Alone in a Crowded Room With Lumines Arise | Summer Game Fest 2025

Tetris Effect is the definition of a comfort game. It’s an experience that completely captivates you through its visuals and soundscapes, which are expertly tied to its core gameplay loop. Sinking into the flow of locking into music and carefully stacking Tetriminos is a religious experience. It’s a mechanical rhythm that only Enhance can execute.

With the announcement of Lumines Arise, I was cautiously ecstatic. After Tetris Effect, I trust the team implicitly to infuse their flair into any classic puzzle game. But as much as I’ve always enjoyed Lumines, it was a game I struggled to find that natural flow state with. Whether it was the 4x4 block structure or the sweeping meter to clear stacks, there was always a ceiling to my skill level. But man, there’s something about the Enhance touch that helps you break through any barriers.

It’s still Lumines at its core, so what makes Arise different enough to unlock the block within my brain? In terms of core gameplay, it could simply be the Burst mechanic from Tetris Effect. Burst forces time to stop and allows you to endlessly make massive, board-clearing combos until the timer hits zero. There might be some tweaks in the design that make Arise’s gameplay feel smoother compared to previous entries. But I think it’s something more nuanced: the Enhance care for the sensory experience as a whole.

I played three stages in one overarching level, each of which had its own distinct visual language and accompanying soundscape. Similar to Tetris Effect, each moment begins with a calm, quiet drop of the initial block. It’s a familiar moment that feels just like playing any other puzzle game, but it’s critical to the journey Enhance takes the player on. As blocks are cleared and scores increase, the visuals and music crescendo. Bombastic particle effects flurry across the screen, blissful melodies with an underlying complementary bass connect your eardrums to your heart. You soon forget about the numbered score and slowly become more and more locked into the rhythm of Arise. As cliché as it sounds, you truly become one with the game.

As you reach the climax of each stage, there’s an explosion to the senses and a soft reset to the palette. Gold and black blocks accompanied by the silhouette of a man transition into stark white wireframe hands, seemingly controlling my every move as if I were the game’s marionette. Each transition feels like I’m falling deeper and deeper into a hypnotic state, where the chaos of Play Days and the fears of the outside world in Los Angeles that weekend begin to fade. But it was when I reached the third and final stage that I felt completely in sync with the experience.

The final stage featured two radiant chameleons on opposite ends of the screen. Their spewing tongues would move in complete harmony with the killer grooves and passively interact with the movement of my blocks. I was completely captivated by the shapes and sounds, but it wasn’t until I reached this deep state of serenity that I noticed the feel as well. Enhance’s use of the DualSense is expertly executed. The precise vibrations—completely in harmony with the visuals, music, and gameplay—created an experience that overtakes all of your senses. This was the moment where I felt completely alone in a crowded room, and there was little that could snap me back to reality. Reaching the end of the journey and being greeted with my scorecard felt as if a hypnotist had snapped his fingers and brought me back.

When the Enhance representative asked me for my thoughts, I was at a loss for words. Again, at the risk of sounding cliché, I felt completely renewed after a long, hectic day. Those 30 minutes stuck with me throughout Summer Game Fest, and I’ve been eager for that serene escape ever since leaving Los Angeles. I booted up Lumines Remastered on my Switch 2 as soon as I got home in hopes of feeling even the slightest familiar inkling, but unfortunately, I was met with that same old ceiling again. The contrast between the two games shows how critical the sensory experience can be for players like myself.

Enhance are masters of their craft. They understand that games can be more than moments on a screen triggered by the press of a button, a polished cutscene, or an impactful line of dialogue. Like its predecessor, Lumines Arise feels like it connects to the player’s soul. It’s the therapeutic experience we could all desperately use, one to briefly escape reality and feel renewed enough to take on the day.