I Ramble For Way Too Long About Magical Tetris Challenge (GBC, 1998)
Introduction
Foreword
I have played this game far, far more any reasonable person should have. I felt like it was a waste to keep all this knowledge to myself, so I am now leaving you with the burden of knowledge for a 28-year-old game.^This sentence doesn't make me feel right. I need to get better at comprehending the passage of time. I wish you the best.
Before I begin discussing this game, I need to let out a couple disclaimers:
- This article is about the Game Boy Color version of the game, not the arguably more popular N64/PS1/arcade versions. Most prominently, the story mode in this game is much more than a sequence of battles, and there's like three new variants in this game. You should play it if you haven't -- it's really good!
- I have done all of my game testing on the European 1.1 and American 1.0 versions of this game. I am unaware of any regional differences, and certainly none that would affect the gameplay. That doesn't mean that there are no regional differences, though, so I can't guarantee anything.
- This article mostly pertains to Quest Mode, but the general Tetris advice works well in the singleplayer modes, too. There are other sources that go in-depth on Magical Tetris (the primary mode in the N64/PS1/arcade versions), such as this page on TASVideos, so you should check those out if you're interested in some extra details.
- Asterisks (*) denote actual footnotes, and carets (^) denote fun commentary. Hover over them to view.
With that out of the way, buckle up! It's going to be a long ride!
Game Overview
Magical Tetris Challenge for the Game Boy Color is a top-down RPG that also happens to be a Tetris minigame collection. I say this with a reasonable amount of sarcasm, but this definition is not strictly incorrect.
The primary mode of the game is Quest mode, which has you play as one of four (or five, if you've unlocked them) Mickey Mouse characters, running around in the Tetris Coin Rally to be the first of five participants to collect six specific numeric coins. In order to do so, you have to participate in various variants of Tetris, some of which are against a the other participants or another simulated CPU-controlled opponent.
In addition to Quest Mode, there is a singleplayer mode where you can play any of the Tetris variants freely (though you have to unlock half of them by playing Quest Mode), a 2P versus mode using the Game Boy Link Cable, and an option to view your high scores. I will be covering each of these modes in order, starting with all the different variants you will encounter, so that I can discuss all the Tetris stuff in this game first. For Quest Mode specific topics, scroll down to that section.
Variants
MTC includes a surprising amount of Tetris variants, totalling to six variants, plus a secret seventh variant exclusive to 2P mode. I will be covering all of them in order.
Standard Tetris
Assuming you've played Tetris before, this mode should look quite familiar. You're given a sequence of falling pieces, and your goal is to move and rotate them to fill complete lines in the playfield for points. If you're a Tetris connoisseur, however, you should note that this version plays quite differently to a lot of the other contemporary versions (including Tetris DX for the same console):
- The playfield is 18 rows high, compared to the standard 20 in most console ports of the game. Both the original Tetris (GB) and Tetris DX (GBC) also have 18-row-high playfields, likely due to the smaller screen size of the Game Boy (Color).
- The pieces have a custom colour scheme and rotation system. The colour scheme is actually different than the N64/PS1/arcade versions, and is as follows: red I, blue J, pink L, cyan T, green S, orange Z, yellow O. The rotation system appears to be identical to the console ports of the game, and unfortunately there is no universal source of truth for how it works. The Tetris Wiki page has an empirically correct description, but the exact mechanics are still unknown.
- The pieces spawn vertically, just like the console versions. This is enough to mess up your muscle memory, so be prepared.
- The randomizer is strange. It seems to enjoy droughting you for long periods of time, and then give you like 4 I pieces in a row sometimes. Do not trust the randomizer. It does not have your best interests in mind.
Other than that, though, the mechanics are familiar. Gravity slowly speeds up over time in this mode (exact curve unknown), and the lock delay is 30 frames of total lock delay. That is, your piece can only be on the ground for 30 frames before it locks, regardless of if it drops further in the meantime. This will be important when we cover Target Tetris.
I will also take this time to make a note of the scoring mechanics. You earn 100 points for a single, 250 for a double, 750 for a triple, 3000 for a Tetris, and 5000 for a pentris (possible only in Magical Tetris mode, which we'll get to later). However, if you clear a combo (multiple line clears with consecutive pieces), the amount of points you get for a line clear doubles per combo, with no cap. So clearing a single immediately followed by two Tetrises awards, 100, 6000, and 12000 points respectively. This is very powerful, and makes it possible to get extremely high scores.
