Good Fortune
Fun news for retro block-busting fans this week, as publisher Forever Entertainment has announced a return for the classic puzzle series, Magical Drop. Magical Drop VI, developed by studios Highball Games and Storm Trident, is scheduled to launch later this winter on Nintendo Switch.
Magical Drop, for those less inclined, is a cute ‘n’ colorful arcade puzzler that first launch in 1995, at the height of the “tile-puzzler” craze. Playing from one of a number of cute avatars, all based upon the Tarot, players must cherry-pick colored orbs from a rapidly descending playfield before firing them back in an effort to match the rainbow-infused patterns together. The goal of Magical Drop is to cause a chain reaction, and thus the player is encouraged to set up several moves ahead of time, that can all be triggered with one final, scalpel-precise move, (hence the series’ Japanese title “Chain Reaction“).
Developed by Data East and published by SNK, several Magical Drop games were released to arcade and home platform markets throughout the mid-’90s. The series’ most recent release, Magical Drop V, launched on Steam in 2012 and was an enormous disappointment, riddled with bugs and issues that often rendered it incompletable. The game was eventually pulled from sale. This new release will no doubt be looking to capture the charm and character of classic entries while delivering engaging gameplay within a variety of single and multiplayer modes.
The visual style depicted here looks a bit “Flash game,” but I remain hopeful, as Magical Drop happens to be my personal favorite of all the tile-puzzle franchises. My character of choice? Empress… But then… you knew that already, right? Shock-freakin’-horror.
Magical Drop VI is currently in development for Nintendo Switch.
