Of the four 1988 Tetris clones for 8-bit Atari I have found so far
(the first generation
, so to speak),
Super Puzzler is the simplest. It does not have the graphic elegance
of Geo, nor does it name the pieces. It does not
have flashy effects like Speed-Puzzle or
an animated background like Tigris, nor the
odd block shapes these two games sport. It is a classic Tetris with
simple graphics bordering on the ugly, but when it comes to actually
playing it, I enjoyed it the most.
This is mainly due to the controls, which, I found, always work exactly as intended. A flick to the left will move the piece exactly one column to the left, the fire button will rotate the piece exactly once, and a flick down will drop the current and only the current piece. Of course I can't judge how it works with an original Atari joystick, but with an emulator, this one definitely works best.
