Because we are dedicated to honest customer opinions Lumines (PSP) (Video Game), we have also included Amazon's customer reviews for this item (of which 6 are displayed below). Amazon customers have given Lumines (PSP) an average rating of 4.5/5.
Top Amazon Review
Every new portable console must launch with a new puzzle game and Lumines is the game doomed to be described as the PSP?s answer to Tetris. In fact, the game has very little in common with the Russian classic, despite looking awfully familiar.The idea is that squares, made up of four multi-coloured smaller blocks continually fall from the top of the screen. You have to create single colour rectangles out of these squares, at which point they disappear when a vertical line, called the "timeline", passes over them. Your game ends if any block hits the top of the screen.Like all puzzle games describing the gameplay is infinitely less interesting than actually getting hands on. Also like most other puzzle games, Lumines doesn?t look very good in screenshots -- seeing it in motion is a different matter all together as the backgrounds swirl and pulse with your actions. The music is even more in tune with your actions, rising and falling depending on how well you?re doing. With a number of different game modes, including a wireless multiplayer option, what looks to be the new console?s least arresting title is actually its most playable and likely to remain a favourite long after other launch titles have been discarded.
Customer Review 1
The best puzzle game on PSP. When I bought this game I was unsure if it would live up to the hype generated by gaming critics. It was cheap and I needed a pizzle game for my PSP, so I decided to get it.
And the critics and reviewers are certainly right giving it the acclaim it deserves. The main game in Lumines is Challenge Mode where you earn points to unlock new skins you can play in Single Skin Mode. The aim is to create as many 2x2 blocks with the same colour using other 2x2 blocks. It sounds really simple, especially when I mention that there are only two colours per skin to make squares with, but thats where the simplicity ends and the addiction begins. Why? Well, the reason you will get hooked into this game is because it is difficult and I do play on this game on a lot and I have not got to level 50 yet and you become determined to complete and thats where the addiction begins.
There are more modes than Challenge mode. You can play on single skin mode where you play on athe same skin for an unlimited time. There is time limit mode where it test you on how many blocks you can delete in a set time limit. There is also a puzzle mode where you are giving a frame and your supposed to delete it twice within a set time limit. You can also face the CPU in amatch where you delete blocks to gain more room to work in. The best thing about Lumines is that is a puzzle game where you can have two players where you face each other to gain more room to work in and force your opponent to the top of the screen.
The only bad thing I can say if that there is a lack of variety when it comes to music as you seem to be stuck with dance beats from unknown musicians or world music. It needs established acts within R&B, pop, inidie and rock to give the skins more variety. Lumines II apparently has Black Eyed Peas and some well known musicians so if you want real pop music get Lumines II. However if you are not bothered about the music then get this version as it is addictive and it bursts with originality. Buy it! 9/10
Customer Review 2
The best "zone" puzzle game since Tetris? Quite possibly!. Any gamer worth their salt will have played Tetris, and any gamer worth their salt AND pepper will have played Tetris enough to have it completely dominate their brain, the block-dropping patterns creeping into their mind when trying to get to sleep, when trying to concentrate on work, and even when watching TV or a film.
Lumines is just such a puzzle game, like Tetris, to get inside your head.
The player drops square 2x2 blocks into a space where a line is sweeping across in time to very hip, stylish music. The patterns are made of two colours and the aim of the game is to construct shapes of 2x2 or larger of the same colour, which will be removed with the sweeping of the line.
It's really that simple.
What makes Lumines so effective, like Rez from the same producer (Tetsuya Mizugichi), is that the music and bright, colourful lights move you into a trance-like state of block-dropping and pattern forming. Playing Lumines is a pleasant, relaxed experience of musical and aesthetic enjoyment.
The game doesn't try to beat Tetris as a deeper or more satisfying puzzle challenge, it simply offers something else to the mix - music and graphics - to take the experience in another direction.
Lumines is the kind of title you can play a bit every day for months. It's perfectly suited to the portable format as you'll find little times here and there (on the bus, in bed, on the loo) where you just have a quick 10~40 minute burst that causes you to forget about all your problems and trivialities of modern life and just escape - get lost in an abstract world of satisfying aesthetics.
Lumines isn't a game to rush out and buy immediately (there are other PSP titles that I would play before it priority-wise) but it's definitely worth snapping up cheap and having in the collection for when the puzzle mood takes hold of you.
