Columns (Video Game Review)

Video Game Review
Columns
Sega Genesis
1990
Developed by: Sega
Published by: Sega

Other than Soviet Russia, the only group to benefit strongly from Tetris is Nintendo. Even though Atari made the arcade version and various other Tetris games were available for multiple platforms, Nintendo reaped the rewards of having two of the best versions available: one for the NES and one for the Game Boy. Since Sega wanted to battle Nintendo in every genre imaginable, they did their best to try and take on the behemoth that was Tetris. Sega touted Columns as a Tetris killer. It was more complicated, had more features, and, most importantly at the time, was exclusive to Sega. Meaning, if you wanted to play Columns, you had to buy a Genesis. The problem is that Columns was such a bad game that nobody was going to spend the money to buy a Genesis just to play Columns. It played like a bad arcade port, was a horribly designed puzzle game, and wasn’t all that fun (whereas Tetris was the complete opposite).

Columns is a typical match-three puzzle game. Vertical rectangular pieces fall from the top of the screen into the playing field below. Each piece is comprised of three different jewels of random colours (although some pieces may contain more than one jewel of the same colour). Players can move the pieces left or right and can rotate the order of the jewel colours within the piece. Once three or more jewels of the same colour are matched either horizontally, vertically, or diagonally, they are eliminated from the playing field and jewels from above fall to fill the vacant spaces. The game ends once the entire playing field is filled and no more pieces can drop from the top. The point of the game is to get the highest score possible.

The controls are fine for what the game allows you to do. The d-pad moves the pieces and any of the face buttons will rotate the order of the jewels within the piece. I find it kind of stupid that you can’t rotate the entire piece so that it can lie flat horizontally. It would have made the game more interesting by adding another layer of strategy. As it is, it feels like the game is restrictive for no apparent reason.

The graphics look horrible for a Genesis game. How a single-screen game can look so bad on a 16-bit console is a question for the ages. Tetris on the NES looks infinitely times better. Everything looks pixelated and there are delays in the animation of the rotation of jewels that can contribute to problems during game play. There is no reason why the graphics should look as bad as they do.

Same goes for the sound. Everything sounds like it’s coming from a broken digital watch. The theme music is horrendous and adds nothing to the game. Even if the gameplay and the graphics were any good, the sound would still be a major determent to the game. This isn’t the case as it’s just another item on the long list of things that are wrong with the game.

Overall, it feels like a really bad arcade port. I’ve never played the arcade version but it feels like an arcade game shrunk down for a home console. Everything about its presentation is just bad. This is the kind of game a parent would give to a child to show them that they’re not loved.

Even if you’re a puzzle fiend, you will not have fun with this game. While there is some strategy involved, once the game picks up speed, survival seems to be attributed to luck rather than skill. If you’re good enough, you can set up multiple combos in the early going but later on, it feels like you just want to put pieces where they’ll cause the least amount of damage. It’s not that addictive either because the further you progress, the less control you actually have which kills the "one-more-try" mindset that turns players into addicts. If the game goes beyond your control, it doesn’t really feel all that compelling to try again.

Sega’s Columns was a horrible attempt at a puzzle game. Only get this game if you hate yourself.

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