Diamond Puzzle

We hate reviewing puzzle games because we find them so addicting that we end up wasting entirely too much time playing them before we finally start writing. Even mediocre games, like Diamond Puzzle, are hard to quit. This rendition of the ubiquitous matching puzzle is pretty bare bones, but it still manages to be a lot of fun.

The program looks just like many others of this genre, with an opening menu that lets users select a new game or view the options. The gameplay itself consists of switching the positions of various colored jewels arranged in a grid; three or more in a row eliminates the jewels and shifts everything down, with new pieces entering from above. Of course, there is no Help file or in-game instructions, so it took us a minute to figure this out. We never did really figure out how the scoring of Diamond Puzzle worked; sometimes we did things that we thought would increase our score only to find that they didn't, while other times our score went up when we didn't expect it to. It didn't really matter, though; eventually we'd reach our goal and advance to the next, more difficult level. The program's only options let users adjust the volume of the game's music and sounds, which is nice; although the music is inoffensive, we can see how it would start to get irritating after a while. Overall, we've encountered puzzle games that are more sophisticated and interesting, but if you have the puzzle urge, Diamond Puzzle will do an adequate job of satisfying you.