Lumines Live!

Lumines is a musical puzzle game in which falling blocks made of four colored fields vanish in time with a battle line that sweeps across the field in step with the background track - and the better the player times it, the more efficiently they play. Designer Tetsuya Mizuguchi, who is also behind Rez, brought the concept from the original 2004 PSP version to the Xbox 360 under the name Lumines Live!, released in 2006 as one of the first major titles on the Xbox Live Arcade service.

Compared to the portable version, the Xbox 360 release adds online multiplayer for remote duels, leaderboards, and the ability to buy additional packs of tracks and visual themes, so the game's music library grew far larger over time than the limited space of the PSP's UMD disc ever allowed. The game ran in a higher resolution on a television screen and used the Xbox 360 controller instead of the PSP's analog stick, which changed the feel of play even though the core rules stayed the same.

Lumines Live! was among the early titles of the expanding Xbox Live Arcade service, at a time when Microsoft was still building its position in digital game distribution on consoles, and for many players it was their very first encounter with the Lumines puzzle series, since the portable PSP version remained tied to a rival platform's handheld. The track packs players could buy over time gave the Xbox 360 game a much longer lifespan than the closed content of the original disc offered. The console was also one of the first on the market to offer a game achievement system, and Lumines Live! added its own set of them, an unusual motivational element for the puzzle genre at the time, one that drew back even players who would otherwise have long since set puzzle games aside.

Why play: The Xbox 360 version makes the most sense for anyone who wants to play Lumines on the big screen with friends online and doesn't mind buying extra track packs. Fans of musical puzzle games will find the same addictive gameplay built on colored blocks and rhythm as on PSP, just with a bigger music library and modern connectivity via Xbox Live.

Why play: For players who want to play Lumines on a big TV with friends over Xbox Live and don't mind paying for extra tracks, this version is the ideal choice.