QJ review: Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo HD Remix

What can we say? Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo is one addicting game. When it was first released in 1996, I was able to play it on the PSOne and later, on the PC. Even then, many gamers (hardcore and casual alike) spent copious hours squinting at their screens and building up multicolored gems. Come to think about it, it’s a fighting game in it’s own right – you can do away with the button mashing and play smart instead.

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What can we say? Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo is one addicting game. When it was first released in 1996, I was able to play it on the PSOne and later, on the PC. Even then, many gamers (hardcore and casual alike) spent copious hours squinting at their screens and building up multicolored gems. Come to think about it, it’s a fighting game in it’s own right – you can do away with the button mashing and play smart instead.

Those who haven’t played Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo, gameplay is pretty simple. You get a standard Tetris-like field with gems falling down at regular intervals. Gems come in four colors (red, blue, green, and yellow) and you need to build up power by placing same colored gems side by side. You can unleash “attacks” by putting Crash Gems (the round glowing gems) on same colored gems. This causes the gems to explode and your character goes to illustrate just how powerful the attack was.

The characters going at each other really have no bearing in the gameplay itself, but their moves, from taunts to special attacks, effectively show the magnitude of the combos. As you can probably tell, the characters are chibi-fied or super deformed, adding a lot of cute points into the game.

For those who played it then, at first glance, it would seem that Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo HD Remix (SPFIITHDR, even the acronym’s a mouthful) is labeled as an HD makeover of the classic puzzle game. The game received more than a visual makeover, as it did get additional game modes, for both online and single player.

The characters from the original stay as is, a mix of brawlers from two of Capcom‘s fighting games, Street Fighter and Dark Stalkers: Ryu, Chun Li, Ken, Sakura, Morrigan, Donovan, Hsien-Ko, Felicia. Akuma, Devilot (from Cyberbots: Full Metal Madness), and Dan are still hidden characters. Short funnies in between some matches and at the end of the game brings in some more cute points.

Visual-wise, Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo HD Remix is definitely prettier and smoother. Gameplay is still as addicting as ever, with the additional gameplay modes thrown in – X’ Mode, Y Mode, and Z Mode. X’ Mode is basically the original with rebalanced gameplay (we’re sure a lot of this game’s fans appreciated this a whole lot), Y Mode offers more action as blocks explode once you get a stack of three aligned, while Z Mode offers a different puzzle aspect and more frantic gameplay as you have to switch blocks around with a 2×2 box grid.

Online gameplay has minimal lag and it’s relatively easy to slug it out with other online players through Quick Play. I honestly had to tear myself away from it before I obsess about the leaderboards.

Again, Super Puzzle Fighter II Turbo HD Remix is an addicting game. No complaints here, we understand that this game is very much about gameplay rather than the graphics, and it definitely plays by its strengths. It’s definitely a worthwhile download, so much that its replay value and fun gameplay are not looking to depreciate in the near future.

Now, if you’ll excuse me, I think I’ll go for another round.