Imagine something like Capcom’s Super Puzzle Fighter, but replace gems with numbers. The resulting game might look a lot like “Sum Fighter”, the only puzzle game I can think of that replaces gem-matching with numbers.
There’s a simple brilliance in the formula. Whereas someone might have trouble remembering different arbitrary values for coloured gems, it’s easy with numbers. If you’re matching 2s, you need at least two of them. If you’re matching 3s, you need at least three of them, etc. So to get rid of 5s, you need to match five of them. Almost every gem matching game has the same rules for each colour, and it’s refreshingly different to see a matching game that doesn’t.
There’s a whole game within the game where you use your block-clearing abilities to out-duel an opponent (either AI, or a human player in the same room), all complemented by visuals and characters that wouldn’t look out of blace on the Cartoon Network. 240 Microsoft Points gets you this innovative puzzle game.
Here’s what the developer (MDCopp) has to say about the game:
“Sum Fighter is a hectic math based puzzle fighter. Players choose one of six highschool archetypes to battle their way through a math competition. Sum Fighter plays like Tetris Attack. Remove large combos of blocks from your board to dump blocks on your opponent’s board. As you clear your board of blocks your character gains energy to unleash its own unique skill on your opponent.”
And here’s a bonus developer description, from the Youtube trailer:
“Sum Fighter is a puzzle game that draws its inspiration from Blocksum and Super Puzzle Fighter. Players choose one of six highschool archetypes to battle their way through a high school math competition.
The main gameplay mechanic comes from Blocksum. Using a cursor players drag adjacent blocks together to combine their face values. The goal is to connect groups of blocks together in the same quantity as their face value (players would connect five groups of the value 5 to destroy them, or two groups of the value 2, etc.). The first player to have his/her blocks reach the top for ten seconds loses.
The game plays similarly to Tetris Attack. Remove large combos of blocks from your board to dump blocks on your opponents board. As you clear your board of blocks your character gains energy to unleash its own unique skill on your opponent.
So yeah! The art’s nifty and the gameplay ain’t too shabby either. Go get it now on Xbox Indie Games!”
Writings of Mass Deduction 