Lose Your Marbles

Lose Your Marbles is a puzzle video game developed and published by SegaSoft and released for the PC on August 19, 1997.

Lose Your Marbles
Developer(s)SegaSoft
Publisher(s)SegaSoft
Platform(s)Microsoft Windows
ReleaseAugust 19, 1997 (PC, North America)[1]
Genre(s)Puzzle
Mode(s)Single player, multiplayer

A version of the game was included in Microsoft Plus! 98.[2]

Gameplay

In Lose Your Marbles, the player moves each color of marbles to create matches on the playing field, while the game drops new ones every few seconds. Whether played against a human or the CPU, the goal in Lose Your Marbles is to fill the other player's board with marbles. Creating matches of three, four, or five marbles clears those marbles from the player's board. In addition, a match of five will send marbles to the opposing player's board.

Due to its simplistic controls, Lose Your Marbles can be played with two players with one keyboard. Lose Your Marbles also features a LAN multiplayer mode to connect two players over a local network.

Marketing

For marketing purpose, SegaSoft added a tag saying "Better than Tetris", on the first edition release of the game. Also in the tag, SegaSoft offered a full refund for purchasers who did not enjoy the game more than Tetris.[3]

Reception

GamePro lauded Lose Your Marbles as "one of the most addictive PC games to come out in recent memory", giving it a 4.5 out of 5 for graphics, sound, and control, and a perfect 5.0 for fun factor.[6] Nicole Freeman of GameSpot said that the AI is easy to defeat, making single-player mode too lacking in longevity, though she acknowledged that the multiplayer mode is much more fun and long-lasting. She concluded, "It's no Baku Baku, but Lose Your Marbles is not a total loss."[4] Next Generation found the single player mode sufficiently challenging, but agreed that the multiplayer is much better, and stated that "Lose Your Marbles is actually quite fun, even if it doesn't grab players quite like Tetris or have the same staying power."[5]

Lose Your Marbles was a runner-up for Computer Gaming World's 1997 "Puzzle Game of the Year" award, which ultimately went to Smart Games Challenge 2. The editors called Lose Your Marbles "the best Tetris clone we've seen since last year's winner, Baku Baku."[7]

References
  1. Staff (19 August 1997). "More Fun than Tetris?". PC Gamer. Archived from the original on 18 February 1998. Retrieved 5 December 2019.
  2. Thurrott, Paul (June 25, 1998). "Plus! for Windows 98 Review". ITPro Today. Retrieved January 28, 2020.
  3. "Lose Your Marbles Review". Game Revolution. Retrieved 4 January 2017.
  4. Freeman, Nicole. "Lose Your Marbles Review". GameSpot. Retrieved 29 January 2020.
  5. "Finals". Next Generation. No. 36. Imagine Media. December 1997. p. 174.
  6. Bad Hare (November 1997). "PC GamePro Review: Lose Your Marbles". GamePro. No. 110. IDG. p. 107.
  7. Staff (March 1998). "CGW Presents The Best & Worst of 1997". Computer Gaming World (164): 74–77, 80, 84, 88, 89.

Lose Your Marbles can be played for free in the browser at the Internet Archive

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