ard to classify but fun to play, Every Extend Extra continues the tradition of music-integrated puzzlers from Mizuguchi and the gang over at Q Entertainment. While I’m ultimately forced to place it in that puzzle category, it has as much in common with Geometry Wars as it does with games of falling blocks, and offers a gameplay experience that is both novel and intriguing.

This new effort lacks the immediacy of Q’s first PSP classic, Lumines. Whereas the patterns and challenge of that title are apparent almost instantly, I was several games into Every Extend Extra before I started to feel that familiar Zen-like flow. Other comparisons to Lumines are useful if only for explanation. Like that game, the musical score is reactionary to your onscreen actions – tempo speeds up as you grab power-ups, and every movement you make has a corresponding musical riff or sound effect attached to it. When you start to actually get what you’re doing and how to succeed, the game bursts open with a need for exciting strategies, lightning quick responses, and careful observation.

Basically, you control what amounts to a floating bomb that can be blown up in proximity to onscreen objects. These objects in turn explode, and if you’re doing everything right those explosions start a chain reaction that spreads across the screen. Destroyed objects drop power-ups – some that “extend” your game by moving you towards having more lives (bombs), and others that speed up gameplay or add extra time to the clock. Eventually, you’re having to contend with a huge number of obstacles that are simultaneously your only route to success. Balancing time, lives, and the insane activity onscreen becomes mesmerizing.  

Alas, the flame burns out too fast. Too few levels (even including unlocks),mean that those who want to constantly see new content are in for a pretty short experience. Only those who thirst for that elusive mastery of the concept will be playing for weeks on end. Even so, this may be one of those cases where the remarkable interaction of different gameplay elements should make it worth a look.