I’m a fan of battle puzzle games but often suck at them so when a game mixes up tactics and speed but provides a few options to ease you in, I appreciate it! Gematombe is a bit like Arkanoid crossed with Puzzle Bobble. The game it reminds me of most is Puchicarat – one of my favourites from the PS1 era.
With Gematombe, you’ll pick from one of six characters that will control a paddle at the bottom of their puzzle board. You’ll hold a ball and aim it to hit various coloured gems. If you hit a red gem for example, any red gems horizontally or vertically connected to it will also vanish too. As your ball bounces around, the idea is to clear as many gems per shot as possible as you’ll need to clear at least 6 gems to trigger something to take place on your opponents board. This might be adding a row of padlocked gems on your opponents side, or it could be triggering your special move. Each character has their own special move and some will add even more padlocked gems, others place a metal protector on a gem to require a double or triple hit to clear it and another has tiny hands that rearranged gems or recolours them. It is easy to understand on the surface but there are some fun tactics underneath.
Padlocked gems are easily used to your advantage if you are quick about it. Hit the padlock on the row and all the gems reveal themselves as the same colour. Suddenly, the next hit will add up to 8 gems onto your combo and suddenly the momentum can swing back the other way. There is a risk versus reward at play with Gematombe. Watch the rubbish pile up and then crush them out of play and across to your opponent. The other way to play is to clear all the gems in your playing area. This wins the round too, instead of forcing your opponents gems passed the penalty line. Both options are very viable and often tied together and when playing with a friend, it gets very competitive. The game is loud about how close someone is to winning and having your opponent snatch it out of your hands is exhilarating in a way only good battle puzzle games are.
Whilst Gematombe works best in local battle mode, single player has a 6 stage story mode alongside an endless practice mode. If you have no friends to hand though, its survival mode that will challenge you most. Here you need to clear a certain number of matches before moving up a floor. Doing so brings tougher AI enemies and increased ball speed. Survival mode beat me repeatedly but helped me learn some of the tactics you can use against friends.
It is great that puzzle battle games are still popping out and this is one worthy of your time. Gematombe is easy to pick up, offers ball speed variety to get you up to speed without too much panic, and then lets you go at frantically with your mates when you all get up to speed. It is then when Gematombe shines and deserves praise and attention.
Gematombe is out now – review copy provided by the publisher.
