When Groovin’ Blocks hit WiiWare last year, it had an easy time of things. Dr. Mario was its only competition. They could have put any puzzle game out there and made money off of it. Fortunately, they actually released a pretty good game, an addictive amalgamation of puzzler and rhythm game similar to Lumines.

Empty Clip has polished up their game a bit and put it out on a disc. Puzzle games are a natural fit for a download service, but they don’t tend to do as well at retail. Will Groovin’ Blocks be worth the extra cash?

What it does right:

At first glance, Groovin’ Blocks looks like every single other puzzle game out there. There are a bunch of blocks sprinkled around the ground, and shapes are falling from the ceiling. Each shape contains blocks of different colors, and if you can combine three blocks of the same color, they disappear. The differences start to appear when you combine those blocks. Not only will those touching colored blocks go away, a “decay” will spread that eliminated other nearby blocks. By learning how to use this decay, you can create massive combos. One other interesting twist - you can’t rotate these shapes as they fall. Instead, you can shift the colors of the blocks in that shape. It takes a moment to get used to, and it has iteresting implications for the gameplay.

Most puzzle games have catchy soundtracks. It’s a psychological thing - use a thumping tune to set the pace of the game. You couldn’t get into a puzzle game that had a calm, fluffy soundtrack. You get pulled into the game by the frantic immediacy of its techno beats. Groovin’ Blocks is no different in this regard, but there is an extra gameplay component at work here. By pressing down on the d-pad, you immediately drop the current falling shape. If you drop it in time with the beat, you’ll build up a score multiplier.

This non-traditional take on the genre is where Groovin’ Blocks sets itself apart. It is simultaneously familiar and different. You can’t just passively let the soundtrack pull you into the game, you have to master both the flow of the blocks and the flow of the beats. It takes some getting used to, but it can be addictive once you figure it out.

What it does wrong:

While Groovin’ Blocks gets the gameplay right, the presentation could have used more work. The simplistic interface and no-frills graphics look cheap. That was fine when this was a WiiWare release, but a retail disc (even one at twenty bucks) shouldn’t feel like an eight dollar downloadable. Heck, even something as simple as adding pointer support for the menus would have gone a long way. There is no indication that you need to play the game with the Wii remote on its side, and the text-only tutorial does a poor job of explaining the game’s concepts. Sure, playing a few rounds is enough to figure out the core concepts, but some sort of interactive tutorial would have been great.

The in-game graphics are alright, they get the job done. It just seems that the developers settled for adequate. Some more special effects, variance in block design, any kind of unique art design should have been applied. As it is, you could place a screenshot of Groovin’ Blocks next to any other puzzle game and you wouldn’t know which game was which.

The verdict:

While Groovin’ Blocks is a no-brainer on the WiiWare service, its value as a retail release is somewhat questionable. Honestly, if you’ve already bought this from WiiWare and didn’t become a fanatic, there isn’t much of a reason to buy the disc. However, If you’re a diehard fan of Lumines, don’t have an internet connection, or really love playing puzzle games on your TV, Groovin’ Blocks is definitely worth the twenty bucks. It’s a solidly constructed puzzler that doesn’t require on the same stale themes that saturate the market. Its gameplay is both fun and challenging (if frustrating for the rhythm-impaired). While the interface and presentation could be shined up a bit, I have to give the developers credit for trying something a bit different.