In
1990, Tetris was the king of puzzle games. Over the course of the
previous three years, it had rocketed to the top of the heap, and now it
seemed like everybody and their brother wanted to cash in on Tetris
mania. Atari Games produced Klax. Sega produced Columns.
Alexei Pajitnov, the creator of Tetris, went and designed more 'Tris
games during that time, like Hatris and Wordtris. Dozens and
dozens of other puzzle games came and went during that time - but only a
few of them, like the aforementioned Klax and Columns,
lodged themselves securly in videogame history along with Tetris. Tetris
itself is still going strong even now, some fifteen years after its
initial release. A year doesn't go by without a new Tetris game
being released, it seems.
The Japanese weren't immune to the puzzle fever of the early '90s,
either. Several companies churned out some fairly good puzzle games, and
for the most part they made it to the U.S. and Europe. A few slipped
through the cracks, of course... after all, no matter how popular the
genre, it's inevitable that some games will get lost in the shuffle.
Namco's Megapanel is a good example of a good puzzle game that
somehow got forgotten.
Remember
those puzzles where you had to slide the pieces around to try to form a
picture? The ones that were extremely frustrating? The ones that would
eventually be scrambled so badly that they could never be solved? Just
think of that kind of puzzle and you'll have the very basic play mechanics
of Megapanel down. You have one empty space on the board. You can
manuever pieces using that one empty spot. What you have to do is line up
three or more of the same colored pieces horizontally or vertically to
eliminate them from the board. Unlike most other puzzle games, where the
pieces fall from the top, the pieces in Megapanel come up from the
bottom of the screen. You can advance them yourself by pressing the A
button. Letting the stack build too high will cause you to lose a turn.
That in itself is odd, as most puzzle games end after you stack too high.
Megapanel contains three distinct play modes. First up is
Training. This part of the game has a decidedly Mexican feel to it, both
graphically and musically. During the course of four lessons, you'll learn
the basics and some of the advanced bits of Megapanel. Next up is
the two player VS. mode. Having a feature like this in a puzzle game in
the early '90s was very rare. Later on, head to head puzzle games like Super
Puzzle Fighter II Turbo would become more commonplace, but at the time
they were a novelty. Megapanel was one of the first to have this
feature, to my knowledge. The two player VS. mode has a Chinese feel to
it, both graphically and musically. The objective is to defeat your
opponent two out of three times. If you're able to get more than three
blocks lined up, you'll cause boxes to drop out onto your opponent's
playfield, which definitely proves to be a hindrance to them.
The
meat of the game, though, is the Pin-Up mode. This mode has a definite
anime feel to it. The objective here is to use the blocks to drop bombs on
a picture of a woman that's been covered with tiles. The bombs you drop by
clearing rows will cause the picture to be revealed, tile by tile. Some
tiles are darker than the others, requiring more hits to be removed. The
higher you go, the tougher it gets, as is the norm for most puzzle games.
This mode is why I initially figured Megapanel didn't make it to
the U.S. - it was rumored that the higher you went in levels, the more
revealing the pics got until the women in them weren't wearing anything at
all. Now, even though it's a fun game, I really suck at Megapanel.
I've barely made a dent in it in all the time I've owned it. Therefore, I
had no way of knowing whether or not this was true. But now, thanks to this
site, I have pictures of all of Megapanel's pin-up girls. Sure,
there's a little risque matierial, but nothing that can be rated any more
than PG-13. Take a look at the gallery below and judge for yourself. ^_^
Overall, Megapanel is a fun puzzle game that's different enough
from the big name puzzlers to warrant a look - if you can find it, of
course. The ROM is out there to download, so at least if you can't find an
actual copy of it, you can still check it out. |