Living up to their promise that they made earlier this week, Sony has revealed the first pre E3 2018 game for the PlayStation 4 and PlayStation VR, and its going to be about Tetris.  That’s right, Tetris makes its grand return to the forefront with Sony’s new game: Tetris Effect.  The game is being designed by Tetsuya Mizuguchi, who is known for critically acclaimed games such as Rez and Lumines.  

You can check out the announcement trailer here:

Tetris Effect looks to be a brand new take on the all time classic.  The core mechanics remain the same, but the environment and activity surrounding the falling blocks has been taken to a whole new level.  As explained in the trailer, a Tetris Effect is a scientific anomaly where “people see falling blocks through their vision after hours of play.”  Right after the announcement, Mizuguchi stated in his blog “The idea behind Tetris Effect, the game, is to amplify and enhance that same magical feeling where you just can’t get it out of your head, and not just the falling shapes, but all the visuals, the sounds, the music — everything!”

Sony is going all in for a full immersive experience with this game.  Not much was shown in terms of gameplay, but from what we can tell in the trailer is that whilst you are concentrating on falling blocks, there will be a multitude of effects in the background and different soundtracks that may or may not interact with the blocks themselves.  There will be more than 30 stages to play on with multiple display options, as well as support for 4k resolution with a PlayStation 4 Pro and VR functionality with PlayStation VR.

Mizuguchi also states that there will be more game modes too.  This includes a new “Zone” mechanic which allows you to stop time, preventing the blocks from falling.  This creates a huge advantage for players as they can get themselves out of a bad situation or obtain a better score.  Other modes include Marathon, Sprint, and Ultra which are fan favorites from older Tetris games.  Tetris Effect is slated for a tentative release in Fall 2018, and chances are that we’ll see more details during Sony’s E3 Press Conference Monday, June 11 at 6 pm PST, so stay tuned for more news and updates.