to immerse players into a trance by connecting multiple extra controllers (which pulse to the sounds of the game) to the system, and placing them around various parts of your body. I hooked up my extra Xbox One controllers and placed them around me as I played, and I must admit it is a more sensational way to play. It is a bit inconvenient, and I don’t see myself trying it more than a few times, or t...