Tubes Download (1993 Puzzle Game)

Tubes is a shareware color matching puzzle game. The main screen shows a series of overlapping transparent tubes climbing from the bottom and curving at the top towards the center. Colored balls, or elements as the game calls them, travel through these tubes to their exit holes.

The objective is to catch the falling spheres with a test tube, moving it sideways underneath the tubes exits with the mouse, keyboard or joystick. The test tube can hold up to five elements. The player has to press a button and drop the elements inside a beaker at the bottom, aligning them vertically, horizontally or diagonally by three or more of the same color. Every level has a number of drops allowed, and when the player fails to catch too many elements the game is over.

Besides the elements, special balls also appear randomly inside the tubes that help or hinder the player. The multicolored element acts as a wildcard, and can be matched with any color. The F element removes space inside the test tube. The M element fills the test tube with assorted balls. The C element creates a gray ball that can't be matched.

The game comes with two modes. In endurance mode, the goal is to make as many points as possible, by making matches until all the allowed drops are spent. In wave mode, each level (or "wave") has objectives, like making a specific type of match, that must be completed before finishing and moving to the next one.

In this game there is a scientist, and all his particles have gone astray. You have to help him clean them up by putting them into test tubes. There are two modes you can play in (endurance or wave) and there are also difficulty levels.

Basically there are 6 tubes, and the particles come down them, and you can't let them fall out the ends (aka drop)! You only get so many drops, and as you progress up through the levels it gets harder. You have this test tube on a slider and you have to catch the particle when it comes out of the tube by sliding across. You then empty one particle at a time from the test tube into the beaker below. You can hold up to 5 particles in the test tube so you can be strategic with how you empty them, as when you get three of one colour on top of each other in the beaker they disappear and you get points (sound like some sort Tetris kinda?)

Sounds easy huh? Well that's not all you see, there are other particles in amongst them and they have different tricks. Some are helpful and empty the test tube, whilst some are evil and turn the ones already in there to lead.

I always thought the graphics were really good for this game. It had an interesting beginning and was always pleasant to look at. The gameplay is excellent, it's a really fun and challenging puzzle game. Tubes is a great game when it comes to taking a puzzle game and approaching it from a great angle. Many games are straightforward and have no theme. Tubes is also really hard to quit. It's also quite rare and overlooked, so the more people out there who give it a shot and spread the word the better. Download it!

Fun puzzlegame where you have to collect balls of the same color. When you've got 3 in a row the balls will disappear. You can collect the balls in a sort of tube, then deposit them where you want. You also can control the incoming tubes, by pressing Alt under the right tube, then all balls in that tube will come faster then balls in other tubes.

How to run this game on modern Windows PC?

People who downloaded Tubes have also downloaded:
Troddlers, Cartoon, Freespace 2, Tamarin, Diam