Primrose: subversive puzzle game by indie legend Jason Rohrer

There were a few elements here that I haven't seen in other block puzzle games: playing it through, a few things struck me as very unique.

First off, the nature of the gameplay is inherently submissive. That means that rather than trying to destroy things, you change them. Unlike most puzzle games, where the goal is to clear the way, in this one you can't just clear things. You're also converting everything around you.

It's also different in that it doesn't force you to speed. In some ways it's tactical, only the pieces are random, so your careful thought can't extend too far. The closest thing I can think to compare it to is Solitaire, where you don't know what's coming up in the deck but by taking your time, you can do slightly better.

The real subversive thing is how the game ends: once all you have left is grey, you're essentially in an endgame where you can't help but lose. That was unexpected, the first time I played, and it strikes me as a bit existentialist - fascinating for me because I never thought of gameplay mechanics as at all philosophical, but this one showed me that it's possible even with a block puzzle game. That also makes the game a bit calmer, and it adds an inherent limit to how long the game goes on for. That in turn favors the slower, calmer players, since you can't get a high score without being clever in how you play.

I don't know if I'd have noticed all that without playing Rohrer's game Passage first, but after playing Passage some of these things stand out in pretty sharp relief.

There's also a fascinating Rohrer interview about it, here: http://wireless.ign.com/articles/956/956026p1.html