As for Standard Tetris specifically... there's not much more to explain. There's no gimmicks. You just play Tetris.
Updown Tetris
This is more analogous to competitive Tetris games. You play against a simulated CPU*I say "simulated" because, in 1P and Quest mode, the meter is fake. It does not actually correspond to a CPU playing behind the scenes, and it just simulates what might be happening. Send garbage, it goes up. When it goes back down, you get garbage. In 2P mode, though, it actually does represent the height of your opponent's stack, because there is actually an opponent., and the height of their stack is represented by a bar on the left side of the screen. When you clear more than one line at once, you send garbage lines (full rows with a hole) to the bottom of your opponent's stack. I do not know the exact quantities of garbage sent, but it actually does not matter that much. The general strategy for this mode is to spam Tetrises and combos, both of which send bonus garbage.
Magical Tetris
Despite being the namesake of this game, this mode is not any more important than the others. It is, however, the coolest versus mode.
Attacks work similarly to Updown Tetris, but instead of sending garbage lines, you send worse pieces. Smaller attacks send various pentominoes (5-block pieces), rarely some larger pieces (such as hexominoes), and occasionally square pieces of varying sizes (2x2, 3x3, 4x4, and 5x5; represented by a ? in the queue). If you send garbage while these pieces are in your queue, you can counter them, which sends the aforementioned large square pieces instead of what you recieved. The more times a square piece is countered, tha larger it becomes. I highly reccomend you see the TASVideos page for the more intricate details of this mode.
There is one important mechanic: if your incoming piece queue is maxed out at 20 pieces and you recieve more garbage, your queue starts backfilling with even worse pieces (noted by an !). These include 5x5 diamonds, triangles, and pyramids. Do not take these lightly. These will kill you. Avoid them at all costs.
Signal Tetris
| Time | Points |
|---|---|
| < 0:30 | 60000 |
| < 1:00 | 40000 |
| < 1:30 | 20000 |
| < 2:00 | 15000 |
| < 2:30 | 13000 |
| < 3:00 | 11000 |
| < 6:00 | 10500 |
| ≥ 6:00 | 10000 |
This is the first mode to not be in the console ports of this game, and is also extremely confusing. Listen carefully, because it's extremely difficult to figure this out just by gameplay.
- The very bottom row of your playfield is the sample. If you play on Easy or Normal, these are red and blue. If you play on Hard, these are red, blue, and yellow.
- The row above the sample is your signal.^Roll credits! Your goal is to make your signal match the sample.
Whenever you clear lines, look at only the portions of the piece that got cleared along with the lines you finished by placing said piece. For every column that the piece occupied in the cleared lines, the corresponding signal at the bottom of the screen will switch colour (Red <-> Blue if in easy mode; Red -> Blue -> Yellow -> Red if in Hard Mode). This is illustrated in the diagram, which I highly recommend you look at because I genuinely have no clue how to better put this mechanic in words.
Whenever a part of your signal switches to the correct colour, you get a bonus of one line removed from the bottom of your stack (denoted by the combo counter for some reason). Lines removed in this manner have no effect other than making it easier for you to finish the round.
You win as soon as your signal completely matches the sample. You are then awarded points based on how fast you matched the sample (see left hand side).
This mode is extremely divorced from Tetris, but is surprisingly fun once you get the hang of it. Good luck explaining it to anyone, though, as it's much easier to play than it is to explain.
Towering Tetris
Another GBC-exclusive mode, and thankfully this one is a lot easier to explain. You begin with a handful of garbage lines on your board -- the top of a tower -- and every time the clock on the right fills up, one line of the tower gets pushed onto the bottom of the board as soon as you place a piece that doesn't clear any lines. If you clear all the garbage lines off the board, the next piece you place will cause the clock to skip to the end and immediately advance the tower one row. At the very bottom of the tower is a keyhole block; you win as soon as you clear it.
In singleplayer mode, the height of the tower depends on the difficulty that you play. Easy towers are 19 rows tall; Normal towers are 25 extra rows; Hard towers are 43 rows. No matter what difficulty you play, the first 7 rows of the tower will initially be on your board.
