Gravity-based Puzzler 'Trism' from Demiforce
posted July 16th, 2008 9:58 AM EDT by Blake Patterson in $4.99, Puzzle, Reviews, iPhone games, iPod touch games
We've been excited about Demiforce's unique gravity-based tile puzzler Trism [App Store] since we first saw it back in April, and with the arrival of the iTunes App Store, it's finally here.
Trism presents the player with a playifeld populated by colorful, triangular tiles or "trisms." The rows of trisms can be slid in six different directions (thanks to their triangluar shape) in order to achieve a match of three or more like-colored pieces. When a match is made, the like trisms disappear and surrounding trisms fall in to fill their place in the direction of gravity. As the YouTube video demonstrates, a big part of the gameplay strategy involves the player repeatedly orienting the iPhone to best advantage.
Notable features:
- 3 game modes: Classic, Timed, and Puzzle
- Online scoring
- 22 achievements to collect
- Auto-save when interrupted by a phone call
- Colorblind mode
I have personally never been a huge "tile game" fan. Generally speaking, they fail to hold my interest for long. In viewing early demonstration videos, I was quite impressed to see the degree to which the game takes advantage of–or rather is designed explicity for–the iPhone's touchscreen and accelerometer controls. It could be played on no other platform, really. Now that I have Trism on my iPhone, I am additionally impressed with the overall polish and clean graphics of the title. And gameplay? While I thought it likely that after a few minutes of toying about with its unique features I'd relegate it to the pile of tile games I'd never revisit, Trism surprised me. There's something about the complexity of the game's movement options along with the added dimension of being able to choose the fall-in direction that makes Demiforce's puzzler seem much more "active" and engaging game than other tile games I've known.
I like Trism and feel that at $4.99 it's one of the better buys currently available on the iTunes App Store.
Game Details
Name: Trism
Developer: Demiforce
App Store Link: Buy
Price: $4.99
Compatibility: iPhone and iPod Touch
I think I felt the same way about Trism at first: looked mildly intriguing, but not worth spending money on. I felt it was worth experimenting on for $4.99 and now find myself playing it until 4 in the morning…. (now when will a player's guide be published for Super Monkey Ball?).
I love it too. It differs from the other 'wow factor' games, as for some reason I don't go back to the wow games except to show them off to friends. But Trism – I go back to often competing with my own scores and 'learning' more every day about strategy. The on-line scores and the tutorial really help to keep you hitched. They hit on something big here!
This game is awesome. He also must be an xbox 360 gamer because he added some of the cool features such as achievements and leaderboards. And the tutorial is great.
Great game with a lot of deep in it. Recommended. And the price is OK!
Anyone else notice this game sucks battery life? I play it for a half hour and my bar goes from full to little more than half. Web surfing on the 3G for a half hour doesn't do that.
I only noticed because it's such a great game and I want to play it all the time but can't.
The developer of this game is sound. I love the way he polished the UI for it's final release. He clear has good artistic taste and he added killer sounds for all the bonus tiles and such. Great, great game! For the price I'd highly recommend it.
I find this game to become boring very quickly. I know most people disagree with me, but the does not really have the forward momentum that tile puzzle games need. I say save your money.
I love this game…very logic oriented and the Starshine mode is almost all skill, whereas Bejeweled relies more on luck.
Or am I just saying that because I'm the first person to reach 200 trillion points in a single game of Starshine Infinism.