Squares (PS Vita) Review

As mentioned, the gameplay is very simple, making use of the Vita's touchscreen - and later the back touch pad too. Each stage is made up of a grid of squares, with a quickly vanishing time limit, and these squares are colour/icon coded for the type of interaction they require. It starts very easy: one of the squares will be blue, tapping on it turns it grey and another turns blue, tap that and another appears and so on.

Chasing this simple and straightforward pattern gives points based on the speed of completion and as more stages are unlocked, the time limits get more constricted, multiple squares can require tapping at the same time and new mechanics are added.

The new mechanics actually make for a much more difficult challenge: darker blue squares require two taps, arrows squares need to be slid in the direction the indicate, red squares have to be avoided, the Vita has to be pinched on front and back touch sensitive panels, and there are even squares which utilize the handheld's gyroscope, requiring banking and pitching of the handheld.

Pitching the Vita is almost necessary in a very different way after a couple of attempts at later levels - pitching it at the damn wall. The difficulty gets absurdly aggressive quite quickly, requiring memorisation of the patterns along with the fastest of reflexes.

There are 91 puzzle stages in the campaign to work through, and thanks to the considerable difficulty it is unlikely that most players will reach anywhere close to the final stage, or even the final few. Along with this, there is a facility to create new puzzles, share them online, and download other people's creations. Level creation is as simple as the core gameplay; just set the grid size and decide which buttons to put where.