Welcome to the Puzzle Chronicle!
Kels if you get notified for this don't look !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
At the start of 2024, I decided to start playing all of the falling / matching block puzzle games I could find. Seeing all the different variations on the genre is something I really enjoy. After a while, I realized I wanted to document my thoughts in a better fashion than a few scattered social media threads. Some of these games have limited presence on the web- I'd like to make a little page for each of these games, and give a bit of information about each one. Ideally, this would be a website that anyone looking for a new puzzle game to play could find something interesting on.
I'll be presenting these games in a very casual fashion, talking about my personal thoughts on the mechanics, characters, and whatever I think is neat. I don't claim to have much knowledge of the competitive side of these games- most of my time with them is playing through their single player modes. If you're looking for competitive focused coverage on puzzle games, you should check out Puzzle Wednesday! I've learned about a lot of these games through the good folks on their Discord server. That said, I'd love to make this website more and more comprehensive as time goes on.
You can look at the chronicle of puzzle game releases, or if you're just looking for the best of the best, you can look at my personal favorites. Or you can go to a random game! Put on some music, and have fun!
Also, I'm planning to have a Testimonials section at the end of each game's page, and I'd love to share other's perspectives there. If you'd like to have a quote featured on a game's page, please contact me at comboconnie on Bluesky, or email me at the Gmail of the same name! You can bring your advanced knowledge of the game, or just say that you like it and that its cool. Anyone is welcome to contribute! Thanks for visiting!
What makes a puzzle game?
"Puzzle" is a pretty vague genre with a very wide scope. For clarity, I'll try and define what puzzle games I'm focusing on for this website: games that are kind of like Tetris. That feels a little reductive, but it gets the point across well. There's not really a universal name for this subgenre- Falling Block Puzzles and Matching Puzzles are pretty clear but exclusive to each other. Puzzle Fighter and Versus Puzzle are good descriptors, but don't fit that well for single player games. Action Puzzle is pretty good, but still somewhat vague. I'll probably just use "Puzzle" as shorthand here in most cases. If I can look at a game, and see any chain of inspiration or mechanics between it and Tetris, Puyo, or other early examples, I'll include it. That's not a hard rule though- ultimately, if I feel like it fits, I'll include it. I'm sure I'll add Puchi Carat eventually.