3. DEFINITIONS
What do we mean by “action puzzle”?
(Falling blocks?)
action - falling gives Tetris its timing, pacing
puzzle - in Tetris this is about geometric shapes,
making them, seeing them, fitting them together
4. CONSEQUENCES
Some other aspects of note about Tetris:
It’s endless - the puzzle continues, if not forever, a
long time anyway
It’s recursive - the puzzle is the same, just gets
harder, and builds on itself
(Very few games do either of these things well!)
5. CONVERSION TO
MOBILE
Ultimately, Tetris relies on not just mental skill, but
physical skill. This is where it falls down on mobile.
Tetris does not convert well to single-input-play.
(One-touch mode == dumbing down Tetris.)
6. MOBILE UI
swipe - move your finger across the screen to control the left/right/down
movement of the falling block
benefits - one finger playing is definitely preferred on mobile
drawbacks - imprecise, slow, still need input for piece rotation (tap is
common), generally needs to be taught in a tutorial
on screen buttons - separate buttons for left/right/rotate/down
benefits - faster input, UI is more “obvious” as it’s always visible
drawbacks - need at least 3, probably 4 buttons, takes up valuable screen
real-estate, no tactile feedback (so on-screen buttons are easy to “miss”)
7. MOBILE UI, CONT.
invisible buttons - allow the user to tap on large portions of the screen
instead of presenting a visual button
benefits - allows for the speed / gameplay precision of buttons, but no
screen real-estate taken up, buttons can be much larger this way
drawbacks - needs to be “taught”
Accelerometer data can also be used as input.
benefits/drawbacks - while initially novel, this tends to get old fast, and
suffers from even more precision issues than swipe control schemes.
A combination approach (with some or all of the options listed above) is of
course also possible. Some apps allow the user to choose from multiple UI
options.
8. IOS GAMES WITH
TETROMINOS
Sequoia Touch - simple but elegant “tetris from all sides” - blocks of 4x4
disappear
Scrap - Sort of the opposite if Sequoia Touch, drag pieces from the middle to
the edges, trying not to fill up the entire gameboard. (Has UI issues, but is
pretty fun.)
Tetrasketch - gives you a set number of shapes, and you have to fit them
into the shape provided (Note that Zentomino is similar, and was first, but I
like Tetrasketch better, partly because you “draw” the shapes.)
Cirrus - Circular Tetris.
Polycubes / Tetricity - like welltris
9. ORIGINAL ACTION-
PUZZLE GAMES FOR IOS
Trism - graddaddy of them all. Triangular match-3, made the dev $250k in 2
months. Made the rest of us jealous.
Drop7 - pieces fall with numbers on them, when they match their position
or grouping they are removed
Critter Crunch - eat the blocks and spit them back out to match-3 (sort of
like Puzzle Bobble) - very nice art
Prism - infinitely tall 2x2 tower with holes in it. Fill ‘em.
Cosmos - same people who did Prism, very nice block “rolling” game.
Numba - create chains of numbers in many combinations
10. P2 - ORIGINAL ACTION-
PUZZLE GAMES FOR IOS
DropOut - sort of a slide-a-row meets match-3, lots of game modes.
Claustrophobia - send pieces up or down to match-3, while the gameboard
moves in toward the center.
Async Corp - swap squares on either side of the gameboard to make larger
squares of like colors that can be removed. Many game modes.
Shibuya - single-column falling block game. Choose where to place the
colors as they fall.
Magic Arrows - tap an arrow and it moves in its direction.
Azkend - slide over groups of like-colors to remove them
12. ACTION WORD PUZZLE
GAMES FOR IOS
Imangi - slide-a-row to make words. very early in the app store.
Bookworm - port to iOS of the popular popcap game.
SpellTower - words-meet-Tetris, (not super original, but very nicely done)
Puzzle Juice - a little more original version of words-meet-tetris, in this one,
the letters are not revealed until you make a Tetris-style row of completed
squares, or touch a group of like-color squares.
13. ACTION PUZZLE GAMES
A brief exploration & curation.
by Martin Grider
@livingtech
http://chesstris.com/
Abstract Puzzle LLC
http://abstractpuzzle.com/
