Puz: Meeklits [by Blue Tea Games]

Meeklits is an “odd” puzzle game. Odd item #1 - The resemblance of the Meeklits to the furry kitten from the “Hello Kitty” product line strikes me as strange. Odd item #2 – It seems the object of the game is to save the little creatures called “Meeklits” from the rising water, by knocking them into the water. Odd item #3 – The music soundtrack of Meeklits is just plain weird. Odd item #4 – Meeklits is produced by Blue Tea Games, which has a couple of games out, both of those games are weird too.

Like I said above the object of the game is to save the meeklits from drowning by dropping them in the water, or at least that is how it appears. What you have graphically is a matrix of eleven rows of bubbles with 10 bubbles in each row. Each bubble is one of several colors, interspersed among the bubbles are the meeklits. As you clear a bottom row of bubbles, the rows drop one level and you get another row of bubbles and meeklits at the top of the matrix. If you clear a bubble underneath a meeklit, the meeklit drops until it hits another bubble or the water if no bubbles are below it.

The method of removing bubbles is to fire three bubbles from a gun at the side of the matrix. Each of the colors of the bubbles you shoot is randomly generated, similar to the bubbles within the matrix. If a moving bubble that you fired into the matrix hits a bubble of the same color, then the moving bubble and the stationary matrix bubble are both removed from game play. In addition to the colored bubbles you shoot, you also obtain clear bubbles which will remove any colored bubble within the matrix, but will be stopped by meeklits. In addition, there are magic bubbles for lack of a better term located within the matrix which give you added bonuses.

Prior to shooting the bubbles you may rotate the sequence of the bubbles using your right mouse button, allowing you to reverse the sequence of the bubbles and also rotate them so they are in a vertical line so you may take out a stationary bubble in one of each sequential and adjacent levels. Moving your mouse from side to side of the screen allows you to move the shooting bubbles from one side of the matrix to the other to obtain a better shot. All-in-all for each shooting opportunity you probably have upwards of seventy to eighty shot configurations for each shot. Added to the number of shot combinations is a shot timer, while although not graphically present, if you take too long determining a shot, the water level rises.

The levels of the game are differentiated by the number of meeklits you are to save. On the easiest level, you are to spare the lives of 20 meeklits, on the insane level you are to save 200 meeklits. Playing on the insane level can easily take upwards of 40 minutes to complete.

Graphics I thought at first were simple, but the second time around I notice they were quite crisp and well suited for the game. The graphics are layered two dimensional graphics with some nice artwork. The background graphic is of some blue mountains, the mid level graphic is the water rising against the meeklits and the foreground graphic is the bubble and meeklit matrix. To the right of the game screen is the game panel showing you the selection of bubbles you will have in play.

The interface was very well prepared, I was able to jump right into the game without looking at the readme file that comes with the game. The download size of the file is 1.3MB and went off without a hitch.

The sound track is, well ok, I turned it off. This is not necessarily a bad thing, since I turn off a lot of sound tracks in games.

The game play is incredibly simple and would be great for the majority of ages. I can easily see this game showing up on a platform like Game Boy Advanced or Nintendo. One fine component of the game is the ability to post your scores on the internet so you are able to rate yourself against all other Meeklit players. My last try put me at No. 20 for the insane level.

Meeklits is a good fundamental puzzle game, admit it, you like odd games, so check this one out.

Added: December 30th 2003
Reviewer: GameDogma
Score:
Hits: 1187
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