There is one exclusive mechanic to this mode -- the Shot Block.*This is the name given in the instruction manual. I prefer to call it the Gun Piece,^(patent pending) though.. It is a 1x2 metal block, appears rarely, and whenever it enters play, gravity immediately lowers to the minimum for as long as you have control of the piece. Whenever you rotate the Gun Piece, instead of rotating, it shoots one block at your stack in the column that the Gun Piece is in. Lines you clear with the Gun Piece immediately disappear*These actually count for combo lines, so you can get some stupid high combos with this., however the Gun Piece itself disappears as soon as you place it, and it cannot clear lines.
This mode is quite fun, but it takes a while to get through, especially compared to the other modes you'll encounter in Quest Mode. Also be careful to not top yourself out over stupid mistakes (which I've done before!).
Target Tetris
Another GBC exclusive, this is unironically my favourite mode in the whole package. For each stage, you are given a preset field with various target blocks on it, and you are given full view of an entire preset piece sequence. Your only goal is to clear all the target blocks off the field with the provided pieces.
To get one thing out of the way, an important mechanic the game never explains: As long as you haven't placed your final piece, you can press Select at any point to retry the stage from the beginning for no penalty. This is especially useful in Quest Mode to avoid having to go through cutscenes multiple times.
Other than that, the only other thing to note is that the stages you play depend on your difficulty There are a total of 135 stages on the cartridge, but each mode only has up to 50 puzzles assigned to it. Easy has you play stages 1 through 50; Normal has stages 51 through 100; and Hard has stages 101 through 135. In 1P mode, you play every stage of the chosen difficulty in order; in Quest Mode, you are given one random*I believe there's actually only a few hand-picked possibilities per difficulty, but I don't know what they are. All the stages might still be in play, I still haven't tested it. stage out of the entire difficulty group that you must clear.
A lot of the earlier stages are simple packing puzzles, but the difficulty really ramps up in the Hard puzzles, which involve weird stacking behaviours, spins, red herrings, and then also Stage 120 being a reaction speed test. I could go on about each individual stage, but I find it a lot more fun to try and solve them yourself.
I should warn you, however, to be very careful of Stage 120. You have to do a handful of simple spins with an L piece, which are easy in isolation. However, remember at the beginning when I said the lock delay for each piece is 30 frames total? In order to maneuver the piece to the bottom of the field, you have to take every movement as soon as it is available. If you hesitate even a little, you run out of lock delay extremely quickly, and you don't get to restart the stage since it's your one and only piece. Be very careful with this stage.
With that, though, that concludes the singleplayer mode breakdown. However, that is not the crux of this game. I will begin by providing a general overview of the mode; after which, I will go in-depth on all the mechanics. I recommend trying to figure some of them out yourself though -- this mode's quite fun!
Quest Mode
Quest Mode is what Story Mode from the arcade version wishes it was. Instead of playing a handful of CPU battles in a row, you have to run around a decently large overworld, running around to beat people clear special challenges in Tetris in order to collect coins.
Overview
You get to pick one of four playable characters: Mickey Mouse, Minnie Mouse, Donald Duck, or Goofy^Does he have a last name? I'm not caught up with the lore.. You will be playing aganist the three characters you didn't choose, along with Pete, who will also be joining the competition.*If you beat Quest Mode four times, you can play as him as well!
After the intro cutscene, you are immediately thrown into the overworld. You are given a coin case, capable of holding six coins -- along with one of the coins you need, for free! Your goal is to collect the remaining five coins from other participants, buildings, or other events. How exactly you get these coins depends on who or what you play:
- Talking to a rival in the Tetris Coin Rally lets you challenge them for any of the coins they carry. Win, and you get to take one of their coins; lose, and they get to take one of your coins. If an opponent really wants one of your coins, they will chase you around the overworld and lock you into a battle if you can't dodge them.
- Talking to a non-rival NPC lets you challenge them, for a coin they may or may not have. Some of the NPCs have coins, whereas some do not; if they do not, you will be given a hint as to who actually has the coin. If you lose, you gain nothing.
- Talking to a building lets you play the owner's own custom "puzzle" Tetris*As in, either Standard, Towering, Signal, or Target Tetris. Magical and Updown Tetris are for fighting other characters.. If you lose, you get to try again; if you win, you get their coin!
- Talking to other objects (lampposts, mailboxes, telephones, and manholes) give you hints about the game. Some of the hints even tell you where other coins are, who has what coins, or maybe some other useful info!
You can press the A button to "knock" on things; you can knock on characters or objects to interact with them. The first person (or CPU) to get all six of their necessary coins and return to the Rally Station in the bottom-left corner of the map is the winner!