141. Cleopatra Fortune (Taito/Natsume, Arcade (PS2), 1995)

Cleopatra Fortune is an arcade puzzle game that was a collaboration between Taito and Natsume. By the time Cleopatra Fortune had released, Natsume had already partnered with Taito on a few Super Nintendo titles that were expansions of earlier Taito arcade games, though as far as I can tell, this was the only arcade game they ever worked on.

Cleopatra Fortune is a puzzle game that borrows a lot from Tetris. You have a grid that is 7 spaces wide, and various puzzle pieces are falling from the top of the screen. The object is to continuously clear block so that they cannot reach the top of the screen, as this will trigger a game over. As the name implies, Cleopatra Fortune has an ancient Egyptian theme, so in addition to dropping blocks, the pieces that you are dropping also contain sarcophagi or jewels. The twist on Tetris is that if there is any area that becomes enclosed by blocks and/or the sides of the play field, the items in that area are converted to points and destroyed, and any blocks above will fall down, increasing the potential for chain reactions / bonus points.

As far as puzzle games that are taking inspiration from Tetris go, Cleopatra Fortune is a much more fun time than game #96 WildSnake, though it also doesn't stray as far from the Tetris formula. The music is pretty fun and peppy and doesn't get too boring.

4/5, a fun ancient Egyptian-themed twist on Tetris.