Well, after much time and reviewing it’s time to open up the newest in retro reviewing.
Our first batch of SEGA Game Gear reviews. Let’s get into it.
First off a shoutout to Doug from GameTZ (the site where I do all my game swapping), who traded me a SEGA Game Gear and 19 GAMES!! Thanks to you, Doug, we’ll have quite abit to review for sometime to come! Thanks!!

If you remember way back when when Nintendo first came out with the first gen GameBoy then you remember what it’s first game was. Yes, it was one of those rare times when Nintendo didn’t launch a new system or handheld with a Mario title off the bat.
It’s first game was Tetris, the now famous classic falling block puzzler by that Russian creator dude (who went on to create a phenomenon slash clonable genre which created many a spin-off, alsoran,

and no doubt inspired the “BeJeweled” genre which, as you know, is the basis of one of the greatest games to combine puzzle gameplay with RPG content (Puzzle Quest). But that’s now, this was back then.

When SEGA came out with it’s Game Gear it also had it’s own style of Tetris game (and yes, if your wondering, I have a classic GameBoy review of Tetris coming at you on a future date) with Columns. Columns name to fame was it used jewels instead of blocks to make up it’s falling block game. That in itself isn’t much, but add the fact that the game is in color and the gems (therefore) come in different varietys (and different matches) as they are in color? And you got yourself a taste of innovation.

Of course it wasn’t all perfection with it’s release.
The jewel blocks are abit… small. Squint your

eyes they’re small small. Color or not they’re abit small, but then again so were the blocks of Tetris (weren’t they?) so we’re comparing nothing much different here… aren’t we?

Past that you won’t see real innovation with this game until Super Columns (upcoming review) which tries to combine an RPG element with the game in Story mode. It’s not much of a story mode, and has more in common with a certain spinoff of the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise than Puzzle Quest, but at least it’s an innovation.

So what can I truly say about a game that is primarly falling blocks you rack up and make disappear? Well… it did have two player mode, but considering how few Game Gears are still out there (let alone fully functioning) it’s not going to be an easy thing to find other people to play with (so this will be a one person player endeavor because of that fact).

So, past that it’s a Tetris style puzzle game and it’s in color.
If you got a Game Gear? Odds are you might as well find the sequel Super Columns since it is the same game as this with more content and stuff to do, otherwise if you can find this one? Then more power to you. You might find it a mild time passer at home (because, well, let’s face it… now that I’ve seen the Game Gear I can assure you this is not a portable system unless you have very large and very deep pockets (like former 2008 Presidential candidate Mr. Kuchinich… yeah, I misspelled his name, didn’t I).

Columns is an innovation, but not enough to rant and rave over to great detail.
Nostalgic gaming? Yeah. But it only rates a 3 out of 5.