Puzzle Quest Galactrix Flash demo

By Tom Bramwell Published 20 January, 2009

Highest cunning starts first.

Infinite Interactive's upcoming Puzzle Quest Galactrix is now available to sample thanks to a Flash demo that allows you to play through a typical battle.

Like the original Puzzle Quest, Galactrix is a mixture of RPG tropes and turn-based competitive puzzle game mechanics, except in this case the simple square-grid match-three gameplay has been upgraded to a hexagonal system.

This means you have different options to create your lines of three, and in another twist gravity shifts depending on the direction you move hexagons to form lines. So, if you move a hexagon downward to make a line of three, the gap will be filled from above, but if you move a hexagon left to do the gap will be filled from the right.

Otherwise mechanics are similar: there are specific blocks that deal damage (mines this time, rather than skulls), and as you level up you unlock special attacks and buffs that can be deployed on your turn.

Outside the battles, you roam space in a more freeform manner than Puzzle Quest's set pathways, guiding a ship with (on the PC at least) the mouse pointer and visiting space stations, asteroids and other areas to get into fights and meet people. Along the way you also do some mining and perform other tasks that twist the core puzzle formula to function in different ways.

Although Infinite Interactive has applied the Puzzle Quest formula to another game in the meantime - Capcom's Neopets Puzzle Adventure, due out in Europe on Friday 23rd January - Galactrix appears to be closer to the original game, not just in style but also in quality and compulsiveness.

The full game is due out for Xbox Live Arcade, PC, DS and - judging by a logo on the Flash demo site - PlayStation Network in the next couple of months. Look out for our review soon.

Picture of Tom.

About Tom Bramwell

Tom is Operations director of Eurogamer Network and Editor-at-Large of Eurogamer.net. He joined the company in February 2000.

Read more articles from Tom by visiting the Tom Bramwell archive page.

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Comments (14) Latest comment 3 years ago

Comments threads automatically close after 30 days, but please feel free to continue chatting on the forum!

  • darm #1 3 years ago

    Dammit. Is it not possible for them to announce exact release date instead of forcing me to check live arcade for their game every day?

  • the_inchworm #2 3 years ago

    Not PSP then?

  • speedjack #3 3 years ago

    If this is anything like the original I'll probably pick it up on XBLA and then weeks later and hopelessly addicted shell out for the DS version too.

  • kinky_mong #4 3 years ago

    Dammit. Is it not possible for them to announce exact release date instead of forcing me to check live arcade for their game every day?

    Aren't XBLA games always released on a Wednesday? Now you only need to check every week.

  • darm #5 3 years ago

    @kinky_mong

    Thanks! I mean, really thanks a lot, I didn't know it as I'm not really much into xbox live stuff except for addons for retail games...and PQ.

  • DrDamn #6 3 years ago

    Hmmm - just tried it - maybe it needs some getting used to but it seems very tricky to predict which way replacement blocks will come it and therefore plan moves ... what am I missing?

  • Weezer #7 3 years ago

    DS is the way to go - works best on stylus IMHO...

  • Domovoi #8 3 years ago

    PQ never really kept its appeal for me, but this seems... addictive. I wonder if it's the hexagonal tiles that appeal more? Weird. Looking out for this on XBLA.

    maybe it needs some getting used to but it seems very tricky to predict which way replacement blocks will come it and therefore plan moves ... what am I missing?

    Shift a tile up, replacement blocks move in from the bottom. Shift a tile right, they come in from the left. The replacement blocks move in the same direction that you just shifted the tile in.
    Edited by 1 at 20/01/09 @ 10:57

  • penhalion #9 3 years ago

    Not for me I'm afraid. I found it too random. The computer won through sheer luck far too many times for it to be enjoyable.

  • Buenos_Estente #10 3 years ago

    Well that demo neatly wasted an hour or so of the office day...more please

  • penhalion #11 3 years ago

    @farticusmaximus

    Puzzle quest is about mana and skulls really. This new one is pretty much the same except that the fall-ins come from multiple directions and cause far too many combo chains as a result. this seems to lead to the computer pulling off special moves far too easily.

    I tried the demo for about an hour and simply don't like it. As I said, I lost far too many games due to these random combos. The computer even managed to get a nova combo on the first go a few times! Allowing it to get a free turn, lower my shields and reduce my hull to half. I had exactly 3 yellow by this stage!

    I clawed back to 15 vs 26 but, then 3 mines (all worth 10 for some unknown reason) caused 30 damage in one go. This is in contrast to the original puzzle quest, where even a disasterous bout of AI luck couldn't cause such rediculous damage in a single turn.

  • Earl_G #12 3 years ago

    Never mind the combos, they've blown it for me with the colour choices! Puzzle Quest was great because they chose colours and symbols that were bold and very different from each other. Galactrix's symbols are just far too messy and complicated and some of their colour choices are just way too similar for us poor colour-blind people (the blue/purple and orange/green choices are way too similar).

    Damn...

  • RedSparrows #13 3 years ago

    I have to say, despite the ocassional AI clusterfuck, I lost more battles in PQ by making mistakes and being undergeared/underpowered.

  • DrDamn #14 3 years ago

    For the stupid people like me the fall in direction of new blocks is the same direction as the one you moved to make the chain.

    Even with this info I'm still not convinced about it. The hexagons clutter and over complicate things. The space setting loses some of the charm of the fantasy original too.

    A couple of things it seems to improve on seem to be making matching XP (purple) and monies (white) a bit more worthwhile by having affects in game. I think matching moneys gets you a shield recharge after reaching a certain number for example.

    Oh and it very nearly works on the PS3 browser. Not quite though - obviously it realised it hadn't gone through a different QA in all regions and stopped it :D