#lumines

Sony Ericsson W580 Walkman phone advertisement (2007)

I believe in music, I believe in hope, and I believe in you. Welcome to Club Delfino, now DANCE YOUR ASS OFF~

Splatoon (Toru Minegishi) - Inkopolis Plaza Persona (Shoji Meguro, Yumi Kawamura) - School Days We Love Katamari (Hideki Tobeta, YOU) - Angel Rain Final Fantasy X-2 (Jade Valerie, Kazuhiro Hara, H-wonder, Takahito Eguchi, Noriko Matsueda) - Real Emotion SSX 3 (Basement Jaxx) - Do Your Thing ~ Jaxx Club Remix Jet Set Radio Future (Idol Taxi) - OK!?House!!!!!????? Samba de Amigo (Bellini) - Samba de Janeiro Sonic Mania (Naofumi Hataya, Tee Lopes) - Stardust Speedway Act 2 Bayonetta (Hiroshi Yamaguchi) - Let's Dance, Boys! (BAИSHI Big Booby Bootleg) Pokémon Sword & Shield (Minako Adachi) - Battle! (Gym Leader) Lumines (Eri Nobuchika, Shinichi Osawa) - I Hear the Music in My Soul Touch My Katamari (Yū Miyake) - Katamari on the Funk (Takeshi Nakatsuka edit) DDR Max (OKUYATOS, Sota Fujimori, Johnny Dynamite, Erica Ash) - Kind Lady Funk Disco Extended Mix) Touch My Katamari (Yū Miyake) - Alien (feat. BAKUBAKU DOKIN) Splatoon 2 (Shiho Fujii) - Showdown! (Calamari Inkantation) Kingdom Hearts (Utada Hikaru) - Simple And Clean -PLANITb Remix- Katamari Forever (Yoshihito Yano, Micazo) - Sayonara Rolling Star (Yuri's Mixx) Space Channel 5: Part 2 (Tomoya Ohtani) - Strobe Action #3 NiGHTS into Dreams (Tomoko Sasaki) - Message from Nightopia Lumines (Eri Nobuchika, Shinichi Osaka) - Lights

I started Lumines because I wanted to find a new eternal puzzle game for my Thor. The kind of game you can deploy when you need to kill a couple minutes while waiting on the kitchen timer or whatever. And at first, it worked for that – I’d play for 10 or 15 minutes, then call it a day. Hell, at that point I thought I might not even come back to it. “Yeah, it’s alright,” I thought, “but I feel like I’ve got the measure of this, there’s not really much more to see.” But then, the day after that, I still booted Lumines up. And the next day. And the next. And with each successive session, my brain started seeing the patterns, the strategies, the blocks unconsciously working their way into my head while I was sleeping.

The thing about Lumines is that once you get even moderately competent, it becomes a game where runs take like, an hour minimum. Once you know the basics, blocks don’t build up the way they do in Tetris. And even when they do, well, there’s a mechanism in place for that. There’s nothing quite like the rush of hitting a bomb square into a perfectly organized trail of colors and wiping out half the screen at once, I tell ya. Comebacks are possible in Lumines, and they are addictive.

The best thing about Lumines’ structure is that, much like the music that guides its aesthetic, it has peaks and valleys. This is not Tetris, where the game simply gets faster and faster, making dexterity the name of the game. No, things will slow down, speed up, ebb and flow. And every time I clocked one of these moments, I felt like the designer themself was giving me a nod. The first time I broke 100k and discovered Lumines II’s secret reggae section I almost laughed out loud – it’s like the game is giving you a second to breathe and catch up.

So, as a game that works in five minute bursts in a waiting room? Maybe not. As a game that can serve as functional time travel on a long intercontinental flight? Yes sir, Lumines is your game.

Well, as long as you’re not ashamed by the thought of a random stranger watching you go absolutely sicko mode on Gwen Stefani’s Hollaback Girl for two straight hours.

Ladder (Puzzle 55) from Lumines