Customer Review 3
Lumines - A launch game to be proud of.... I am not usually a fan of simple puzzle games, I owned Tetris for the Gameboy a long time ago, but out of the twenty-odd games I have in my Playstation 2 collection, most of them are driving simulators or third-person shooters. Consequently I did not have particularly high expectations when I purchased this game for a bargain price with my PSP two weeks ago.
After firing the game up and entering straight into the challenge mode. I was surprised at how simple the concept of this game is. Like Tetris, it involves fitting coloured blocks together to achieve the highest score, with bonus points being given if more than one block is erased at any one time. Although in Lumines, the blocks are always made up of 2x2 squares, which did seem a little tedious at first. However, this initial downfall is completely forgotten after a few attempts, which is helped by the unique style of the game and the attention to detail found during play. Firstly, the music starts off rather chilled and the block colours fairly plain, however, once blocks are dropped faster and the pace of the game increases, the soundtrack steps up in tempo and the game's "skin" and contemporary backgrounds alter in line with what is happening onscreen. An unobtrusive line constanly moves across the screen in time with the music and if more squares can be erased before the line makes full circle, bonus pints are given. Large amounts of blocks can also be erased at any one time by careful positioning and using the bonus blocks which are sometimes capable of emptying the screen in one go. This can be very convenient at times in the game when I was beginning to become very unstuck! Suffice to say, after a few attempts at the challenge mode I was addicted, just like the old Tetris days.
Although there appears to be little depth throughout the main game, the constant changes in atmosphere drew me back to play again and again, with at least an hour being lost in only one sitting. With the multiplayer and puzzle modes (which asks the player to make shapes out of the squares which can be diverting for a short while) as an added bonus, I was not only very pleased at the originality of the game, but actually taken aback at how good it is. Simple, but very effective!
Customer Review 4
Great game. Lumines is a game which tricks you with its apparent simplicity but which goes on to show surprising depth of gameplay.
On first playing Lumines I thought it must have have been a bit of a joke, that the reviews I read raving about it were all wrong - how could a game that simply let you stack 2x2 cubes in only two colours have any real depth?
I found out pretty quick how wrong I was. The game is great fun. It takes a little getting used to whilst your grey matter gets used to figuring out which types of blocks are best in certain situations but once you start getting it the game opens up and you'll find youself building up the network of blocks only clear half of the screen with a few well placed cubes and earning the big bonuses!
The basic premise of the game is to creat 2x2 cubes of the same colour from blocks that fall from the top of thes creen - sounds simple but can be fiendishly difficult if you let your concentration slip! Every once in a while special blocks appear and when they are built into a 2x2 cube of the same colour any cubes linked to this cube of the same colour will all be deleted on the next pass of the deletion bar - it's great fun to build up the blocks and clear half the screen in one hit to get the big bonuses with this feature!
Blocks are cleared from the screen by a bar whose speed is goverened by the tempo of the music and the timing with which you place your blocks in relation to the beat of music can prove crucial to staying in the game.
The music also reacts to what you do - clear a load of blocks and get a cool breakbeat thrown over the top of the music! Each level has its own tune and unique beats. Another really cool feature is the way the game morphs between levels. You'll be playing and suddenly find your blocks smoothly change colour and the background simply change before your eyes without the game missing a beat. This plays havoc with your brain when you're used to playing with certain colours for the last five minutes!
As you progress through the main game in challenge mode you unlock the specific backgrounds/tunes which you can then play on their own in other game modes and they won't change so you don't need to worry about the colour of the blocks changing and scrambling your brain!
I should give a brief mention to mulitplayer. If you play head to head you each get half the screen at the start and as you clear blocks from your side you take over more of the screen. Needless to say if you're winning you have more space to place your blocks and you leave your opponent scrabbling to place their blocks in a tiny space which is always great fun! Sucks when you're getting trounced though!
Anyways, pick this game up - it's great game for PSP and I'm sure is available for next to nothing now.
Customer Review 5
Just to darn addictive. Have been playing this for a while now and while other games have been and gone this has just stuck. Simple idea (create a 2 x 2 square of the same colour blocks and they disappear, the more squares created at the same time gives a bigger bonus) but as the game progresses minor things are altered (speed of the blocks dropping, speed that the time line goes across the screen, background changing...) and the game can change quite drastically.
It is a simple concept that has been well executed and created an addictive fun game which makes hours of your life disappear.
