For many players the original portable console version released on the Game Boy over twenty-five years ago will be all they ever need, indeed while I could say that this is true of myself it's very hard to resist the allure of a shiny new Tetris title, especially when it's made available for the latest Nintendo handheld. I'm more than aware that we have already had a 3D version of the classic near the start of the 3DS life-span but it has been a few years since then so I suppose the timing must be right being that Ubisoft have seen fit to release Tetris Ultimate across nearly every format under the sun; at the very least it is a budget release but it is worth spending new money on some old bricks with a new coat of paint?

Normally I would just recommend the original being that it has had a Virtual Console release but I must say that I'm a little aggrieved at the original game having to be taken off the Virtual Console due to complicated licensing issues, however this seems to be the price paid for having a modern Tetris title published by a third party appear on a Nintendo machine these days. To give this release its dues there are at least a wealth of options available in order to play the game how you like it, if you prefer the Game Boy title however you'll firstly need to turn off 'Ghost Piece' while having the 'Next Queue' set to '1' with no 'Hold Queue' plus the 'Classic' option chosen for every option which allows it; additionally if you want your Tetrimino's to behave then 'Soft Drop' plus 'Left/Right' speeds will need to be at '10' while the 'Sensitivity' should be at '7' so as to make it feel like the Tetris you remember... then and only then can you properly enjoy the title if you're anything as particular about your puzzle games as I am, at least all the options are there though.

All of the menu's are reasonably well presented containing a wealth of extra stuff including progress towards goals which are in-game accomplishments if you enjoy those, various stats which are all tracked, even a 'Tetris Rank' to give you some idea of your standing; it's all there if you want or need it though I  just found it all to be rather superfluous even if it's nice to have... I mean there's even a 'How to Play' in there which most gamers probably won't even need to touch. But it's usually down to the modes which make Tetris these days, so you have 'Marathon' where you must try to clear fifteen levels, 'Sprint' is for clearing forty lines really quickly, 'Ultra' is points-based with a three minute time limit, 'Battle/Ultimate' pit you against the 'Tetribot' who is surprisingly hard to beat even on the default difficulty and finally you have 'Endless' mode which is self-explanatory. Worth a mention is 'Challenge Mode' which starts with 'Rotation Lock' a mode with no piece rotation but you'll need to earn badges to unlock Invisible, Escalation and Master modes so there's plenty to play with.

You can battle against anyone by joining an online community or you can create your own, people will be able to see it and join plus you can use the community code to share it with other people you know who might want to join, I decided to make a battle community nostalgically named 'Tetris1989' in reference to the original GameBoy game - which is still the best to this day - but if you want to just get right into the action then just select 'Quick Play' which will match you up with seven other players as you then watch your screen fill up quicker than you would have thought possible; well in my case anyway though I did do a bit better than I expected. There's a similar rating system which I think has been in place since Tetris on the DS - which had a superior aesthetic to this release thanks to all those 8-bit Nintendo characters - where you start off with a thousand points, if you lose then points are subtracted but you gain them if you win though the only way to not lose any points it seems is to come first as there are no consolation prizes here. 

All of the visuals look nice enough in 3D though I found the backgrounds too distracting as they were detracting from the experience so you may wish to switch these off but otherwise all the blocks seem to be the 'correct' colours being that this was standardised years ago by the Tetris Company, you also get a window showing your Mii's reaction to the on-screen action as you play which is a nice touch but it's nothing new. Audibly the only thing worthy of mention are the sound effects, I can see where they were trying to go with the music as I can hear a vague attempt at a reworking of something that's supposed to be Tetris music but which ultimately fails, I had to turn it off in order to keep playing; also the 'tapping' sound effect which plays when you're a mere two or three lines away from the top might be there to create attention but the only thing it does is annoy so I really wish there had been an option to turn it off as sometimes less is more.

If you're wanting to play a modern version of Tetris then it's not hard to see why this would be a viable option escpeially as it's at a budget price - I paid less than £15 on release - as you do get a lot of block-dropping goodness for your money, even if it isn't quite the same as you might remember it these modern alternatives always seem to change a lot where they don't necesarilly need to but the result this time around is a reasonably tolerable middle-ground. Ultimately this doesn't quite live up its sub-title but if you're looking to play the game online then this at least has something good going for it but in all honestly you could just as easily keep playing your old copy of Tetris on the Game Boy or DS as this really doesn't offer much more that you really need so much as it bloats it out with extras; Tetris was based on a simple concept for a reason, it was all that it needed to be... this is a viable option but it's a standard multi-format release, nothing more.