Lumines Arise's new demo reveals Burst mode, the game's answer to Tetris Effect's Zone, and the demo is out now

In our house, the first level of the new Lumines Arise demo already has a name. The demo hasn’t been with us long – and it’s available for PS5 and Steam until 11.59pm local time on the 3rd of September, so get on it – but it’s made an impact. That first level has made an impact. I call it Cadbury Physics.

Super quick: Lumines is a puzzle game about sorting blocks into groups of two colours. The blocks drop into the horizontal playing area wonderfully jumbled, and you rotate them, match the colours, and ideally use them to build squares of 2×2 blocks of the same colour. You then grow these squares by adding more blocks of the same colour until the timeline sweeps through and cancels them out. Points for you! And more space to play with! And onwards and upwards. Beautiful.

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But the colours, and the theme and music surrounding them, change with each level. And in the first level of the Lumines Arise demo? Well. Hard to say, really. You’re either deep in space or diving down into the secrets of the quantum universe. One of the colours you’re matching is less a colour and more a little galaxy captured in an oily bubble. Form 2×2 squares and it sort of blobs outwards into a bigger bubble. It’s less bottle galaxy and more puddle galaxy, and it clashes gorgeously with the other strain of blocks in this level, which are jagged little gold leaf diamonds.

Far-flung space? Deep within an atom? Whatever’s the truth, it all looks strangely delicious. Houston? We have a tasty problem. It’s like a chocolate advert out there. I can just imagine ripping the foil off those diamonds to reveal the chocolate melting within, and then dipping them in the syruppy quantum goo from those puddle galaxies. It would be irradiating, sure, but it would be such a sweet way to go. The whole level feels like a black forest gateaux baked by Nasa’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory.