Meteos

Designed by Masahiro Sakurai and produced by Tetsuya Mizuguchi, Meteos was the DS's second big-name puzzle game (after Polarium). Most of the game's action takes place on the bottom of the DS's two screens, where colored meteors plummet downwards towards a planet's atmosphere. There, they form columns that the user can manipulate with either the stylus or a combination of the D-pad and A button. When three or more meteors of the same color are arranged either vertically or horizontally, they "ignite" and rocket up towards the top screen. Rockets carry upwards any other metors that happen to be above them, and by stringing together several ignitions it is possible to lift many blocks at once. The ultimate objective of the game is to lift as many metors as possible back into "orbit" in the top screen; the game is over if the bottom screen fills up completely with meteors. Meteos features many different "planets" that the user can play on, each with subtle variations (such as in gravity) that affect gameplay.