What is Lumines Arise?

Originally released on the PSP, Lumines stood out as a musical twist on the tried-and-true puzzle gameplay seen in games like Tetris. Matching shapes to the beat of the music creates a powerful, zen-like experience. Lumines Arise utilizes the original’s foundation, adding impressive features and striking visuals to the core mechanics.

Does this modern take on the musical puzzler match to the beat? Or is it off-key? After playing through all its game modes, I danced away from Arise, eager to get one more match in.

Publisher/Developer: Enhance, Monsters Inc.
Platforms: PC, PlayStation 5
Release Date: November 11th
Price: $39.99
Platform Reviewed On: PC

PC Specs:
CPU: AMD Ryzen 9 6000 Series
GPU: AMD Radeon 6850M XT
RAM: 32GB

Gameplay of Lumines Arise – A Dazzling Beat

• Resume gameplay with bursts of color and sound, amplifying the flow state experience, creating an explosive visual payoff
• Accessible and deep with easy-to-learn mechanics layered with strategic depth, it keeps players engaged for hours.
• Nostalgic Yet Innovative by honoring the original Lumines while introducing fresh mechanics that elevate the formula.

Honoring the gameplay of the original, Lumines Arise continues the match-to-the-beat energy of the original, where you have to align cube shapes of various sizes as a line passes across the screen. When the line passes, the blocks break.

Similar to Pyuo Pyuo, you have to match the blocks to the correct color, with each board having two. The best part of the gameplay is getting into the ‘flow state’. This is when the music starts matching the beat of your block drops, and the board changes its visual appearance as the song dynamically evolves.

Further adding to the fantastic flow state is a new mechanic. When you press one of the triggers after filling up a bar past 50%, you freeze time to chain multiple block breaks in a row. And when the music kicks back up again, you visually see an explosion of color, adding to the game’s fantastic flow state.

Overall, the gameplay is simple on the surface, but many factors come together to create something magical that you can lose hours into.

A Vibrant Disco – Game Modes of Lumines Arise

Lumines Arise offers a wide suite of modes to test your block-breaking skills, each adding new layers to the core experience. They take the core gameplay of the main ‘Journey’ mode and add some fun wrinkles to the formula.

Mission Mode

• Modifier-Based Challenges are spread across boards featuring unique twists, from blocks falling to the beat to oversized cube shapes
• Offers access to boards you might not encounter early in the main Journey mode.

In this mode, players are tasked with completing boards with specific modifiers. They can range from blocks continually falling to the beat of the music to the block sizes being extra large, forcing you to be careful with your block-breaking chains.

This mode also locks you into a specific board, with each one offering a unique theme that affects the block appearances and music that plays. Considering how challenging Journey mode can get, you can use this mode to see boards you may not encounter there early on.

I loved this mode, as the minor gameplay mix-ups kept the puzzle gameplay fresh and engaging.

Training Mode

• While easy to grasp at first, challenges quickly become complex and mentally demanding.
• Some challenges require careful planning and experimentation, rewarding persistence and skill.

Outside of Mission Mode, the game’s Training Mode is the other major single-player experience on offer alongside Marathon Mode.

Here, you are trained on how to break blocks. It sounds simple on the surface, like the game’s core gameplay, but this is one of the game’s most challenging experiences. Trying to figure out how to finish some of these challenges can be a real brain-scratcher. With over fifty to overcome, completing all of them pushes complete mastery of the game’s gameplay mechanics.

Playing through a sizable chunk of them helped immensely in understanding the nuances of the block-breaking systems.

Online Modes in Lumines Arise – It Takes Two to Tango

• Control customizable avatars and interact with fellow players in a shared online space.
• Matches operate on a best‑of‑three format, with two victories securing the win.
• Similar to Puyo Puyo matches, opponents can box you in, limiting block‑breaking options and raising tension.

Lumines Arise has a robust online mode, where you control customizable avatars and can see fellow players running around. When challenging other players, the game operates on a round system, where the player with two victories is the winner.

These bouts can be particularly intense, similar to VS matches in Pyuo Pyuo, opposing players can box you in and leave you with little room to block-break effectively. But getting that victory feels fantastic, only enhanced by the game’s strong presentation and score.

Also worth noting is that I never experienced disconnect issues during my online matches. Outside of challenging other players, there is a score attack mode, where players can try to chain the most block breaks possible to earn currency for unlocking items to customize their online avatar.

The cosmetics are free to use in-game currency earned through simply playing the game. So even when you are not online, you can work towards getting cool-looking accessories and more for your avatar.

Presentation of Lumines Arise – Vibrant Synthony

• Monstars builds on the acclaimed visual artistry of Tetris Effect with its own unique flair.
• Each board features stunning backgrounds and eye‑catching block icons that enhance immersion.
• Themes shift dramatically, from snowy landscapes to vibrant gardens and even abstract concepts like time.

When you imagine a puzzle game, a simple look is what one would imagine; blocks dropping down with little to make them stand out. Following up on the downright stunning Tetris Effect, Monstars applies a beautiful art style for Lumines Arise.

Every single theme is distinct, with stunning backgrounds and visually appealing icons for the squares you need to match up. The game cements this with the ‘Arise’ theme. Featuring a black background, with a shadow figure slowly walking toward the player, small rays of light shine down as you match up blocks made up of blue spheres and yellow rectangles.

But soon, a bright yellow light replaces the darkness, with the hunched-over figure now walking proudly toward the player. It’s a great introduction, with other striking themes present in the game. From snowy fields where you match up snowballs, connecting a garden of fruits and veggies, and even time itself, there is always something visually striking.

And most impressively, the visual shake-ups never detract from the puzzle-matching experience, as the game always clearly presents what can be matched up. Despite the impressive presentation, early on, it can be a tad overwhelming with effects happening all at once.

However, after a few rounds, you will get used to the colorful symphony of color Lumines Arise has to offer.

Soundtrack/Audio of Lumines Arise – Killer Tunes

While the presentation is fantastic, the glue connecting everything is an equally fantastic score. Composed by Hydelic and Takako Ishida, the thirty-six tracks in the game add so much to the experience. Standout tracks like Arise, The Dark, and Destiny demonstrate the power of games’ effective lyrical tracks, while the non-lyrical songs are equally catchy.

Supporting the game’s powerful score is equally effective sound design. Every theme has unique sound effects for the puzzle blocks. Successfully matching to the beat, just to hear how the sound effects mix alongside the proper game soundtrack, creates a powerful feeling within the player.

Performance

Playing the game on my Lenovo Legion gaming laptop, it ran without any issues. I managed to hit both 60 FPS and 165 FPS at High and Medium settings on my setup. However, when playing heated online matches, the FPS dipped to 90 FPS when playing at above 160 FPS

Closing Thoughts on Lumines Arise

Combining a powerful musical score and striking presentation with tight puzzle-solving mechanics, Lumines Arise is a sleeper hit of 2025. Honoring the gameplay from the original Lumines while adding a robust suite of modes, this musical symphony of puzzles is one every fan of the genre shouldn’t miss.

Score: 8.5 out of 10

Pros:

• Strong presentation with soul and personality
• Outstanding and varied score
• Core puzzle-matching gameplay that’s engaging
• Solid list of offline and online modes

Cons:

• It might be too visually overwhelming for some players early on

Note – The reviewer was provided with a code by the publisher for this review.