Columns
System: Genesis
Release Date: September 1990
Developer: Sega R&D2
Publisher: Sega
Genre: Puzzle
Now this is what I’m talking about, it’s Columns on the Sega Genesis! Match three like colored jewels as they drop from the top of the screen. So simple. So elegant. Earn points by dropping the jewels and clearing them from the board. Get the high score to be the best of all!
Jewels are rotated by pressing any of the face buttons, but the jewels only go in one direction. This isn’t really a problem, as you have enough time to rotate it a couple times after you’ve dropped the jewel all the way. You clear like jewels if you get three or more horizontally, vertically, or diagonally. As you get more adept, you’ll set yourself up for big combinations of lots of jewels or awesome chain reactions. The higher the difficulty level, the more colors of jewels you’ll play with. There’s also the much lauded magic block that will erase all of the jewels of the color it lands on. (1:24:35) This can create some neat cascading chains.
You can play the original game or a flash jewel game where you need to clear a specific jewel from the board. You need to do it in the quickest time to earn the best accolades. The music in this game shows that the Genesis has capabilities of doing awesome things. Clotho and Lathesis are banging tracks to play to, but Atropos isn’t one of my favorites. What I think is really neat is that the music modulates to different instruments and speeds as you play the arcade mode.
This is a game where I can sit down at 10 PM with a tall drink and some chips and the next thing I know it’s 2 AM and I’m playing the same round. I didn’t realize the time passed, but it did and I’m not sad about it. The level caps at 199, and jewels don’t count past 9999. The jewels start dropping down lightning quick at this point, so it’s probably when you’re liable to mess up or just quit because you should have gone to bed three hours ago.
Graphics: 2.0
It’s colored jewels, but they’re nice colored jewels.
Sound: 3.0
The sound effects are very nice and the music is great, despite the lack of variety.
Gameplay: 3.0
I feel like I should be able to rotate my jewels in both directions, but other than that, extremely solid.
Difficulty: 3.0
You have to use your mind and hope your finger dexterity can keep up.
Fun Factor: 4.0
I have so much fun with this game that it isn’t even fair. I’d play it all the time if I could get paid for it.
Overall Rating: 3.0
Columns earns a B. I love this game. If you gave me an ultimatum that said I could only choose 10 games to play for the rest of my life, I’d contemplate this one.