Coming from renowned producer Hideo Yoshizawa, he of Mr. Driller fame, Trioncube is exactly the sort of relaxingly fuzzy puzzler one can get lost in for hours in a similar way to Lumines, although it must be said that Trioncube lacks even that game’s less-than-fearful difficulty curve. The two games do, however, share a commonality in their ethos, that being one centred around presentation as much as gameplay. This is Puzzling in the Name of Cuteness. Slightly offbeat cuteness, but cuteness nonetheless.

Trioncube is a falling-block style of puzzler akin to Tetris but where the player is encouraged to completely fill the screen with blocks. Coins are earned, from bronze to gold, by building up a multiplier based on the amount of cubes the player can link, in grids of 3x3 (i.e. a trioncube) within the window of opportunity without losing the multiplier. Hence, link a few cubes and bronze coins will be earned; nearly or completely fill the screen with linked cubes and gold is your coin of the realm (gems are received if your combo fills the screen and beyond). As the player progresses though levels, inevitably the cubes fall faster, have more awkward configurations, and the window of opportunity available in which to build up your cube multiplier is lesser.

And that, in a nutshell, is it: unlike most block games, it’s not Game Over if your cubes touch the upper edge of the screen (unless you have no multiplier) – this merely triggers their emptying and coins being granted depending on the strength of your multiplier. The only ways to “fail” are if the timer reaches zero, which is rare unless deep in the game or playing at higher levels in Endless, or if an AI opponent earns more coins - and hence travels faster and further - in any of the “race” stages.

There are five modes available from the main screen (all of which are easy to figure out if kana mean nothing to you - indeed the game as a whole is easy to suss out if not Japanese-proficient): Prologue, Story, Endless, Taisen (Multiplayer) and a Tutorial mode. Prologue is a condensed, time-trial taster of the game proper in which you journey through eight stages to confront the billowy purple cloud that Hell Metal, the behorned space demon baddie of the piece, dispatched to steal your princess. Story sees the player continuing to guide the rather melancholy boy-hero through space - in his giant farting bluebird spaceship named Penko, no less - to ultimately defeat Hell Metal. Earning coins fuels the perverse bird-thing and keeps it moving. Achieving the required amount of coins/distance propels the player to the next planet. Occasionally a rival will appear and the player must outperform them, achieving the target in a more timely fashion. The occasional boss fight, with stricter time limits, also occurs. Endless isn't strictly endless, with 99 difficulty levels to progress through, though by the time you're in the mid-80s things become very fast (and hence tough) indeed. The difficulty level at which to start can be selected, based on levels previously attained, so the player does not have to grind their way through hours of replay to get to the level that bested them.

It’s rare, until deep in the game or in Endless at level 70+ when cubes fall like greased badgers and there’s literally a split-second granted for combo-linking, that Trioncube will challenge, but this is not its reason to be: for the game dangles, like a wanton cartoon Tantalus, a series of unlockable items and content in front of the player. Points are earned in playthrough of any of the modes which are swapped, at a pretty lousy exchange rate in the main, for coins to unlock new themes and sound effects. This may not sound like too much of a temptation, but the variety and bubbliness of the content is quite addictive: candy-themed backgrounds (the chocolate being especially yummy) are a highlight, as well as a stark monochrome, scribble-like affair (imagine the cover of the Beatles' Revolver mixed with Vic Reeves' doodling). The crown goes to the Xevious theme, though, with arcade attract screen and scrolling landscapes.

Trioncube doesn’t make any striking use of the DS’s abilities other than using both screens to present its cuteness with aplomb. There is no real use of the stylus, for example, other than navigating the options and bonus item screens, and the top screen is not used in any gameplay sense – rather, it displays simple, repetitive animations depicting the flight of your spaceship-bird through the cosmos. The emphasis here really is on presentation and the whimsical yet slightly abstract nature of the thick-black-outlined, Yoshi’s Island-style aesthetic, and on that front Trioncube doesn’t really founder. Everything is endearingly quirky (Ref: The Lazy Westerner, P. 98, “101 Clichés When Referring to Anything Japanese”), down to the farmyard animal/karate man sound effects that can be unlocked. Thus, it’s hard to fault its general level of easiness, because it’s never less than fun to play, but that fun is in no small measure derived from the seemingly endless breadcrumb trail of rewards, and some of them (at a cost of 1,000,000) take a LOT of play to accrue enough coins to unlock. A LOT. Of course, playing at higher levels - for example, starting in Endless at above level 50 or in Multiplayer when setting a greater distance to be travelled - reaps greater dividends, but there’s still a swollen amount of time needing to be devoted to unlock everything.

Single- and multi-cart multiplay is supported, consisting of a simple game mode where the host selects the “distance” to be travelled and the first player to reach it wins. CPU opponent play is also catered for.

Being a lower-price release, it’s reasonable to not expect the same feature set as a premier title, and Trioncube certainly is a polished product with delicious presentation; approach it as such, a scrummy little gumdrop of a puzzler with no aspirations of making you pull your hair out in ludic frustration, and it has a fruity liquid centre. Those seeking a demoncore challenge should look away, thus, to the mountains of (puzzle) doom. Trioncube’s mesmerisingly spartan yet compulsive gameplay, married to the charming presentation, indelible soundtrack and reward trail, often confect to make this feel like a honeyed breath of fresh air.