Planaris 2+ Reviews

Fun puzzle game.

Best tetris game I've seen/played in a long time - possibly ever. Partially because it's not timed. Partially because of the Campaign mode features. :) Achieve certain milestones on a certain level, to unlock specific next levels.

tetris is a young man's game. gotta think fast, be on your toes, react quickly. at first I thought [b]planaris 2+[/b] would be the same, but turns out it's not. well, not entirely, and there's nothing wrong with that, quite the contrary. you get a grid and have to place various shapes on it so that they form horizontal or vertical lines and disappear, but in the campaign there's no timer, so you can take as long as you want to figure out your next move, and there's not one, but two upcoming pieces, and you can decide which one appears after placing the one you're holding. there's even a pocket to save a shape for later, or as a last chance when you run out of moves. you'd think that with all these thrown in, the whole thing is a cakewalk. well, think again. levels come in various shapes and sizes, as do the pieces themselves, of course, so getting enough points to unlock the next level can take several attempts, not to mention reaching mastery, which is more or less double the regular score. besides level shapes and sizes, there are other tricks up the game's sleeve. most common are [b]locks, appearing every few turns[/b]. you can move their spawn position to a random square by placing a piece on their countdown number, and when they show up, that square obviously gets locked until you clear an adjacent line to make them disappear. or explode a bomb next to them. yes, [b]there are bombs[/b] too. random power-ups appear when you clear multiple lines at the same time and bombs are one of them, they explode in 3x3 when the line they're in disappears. crosses clear squares in all 4 directions in a full line and keys remove all the locks on the level. if you play your cards right (or just luck into it), there's some pretty fancy chain reactions to observe. and sometimes there's fog of war, meaning you can't place anything on those tiles until you clear a line next to them. it also means they don't count as part of a line, so if you only have 3 squares available from a 10-square line, placing a 3-square-long shape there will count as a full line until the rest is opened up. [b]the campaign has 74 levels[/b] laid out on a zoomable world map and you can decide where to go, which level to unlock next. most become available as you beat the score requirement on the one connected to it, which also gets you a star, and with enough stars (there are 84 altogether) some other levels open up, off the regular path, and those have further mechanics not present in the rest of the campaign. not gonna spoil everything here, but they're really fun. [b]3 other game modes[/b] become available after the campaign's tutorial. [u]classic normal[/u] is a no-timer matching thing, like the campaign, but without goals and with more weird shapes. [u]classic multiplier[/u] rewards you if you're quick by increasing the multiplier, and [u]classic survival[/u] is like normal, but if the timer at the top runs out, it's game over. of course, placing things fast can prolong the run. they're all endless, but you're bound to fail eventually, then you can compare your score with others on the leaderboards. [b]the ui is slick and elegant[/b], just like in the developer's other game, [url=https://store.steampowered.com/app/1162370/]paper - a game of folding[/url], though there are no separate volume settings here, only music on/off, sound on/off and a master volume slider. audio levels are balanced, but I would've still liked more control. both [b]the sound effects and the music are great[/b] though. the game supports keyboard, mouse and controller, I played with the mouse and had no issues. move pieces around, rotate them, if necessary, then place them. you might want to switch between the two upcoming pieces or pocket a piece, and that's all you need, because it's still basically tetris. [b]I liked the presentation[/b] of the game itself as well. areas where you can't place the current shape are colored differently and everything is easily recognizable, like which lines are gonna disappear, etc. I found some color combinations a bit harsh (very red on very green, for example, especially when the end is near), but some are quite pleasant, and you can turn off background colors entirely if you so desire. naturally, there's a lot of randomness in a game like this, and sure, it can get frustrating, especially when you finish 200 points shy of a 50k level goal or a 100k mastery score, and some of the layouts are very hard to handle, but I found it a lot of fun nonetheless, and thanks to non-linear progression, there are always multiple levels to try. completing everything, and especially mastering each level will take many-many hours, and if you're into endless modes, the fun might never end. [b]I rarely pay full price for games, but this was worth every cent[/b], even if I won't be able to master all of it, and even just unlocking and completing campaign levels was quite a challenge sometimes. oh, and don't be alarmed if achievements don't pop while you're playing, they trigger when you exit the game.

