The Panel de Pon series, perhaps the indie darling of the puzzle game genre, has been through an interesting journey outside of Japan. Even when packaged with a group of other puzzle games in a collection, popped in with classic Dr. Mario on Gameboy Advance, called Tetris Attack, or branded with Pokemon, the series has never sold terribly well. The latest in the series, Planet Puzzle League on Nintendo DS, is giving it another chance by being branded with the ever popular “Touch! Generations” label, under which games like Nintendogs and Brain Age have thrived. Puzzle League likely isn’t going to make the same kind of impact those games have, but it’s very possible that casual and non-gamers will really enjoy it, alongside the gamers that have for years.

You play Planet Puzzle League by holding the DS notebook-style (turned at a ninety degree angle), like Hotel Dusk: Room 215 or Brain Age. Once you get over the original “what?” of holding your handheld sideways, it’s much more comfortable and easy to hold than the traditional position. Once you’re completely comfortable with it, you’ll wish that every DS game controlled only by the touch screen was set up this way. And the touch screen controls really are wonderful. Planet Puzzle League, unlike Kirby Canvas Curse or Elite Beat Agents, isn’t an example of a game you could only play with a touch pad, but it is an example of a game which is just improved by it. Sliding blocks to and fro and not having to wait for your cursor to scroll all the way across the screen when you need it to makes Planet Puzzle League easily the most playable game in the series to date.

From a presentation standpoint, this game is quite similar Nintendo’s 2005 line of Gameboy Advance games, Bit Generations. The menus are simple and easy to navigate, the visuals are very clean without being bland, and the music ranges from techno to jazz to pop rock. It’s all so seamless and beautiful that you might not even notice it at first, but when you do you’ll be grooving to the music and enjoying the background graphics during every tiny break you get from attacking your DS with your stylus. It almost looks and sounds like it’s from the future.

Planet Puzzle League is the kind of game you would feel comfortable spending your last dollars as a gamer on. The wireless and online multiplayer modes are infinitely replayable, expect to waste away entire nights with your friends screaming “how do you like me now?” and “five times combo, bitch!” The single player is also a time sink, with the classic endless, puzzle, and versus AI modes most puzzle games have. New players to the series will start off playing the game like Bejeweled, just lining up three tiles over and over to stay alive, but after a few short hours they’ll be seeing four or five moves ahead and lining up five tiles in a row like it’s nothing. The learning curve is definitely there, and it’s not too steep, but the game can certain be enjoyed at different levels.

This is the best version of the best multiplayer, and one of the best single player, puzzle games released to this date. Veterans of the genre, new to Panel de Pon or not, will rank Planet Puzzle League among the best puzzle games on DS, alongside Meteos and Tetris DS. It’s pure gameplay - you’ll be playing it until you try to line up windows on a building and see it on the inside of your eyelids when you’re trying to go to sleep at night.