Tidalis nominally has a story, so we'll detail it. It is, however, completely nonsensical and childish, although it certainly fits the theme of the game. You play a shipwrecked man who has reached the mythical continent of Tidalis. This continent is surrounded by fierce seas and imposing cliffs, so your survival is mostly good luck. As you explore the interior of the island, you find that a culture has sprung up around puzzles, treating them both as diversions and as weapons. That's it! The cast reads like something from your average kid's book, and are drawn in the same way, but it has a charm about it. It's not pure cuteness, but it's not testosterone-filled either.

Presentation-wise, Tidalis is very calming while still have an air of visual splendor. The artwork is excellent, as are the little animations. There are a number of top-notch block skins to select from, although the default set is the easiest in terms of determining direction. The effects are muted, but still pleasant to behold, and the game gets more vibrant as you do better. The music and sound effects are much the same way, with peaceful music and chimes being the norm. However, as you get close to losing or making a huge chain, the sound gets more intense and upfront. We love that! It's engaging in a very immediate way.

Tidalis revolves around the clearing of blocks in groups of three or more. While this is pretty much the standard for puzzle games, Tidalis' core mechanics introduce a twist: you clear by hitting blocks with a stream. When the stream hits a block, it travels in the direction that the block is pointing. You can change the direction a block points, thus setting up chains. If the block is a double arrow, then is sends streams in both directions. Once a stream has collect three victims, it will terminate when the stream dissipates. It's a very simple mechanic, but where Tidalis quickly establishes itself as a non-standard game is in the game modes and extra blocks.

Game modes are best described as rulesets that fundamentally change the way the game is played. The standard ruleset is one you would expect from any other puzzle game: blocks drop from the top of the screen, and you try to clear them as quickly as possible. If blocks exceed the top of the screen, you lose. However, there are many other rulesets that radically alter this. For example, Graviton makes gravity affect streams, pulling them hard downward. It makes going up difficult, but allows you to hit objects at a diagonal. Featherweight does the opposite, pushing streams up and making it impossible to go further downward than the starting stream. Brainteaser is a very common one. It makes no blocks fall whatsoever, allowing the player to build complex puzzles. Our personal favorite? Zen, which is impossible to lose thanks to blocks only falling when you clear things.

Alongside game modes are special blocks. These special blocks react in different ways from the normal blocks, and can either help or hinder you greatly as you proceed. For example, white blocks act as wild cards, and while they can't start chains, they can continue them. Tinder blocks can only be removed by clearing a red block next to it, setting it on fire and removing the block. Glass blocks can be streamed through, but can't be matched and must be broken by dropping them one level. The special blocks turn what is a relatively simple game, even with the strange game modes, into an exceedingly deep and complex one. When you start to get things such as rocks or magnets, then you'll see just how complex the game can get.

While the game could certainly get by resting on its single-player laurels, it doesn't. Multiplayer is definitely part of the game, and even has two modes: co-op and competitive. Co-op wells involve you and a friend clearing different wells at the same time, whereas competitive is more like Tetris, where you are aiming to clear it and ruin your opponent. Both modes are lots of fun, and can be played either on a single screen (unusual for a PC game, we must admit) or through a networked connection.

Tidalis also has a fully-featured editor that can be used to make your own levels, as well as the capability to mod in new blocks if you so wish. It's very cool to see a game with such massive modding potential, both in terms of new levels and new graphical content. The developer has even decided to include player-made goodies, such as new brainteasers and new themes, within the game proper. It's also worth noting that the only way to get the most difficult achievements is to make your own level and play it, so if you are an achievement-focused person, you'll definitely want to learn the level editor to set up your own achievement level.

Tidalis is, in short, stunning. It's one of the most complex, yet easy to learn, games we have ever played. Just when you think you know everything, new blocks and modes are given to you to toy with, leading to tons of replayability. We would, in fact, say that this is one of the best casual games we have ever played, if not the best. It is, in short, a classic that blows everything else out of the water. Where others are content to make clones, Arcen twists the mechanics into something new and exciting, and we are wholly satisfied. It's a must buy in all areas. You can buy Tidalis from the official website or virtually every download service available.