If you’ve been looking for a Nintendo DS game that takes advantage of the system’s unique attributes, would be really difficult for another system to accommodate, and is truly fun, wait no longer—Meteos is here. A kinetic puzzle that uses the DS touch screen to full measure, Meteos is destined to become one serious time waster.

Now let’s face it, kinetic-puzzle games have been a staple of handhelds since Tetris became the reason many people bought the original Game Boy back in 1989. (Can you name me a handheld that has succeeded with a kinetic puzzle? Oh, that’s right, only the Game Boy and its descendents have really been successful so far.) Meteos is not quite Tetris. It is highly addictive and has more variety than Tetris, but it is still a notch below the Great One.

The back story, which at least makes more sense than most puzzle games, involves planets of a galaxy under attack from the planet Meteo. Matter called Meteos is bombarding the peaceful planets and piling up, crushing the life out of the planets. Then a defense strategy is developed. It is found that when three like Meteos are aligned, they ignite and thrust away from the planet, taking any Meteos stacked on top of them away too. That is where you come in.

In the most basic mode of Meteos, the player is simply working on a single screen like Tetris. Various types of single Meteos blocks rain down from the sky into a bin, much like any other stacking puzzle game. That is where the similarities end. There is no way for the player to manipulate the Meteos blocks as they fall. Once stacked, the player uses the stylus to slide the Meteos vertically within the columns. Horizontal movement of Meteos is forbidden. When three matching Meteos are aligned, either horizontally or vertically, they thrust up toward the top of the screen like a rocket. How far the blocks go depends on the height at ignition and the load of additional blocks it is carrying. The aligned cluster of Meteos will thrust up the screen a set distance with its pile of passenger Meteos and then will begin to fall back. Unless it completely clears the screen with the first boost, the player can quickly align more Meteos within the lifted pile into another group of three, the new cluster of three will act like a second-stage booster and thrust the pile even higher and perhaps completely off the screen. If the player cannot get the lifted pile of Meteos to clear the screen, the cluster will fall back and return to the bin. When the player cannot keep the screen clear and any column tops the screen, the game is over.

This play mechanic makes for an absolutely frantic gameplay experience as the player tries desperately to align Meteos while managing the rocketing piles. The stylus and touch screen are a perfect pair to quickly manipulate the fast-stacking Meteos. The folks at Q Entertainment provided an interface to play Meteos with buttons and the directional pad, but without the stylus/touch-screen interface the game is not the speed-planning monster it was born to be.

In addition to the basic single-player mode, there is a quest-like mode that has the player moving from planet to planet, ridding each of a set number of Meteos and then moving on to the next. Meteos also has multiplayer modes that let the player game wirelessly with up to three other players. There is even a mode that allows four to play wirelessly with only one game card. (A big plus when your friends don’t own a copy of the game.) In multiplayer, the Meteos piles you launch off your screen don’t just go into space. You can direct them into the bins of your opponents and make them top out.

Graphically the game is smooth and highly functional. Puzzle games are seldom known for their beauty, but Meteos actually manages to have graphically attractive themes for the planets you play on. Sound is minimal but keeps the excitement high as the background tunes build pressure and each rocketing pile is accompanied by appropriate fanfare. If there is one real weakness in Meteos it is that some of the planetary-themed blocks can be a little bit hard to tell apart in the heat of battle. Of course this could have been somewhat intentional as it really makes you look before executing a move.

While it is probably never going to be the system-seller for the DS that Tetris was for the original Game Boy, Meteos is a superb game. It should make the folks who bought the DS and maintained faith during the initial drought of games very happy they hung on. It uses the touch screen to great affect and is a terrific demonstration of what Nintendo’s new handheld is all about. It has a definite "buy" recommendation from me. If you rent it, I’m afraid you’ll be racking up too many late fees because you can’t put it down.