Block Out - Amiga Review

Block Out, 1990

California Dreams

$39.95

Originally published November 21st, 2016

My Video Review Of Block Out Here
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Occasionally I get requests from subscribers for games they think I should review. I’m quite terrible at getting to them in a timely fashion, though I do keep a list of them all. For the most part I just do what I want to do and I find it best to operate this way. Despite making reviews for my own enjoyment and memories I can feel frustrated when I put time and effort into both video and written reviews only to get less of a response than I once did with far fewer subscribers. So you try not to care and you do what you want to do, it lessens the anger.

Probably a year ago I got a request from one of my first subscribers (Stygian Phoenix) to play the game Welltris. She always seems to request games I like so I’m more than happy to devote a review to them. When I went to look into the game I immediately noticed a similarity to one of my childhood favorites; Block Out. While I plan on reviewing Welltris quite soon, I felt because of the similarities I saw in comparison to the game I already knew, I should first get reacquainted with the game Welltris reminded me of.

Block Out originally came out in 1989 for the arcades. It was made by Technos Japan Corp. and published by California Dreams. In 1990 Polish developer PZK created the Amiga version, which appears to have been completely bought out by the American company who published the arcade game; California Dreams. The Amiga version was published by California Dreams in all areas of the world except Europe, where Rainbow Arts got the publishing rights. There is however, absolutely no mention of Rainbow Arts in the game itself in any version I found.

^Amiga World Review, note they’re talking to adults

The game starts off with a nice little jingle and a pretty good animation of a pair of hands grabbing a couple of Tetris blocks. That’s right; Block Out is a Tetris clone. It attempts to forge its own identity by taking Tetris from the 2D realm into the 3rd dimension. Was it the first to do this? Welltris came out the same year but from the review I found of Block Out in Amiga World it sure seems like this was the first time they had come across a 3D Tetris game. Also worth noting from their review is how they are speaking to adults, not children. “For you gamesters that loved to play with blocks when you were kids...” This brings great perspective on the computer market in America and how different it was to the European market. Here they were talking to adults, overseas they were talking to kids.
^Lots of options on the main menu screen, but we’re going headlong in

There are several options to choose from in the main menu screen, but for now we’re going to get right into the action. Upon clicking the start game button you’re asked to choose your starting level, which will effect game speed. You’ll then quickly be placed into the gameplay.
^The default game mode

The impression of a three dimensional world is given through the use of geometrical line perspective. You’re at the top of a large cube looking the bottom while your standard Tetris blocks start to fall down. The blocks themselves will start off at random positions and it’s your job to not only move them from side to side but to rotate them. Rotating is accomplished by with your q,w,e,a,s, and d keys. As long as I’ve played this game I feel no amount of time will ever have you memorizing exactly which of these buttons rotates the block in whatever way. I just start pressing buttons and when it won’t do what I want I go to the next one. I got no better at this no matter how much time I put into the game.
^Control scheme

Moving the block from side to side can be accomplished with either your keyboard arrow keys or your mouse. When using a laser mouse I found control was incredible. It was always incredibly smooth, never jerky, never hard to get to where you wanted. Personally I found that the way they designed the 3D aspect of the game is incredibly easy to understand the depth of the blocks. I could always tell where I was in this 3D world, I rarely made mistakes when judging where to place the blocks.
^Setup menu and the 3D Mania and Out of Control game modes

The default game mode for Block Out is called “flat”. This will give your basic Tetris tiles the way you remember them. On the main menu if you press “choose setup” you’ll be allowed to alter the options for the game. In the predefined setups there is Flat Fun (the default), 3D Mania, and Out of Control. 3D Mania changes the blockset to a more 3D look. It also changes the dimensions of the playfield to better play this mode. Out of Control changes the blockset to an extended set. Think of your normal Tetris blocks but make them longer on one or both ends. I found both of these modes frustrating to play, most likely because I’m just not used to them. The 3D blocks in particular were incredibly difficult to place because some of the blocks have no flat sides.
^The largest and smallest options

You may also use the options menu to play any of these games modes with your own varying dimensions. I had a lot of fun putting them in the largest and smallest modes I could and playing around on the flat block set. No matter what mode you choose though I have to say the game never seems to go quite fast enough. When you’re doing well it feels like it lasts forever, when you’re doing badly it’s no different. While I feel the game has incredible charm there’s a reason a game like this was made, because the game it was inspired from was oh so much better. Block Out was actually my first experience with Tetris. I had a Gameboy but it was packaged with Super Mario Land, not Tetris. I did end up playing the Tengen version of Tetris on the NES at a friend’s house, but my main exposure to Tetris like games was Block Out on the Amiga and Dr. Mario on the NES. It took years before I had any extensive firsthand experience with the original versions of Tetris. I’ve always been just okay at Tetris, never great, never terrible, but the pace was always good and you wanted to get better. With Block Out, although I was having fun, I always found myself just purposely killing myself by the end. In some ways it’s easier than Tetris, in some ways it’s harder, it’s a fun experience but it’s never as good as Tetris.
^A hall of fame that SAVES your scores! Oh my! Too bad the battery has been pulled from my clock

I do however fully recommend having this game as part of your collection. It does have a Workbench icon so although it does not have an install program it should still be fairly easy to manually install it onto a hard drive. It’s a great casual Amiga puzzle game to go to once in awhile. The graphics are nice and colorful, the 3D is primitive but effective, and it will suck a little bit of time away until you figure out what you next want to play. Perhaps comparing it to Tetris is not quite fair, because it is the best 3D Tetris game I have yet to play. I remember it fondly from my childhood and I had nothing but smiles coming back to it here.

Lastly I would like to again point to the terrible state of our online Amiga archives. The site I went to download this game featured at least 7 copies of this game… All cracked, and all from Rainbow Arts. This means all versions online are pirated copies of the European release. While the European release is an exact copy of the American release I just shake my head at how many options I have in terms of Amiga games, yet how few we truly have. I have the physical copy of the game, I have the manual, give me the option for the original release. This is actually an attack on the American’s who simply can’t be bothered to give a shit about history and would rather throw away the history of these great machines. But it’s also an attack on the European centric Amiga community who refuse to acknowledge and most likely can’t be bothered to know that America deserves a hell of a lot more credit for the Amiga than it’s currently given. TOSEC should be actively seeking to preserve the original American releases of these games, not just hoping someone comes to them, and they need to start understanding and labeling how these games are meant to be played. Namely in the form of how best played via NTSC or PAL mode.

This game is a great example of a game where despite being designed in Europe, presumably on a PAL machine, it is best played in NTSC mode. The original game was designed in Japan, an NTSC country, and if you look at the original arcade and you compare it to the Amiga version in NTSC mode you have a match, the same can’t be said for the game in PAL mode. Just because a game can play in PAL mode does not mean that’s the best way to play it. Please start researching these games and giving recommendations on how best to play the game. Your file names are already a paragraph long with all the different cracks you list, it couldn’t hurt to add “org design NTSC” if that was the case. – Rant complete, end review…

Watch my video review of Block Out here.
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