Review written by Corn Bread
Another day, another puzzle game to review. There seems to be an endless barrage of puzzle games for the Pocket PC; some are worth playing while some are boring as heck. Particle has arrived and, as much as I am tired of playing clones of popular puzzle games, I feel this game is worth our time.
Similar to Doctor Mario, the purpose of the game is to use dropping blocks called particles to get rid of the atoms scattered throughout the board. You can get rid of an atom by combining it with two particles of the same color; particles can also be destroyed by combining 3 particles of the same color.
The particles drop in rows of 4, with you being able to rotate them so that they are either oriented horizontally or vertically. In addition, you can also alter the positions of the colors within a row. The higher the level, the faster the rows of particles drop and the more atoms will show up for you to destroy, meaning that this game isn’t exactly a walk in the park. Fortunately, a leveller exists in the form of the Particle Cannon to help you through those more difficult levels. As you destroy particles and atoms, the Particle Cannon charge meter slowly fills up and, depending on the amount of charge, you can fire it to destroy whole rows of particles and atoms.
The graphics aren't really very spectacular, looking as they do very dated, almost like a game made for one of the older Windows CE palm-sized PC's. The colors used in the game also look very cheap and bland - I’ve seen Game Boy games with more attractive color schemes! Particle won’t be winning any awards in the graphics department, that’s for sure. Of course some may consider the graphics as having a “retro” look; if that floats your boat, then you won’t mind the dated-looking graphics.
The animation of the falling particles looks and feels kind of jerky, and it’s a shame that Particle doesn’t have the smooth movements of games such as PsyTris and Sunshine Dice Palace. The special effects, on the other hand, are something worth taking note of. I love the explosion effect used when you destroy a particle or atom. Using the Particle Cannon to destroy rows of particles and atoms is always a sight to behold.
The music and sound effects are mostly average, but still good enough to get you pumped up for the game. In the settings menu, there is an option to enable the Expander sound system. The Expander sound system is for those using headphones, with the idea being that it gives you a richer and fuller sound experience through the headphones than you would normally otherwise hear. Kudos to the developer for thinking up an option like this, and I hope that more games offer this kind of sound option in the future. The in-game volume control is also fully featured. Whereas most other games only offer an on/off toggle for volume, Particle has its own music and sound effect slider control so you can adjust the level of music and effects individually.
The controls are highly customizable - you can assign any of the function commands to the hardware keys, and there is also an option to use virtual keys that appear on the bottom of the screen. But I would advise that you use the hardware buttons instead of the virtual keys as it’s considerably faster and easier to use them than the virtual ones. If you find the first few levels too easy, you can automatically skip levels by using the difficulty level slider found in the settings menu. There is also a well-written instruction manual to be found within the game. Unfortunately, there is no high score chart - only the current high score is displayed.
Particle is really another typical puzzle game in the vast sea of puzzle games available for the Pocket PC. It's challenging enough to entertain you but doesn’t have that special “oomph!” to really stand out from the crowd. Taking into consideration, however, that the asking price of this game (at the time of writing) is a mere $5 only, I suggest you take a look at it. It's not often that we get a solid and entertaining puzzle game for such a low price. If you’re a budget-conscious gamer or a Columns/Dr. Mario fan, don’t hesitate to get this game. Just don’t expect to be blown away by the graphics and animation - it does get rather boring to look at.
Particle is available for all major Pocket PC's as well as the Casio BE-300. It can be installed in either the Main RAM or onto a storage card, and requires 645 KB of storage memory. You can also get the desktop version of Particle for $5, or you can get both the Pocket PC (or BE-300) and desktop version in a bundle for just $7.
Pros:
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Wide range of difficulty levels.
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Customizable controls.
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Enhanced sound while using headphones.
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Sold at a very reasonable price
Cons:
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Outdated, mediocre graphics.
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No high score chart.
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Jerky animations.
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Gets boring after long play times.
Overall Score: 7/10
Many thanks to Unknown for providing us with our review copy.
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