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Many people play video games in search of the “flow” experience that near-mystical experience where you forget yourself, where you and the game become one and your flawless performance seems to come from somewhere deep inside you. Some find it in Defender, others in Centipede or Pac-Man. How wonderful it was to find it in an elegant, beautifully crafted game named Zenji. Zenji is a delight to both the senses and the mind. Its object is simple enough–to connect a grid of T, I and L shaped pieces to a central section by rotating so as to create pathways. Pieces connected to a central “source” turn green; along the path available to it; when you get to the centre of a piece, you can rotate it by holding down the joystick button and moving the joystick right or left (I tested the Atari 400/800 version).
You start with five “faces” and “lose face” (groan!) when the timer at the bottom of the screen goes to zero or when you are touched by the Spirits of Illusion (wandering adversaries that appear at higher levels) or the Flames of Desire they sometimes shoot at you. And while a delicate, oriental tune enhances game play, an urgent, concentration-breaking beep sound appears at higher levels. You score points for touching vanishing bonus pieces and for connecting all pieces to the source in the lease amount of time. Though the game seems leisurely, it is not. It is a puzzle with a time limit. The puzzle itself is exquisite because any move (rotating a piece) changes pieces across the width of the board.
With ten seconds on the clock and one piece unconnected, you may suddenly realize that several key pieces must be reoriented to provide a different set of paths that reconnect all the pieces–and when your hands make that connection on the last second while your brain stares dully in indecision, you know you’ve accomplished something. As with most videogames, you must play several rounds of Zenji before you stop feeling intimidated by it. Fortunately, the first two levels are 3-by- 4; the later levels get larger (up to 7-by-6) and faster. Your first scores will be 2,000 to 4,000 but you will soon progress to game scores of 7,000 to 10,000. My highest score so far is around 16,000, and a friend has (sigh) doubled that. This game is not for everyone. It left about half the people unimpressed, but delighted and overwhelmed the rest.
Unfortunately, there is no “pause” key for the game. For a slow learner like me, I wanted time to pause between levels (well, to study the board, actually) but I suspect the game was done this way to prevent insight into the design of successive levels. Also, on the Atari version, you cannot start the next game by hitting the fire button. You must reach over to the computer and hit the start button. Finally, I have two strategy hints to maximize your score, go for the vanishing bonus pieces as quickly as you can without risking losing a life you will never get high scores by completing levels alone. Second, one way to survive the dangerous “illusion” adversaries on the higher levels is to quickly isolate at least one of them in an unconnected corner of the board.
Done correctly, you can interconnect most of the board, then, by turning a key piece, connect the remaining portion and thus end the level before the adversary can touch you. If you like geometric puzzles and games like Othello, you should like Zenji It is a potential classic and gives exceptional value for the money.
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