Game:

Columns III (1993)

Duration: 12:44

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Originally made in 1993 for the Korean market, in Japan, and in the U.S., the game wouldn't see wider distribution until fifteen years later in 2008 for the Wii's Virtual Console (which is the first time the game would get a European release) and for PCs in 2010 through Steam. A game based on some of the new traits of Columns III would be released in 1994 for Arcades under the name of "Stack Columns". At the time, Columns III was the biggest departure in the series, as the first two games had virtually identical gameplay and only small cosmetic differences. Game Gear's "Super Columns" and Game Boy Advance's "Columns Crown" would further play around with the Columns formula.

Columns III presents several changes, the biggest of which is that the game always features versus play of some kind; you cannot play by yourself. In the game, you can play the game's "Story Mode" (Pyramid Columns) or play a variety of versus-player challenges with two, three, four, or even five players (multitap required) and is one of the few non-sports multiplayer games of its kind on Genesis. Versus matches against living players have further options such as changing the number of rounds, the background theme, and more (Story Mode is always two rounds per opponent).

The actual gameplay has some minor changes in Versus Modes and a few additional changes in Story Mode. The core differences is that people can be attacked; when you are attacked, you will get Crash Bar junk, but when you attack an enemy, you raise their Crush Bar. As you make eliminations, you get points which can lower and raise these bars (10 points is one bar, cannot exceed 30 points at a time), but you can also lower and raise them with the game's two new magical jewels (arrows surrounding a flashing jewel), adding more strategy to the game. You get more points for combos than standard eliminations. Another difference is that you can earn Flash Gems by doing 3+ chains or other eliminations, which inflict varying "Poisonous" effects on the computer (they have names which vary in-game and from the manual for whatever reason). There are also "Super Flashing Gems" which have even more powerful effects, but are rare and flash for a very short period of time. The Story Mode also adds the ability to gain and use items which have various effects, most of which mirror the effects of various skills and flash gems but can be used in a pinch against tough foes in conjunction with anything that appears on the field.

The game isn't very different from prior games aesthetically, though the game has a great soundtrack and a few minor graphical effects. The main flaw of the one player game is that it has the potential to be quite long and drawn out with no way to save or resume progress. With three difficulties (Practice - 3 Stages, Normal - 10 Stages, Hard - 11 Stages) and two mandatory matches each, with even some of the most skilled Columns players spending at least one minute on average per round, you're looking at up to 22 rounds (for perfect playing and not losing a single round, best two out of three), at least twenty two minutes (this is defintely on the light side, as this is one of the most challenging Columns games out there), and no way to resume where you left off, it's slightly vexxing. As such, this game's strength definitely lies in its multiplayer aspect, which I'll likely never experience in full (while I have a multitap and the gear, I'd be hard-pressed to find four others that want to play) but it's one of the most enriching competitive puzzle games released outside Japan for the system. The game is a must-have I'd imagine for fans of both the Gen/MD and Columns series however. This is a vid of the game in action, showing various traits of the game. Enjoy.