Puyo Puyo Tetris 2 Review – The Sequel You Didn’t Know You Needed

I’m admittedly not the best Puyo Puyo player, but that doesn’t mean that I don’t have fun with the puzzle game. On the other hand, I consider myself decent at Tetris, so when Puyo Puyo Tetris launched, I found myself thrown to the wolves to perfect my skills in both if I wanted to be competent through its fusion-style gameplay. The result wasn’t getting significantly better at any of the competitive puzzle games, but I sure had a ton of fun. Now, with the Puyo Puyo Tetris 2, we see some updated balances, an improved story campaign, and so many modes to play through, making it a worthy sequel to a game that you might have thought didn’t need one.

Puyo Puyo Tetris 2 has plenty to do at the start, but I feel like the game’s campaign is required if you wish to unlock things quicker in the other modes. Surprisingly, there is a significant amount of story in this competitive puzzler that revolves around the worlds of Puyo Puyo and Tetris colliding once again for a unique adventure. We are first introduced to Ringo and Tee, who must figure out what is causing this dimensional disturbance, and along the way, they’ll meet a ton of friends.

The story progresses on a gameboard where players can clearly see which game they will be playing and whether the stage is a part of the main quest or a side quest. Every mission completed has a story portion and unlockables, which respects the player’s time and offers various challenges to improve their skills. The story portion of the game is a charming mess of exaggerated characters doing their best to take the plot of saving the world using Puyo Puyo and Tetris seriously. There are some insanely funny moments shared between the growing cast, which had me wish that more than two character illustrations were allowed on the screen at once, if only to improve the large group’s interactions.

Each character is as colorful as they are memorable, and you’ll surely have your favorites before long. As the plot thickens, you learn more about this mysterious girl named Marle, who creeps everyone out but is definitely powerful. Sure, the narrative can be skipped entirely if you want, but you’ll be missing some of the charm that the campaign presents.

Each stage will require you to either play Puyo Puyo or Tetris, and the matches’ difficulty becomes greater during the later levels. Many of the stages are basic versus matches, but the campaign does switch things up a bit by requiring you to participate in the other modes, including Skill Battle and Swap. I did wish that they pulled the trigger a little sooner on the different modes because there are just a few too many standard Versus battles that make the earlier stages feel repetitive since the challenge doesn’t kick in until later.

Following the campaign, you should have plenty of credits saved up to unlock new customizable items, a large pool of playable characters, and your Skill Battle level should be relatively high. This is all very important because once you get into the other modes, the real fun begins. For instance, Skill Battle allows players to get creative with a party of characters who gain level the more you play. Additionally, each character has a special skill they can use that can activate active or passive boosts. Playing through this mode using different characters and understanding the skills made it the stand-out experience within the title.

Returning are the other modes from Puyo Puyo Tetris, including Swap and Fusion. I ended up finding a lot of enjoyment in the Big Bang mode, where you quickly complete lines or chains to cause damage to up to four others. There’s also a Challenge mode where you can show your skills across several unique game modes for a high score.

All of the modes can be played in Online or Local Multiplayer save for the Challenge levels. This allows some diverse match up against various skill levels, but I found that I needed to improve when playing against anyone else. Luckily, there’s also a tutorial, but I wish it were more hands-on than simply watching a lesson and reading why it works.

Graphically, I don’t think Puyo Puyo Tetris 2 has changed much when compared to its counterpart. The music sounds similar, and the characters are just as exaggerated as before. The cast of voice actors did a great job representing these characters, but some of their in-game dialogue can get a bit repetitive, at least for the low-tier characters who only seemed to record one line to say when they send over garbage.

I think those who loved Puyo Puyo Tetris and want more will find that this sequel scratches any itch for these competitive puzzle games. However, it’s not as drastic a difference as I could have hoped for. Many of the improvements may have been behind the scenes with balances and improved quality, but both titles could be seen as almost identical to the casual player.

Puyo Puyo Tetris 2 is a brilliantly fun and addictive experience that all fans will quickly sink hours in. The game doesn’t deviate too much from its predecessor, but the campaign and Skill Battle mode provides hours of unique Puyo Puyo and Tetris enjoyment. Only hardcore fans may notice the updated systems, but this is still a very accessible competitive puzzle game for all fans of the genre.