An interesting variation on the tetris idea. It's pretty fun but could also get addictive if you are prone to playing tetris. solitaire etc compulsively. There are a lot more detailed reviews than this but wanted to leave a positive vote. If you ever wished tetris was't a timed game and you could place the pieces instead of having them fall, this is for you.

Nice idea of using tetris style in different way! I like nice, simple and intuitive controls and UI. Thanks to the tutorial you can jump into the game very easily. Option for keeping one block for later use is very handy, I missed this feature in so many games before :) Gameplay is varied by powerups and locked fields so you must plan your moves carefuly. There is many mods for playing and I enjoy everyone of them because every mode has different game style and there is even campaign, which isn't very usual in this genre and I really enjoy it, it really extend the gameplay variability with nice ideas like different game boards or unfreezing new blocks :) Like every good puzzle game, Planaris 2+ offers the right amount of addiction and together with online leaderboards there are definitely reasons for buying or returning to the game.

I am only partially through the Campaign mode and have not started the "normal" modes as of yet. This is a fun and challenging twist on the Tetris game. The colors and graphics are beautiful. My favorite part is there are no falling pieces and you can take your time (though there are timed boards). You can choose from two pieces which piece will be played next and you can "store" a piece to be used when you want it. There are varying shapes and sizes to the boards and some have quite different shapes of pieces than the original game. I would definitely recommend this for a zen (but challenging at times) game.

Nice "Tetris like" game without time stress. Price is appropriate. The ingame graphic is OK but the menu graphic is ugly. [b]Pros:[/b] [list] [*]interesting game principle [*]good campaign [/list] [b]Cons:[/b] [list] [*]poor tutorial (there aren't explained some symbols in cells like key, bomb, star, number etc.) [*]can't view and customize keyboard control [*]missing undo [*]you can't play only with mouse (sometimes you have to press "Space" or "x") [/list] [b]Conclusion[/b]: I can recommend this game for logic game lovers.

Take the basic gameplay of Tetris but remove gravity. You now can play at your own pace as you setup big combos of lines both vertically and horizontally. As just being able to place pieces completely freely would be a bit too easy, the game adds the concept of locks, which are nasty bits of debris that block line placement unless you clear a line right next to them. Another neat twist is if you ever do manage to get a 2 or more line combo, a few handy powerups will be dropped on the board that activate when you clear a line with them inside. If really looking for a chance to break your mind, you can take on the campaign of 50 levels, each with their own twists to the rules and or take place in oddly shaped levels.

I usually don't write reviews of games on steam - but here goes: Planaris 2+ comes with a slick minimalistic presentation and relaxing puzzlesolving perfect for both short bursts of play or longer sessions if you have the time to spend. The objective of the game is to fill areas on a grid with polymino shapes to score points. The concept is simple to grasp and easy get into, but the player has to take into concideration the shape of the grid as well as the risk of having certain spots on the grid risk getting locked out until adjacent lines of the locked position gets cleared. On top of that there are bonuses that offer the potential of clearing additional blocks if triggered correctly. All meshed together the concepts make up for addictive gameplay that is easy to get into but also adds enough depth to keep the player engaged and adapting strategies for a long time if this type of gameplay tick your boxes. So why doesn't this game have more reviews? Sadly Planaris 2+ has a few disadvantages that might have ruined it's release and not all has anything to do with the game nor its presentation itself. Planaris 2+ was set to release right during the summersale wich is a bad spot for the discoverability of new games due to them drowning in all the sales. This resulted into Bryce postponing the release right after the steam summersale - a time where I would imagine the steam userbase are a bit more conservative in their spending having gone all out during the sale. On top of that there's a tendency for games with few to none reviews after release to quickly get forgotten and as a result there's fewer people giving it the chance it's deserving. The other main disadvantages is probably its place on the steam store itself. The steamstore is filled with assetflips that try to make easy money, and without trying to be insulting - Planaris 2+ screenshots makes it look suspiciously like a cheap assetflip. I even googled the creator and the game before I bought it to make sure it was original, wich it indeed are. While the screenshots might look cheap, the minimalistic asthetic lends itself perfectly to the gameplay while playing. The third disadvantage is that largely the game is available on browsers. If you are uncertain if Planaris 2+ is something for you - I'd recommend you to try it out on the browsers and if you like it - give it a shot here on steam - because it is indeed good and worth your time.