Battle Puzzle Balls is a collection of the games, two puzzlers and then a bonus minigame. It features a cast of random characters including a “magical girl” that might be a vampire, a mad scientist, a rockstar, a baby and an axolotl.

The first game is a variation on Puyo Puyo. In this version, a group of three will make them disappear (instead of four) and the “bad blocks” sent from your opponent can be turned into regular balls. Unfortunately, there are no colour options and I couldn’t tell apart the green and yellow – these also lack the slight shape variation from Puyo Puyo.

The second game has the same linking and chain rules as the previous, but instead of balls coming from the top of the screen, you have a pair of wings that can pick up one of the balls, swapping it with another. The green is a darker colour in this game so I could tell the difference, so I was able to do fairly well at it.

The final mode is a very basic bowling game. A cursor swings up and down the screen and you press A at the right time to bowl. It’s like a rather naff java version of bowling.

This is mainly just a less fun version of Puyo Puyo.

Fine

One criticism of this version is its apparent ability to cheat. Achieve a thunderous rection and your opponent seems to suffer very little. Indeed, after scoring a ten-hit chain (that’s TEN-hit), our opponent had three lines of glass blobs added to his side, which he promptly got rid of and, seconds later, dumped – with five over lines – on our side.

Tim Weaver, N64 Magazine #15. Review Score: 47%

Remake or Remaster?

Other puzzle games need more attention.

Official Ways to get the game

There’s no official way to play Battle Puzzle Balls: Fighting Spirit!