Calcolo refers to itself as “Ochimono Shooting” (“Falling Object Shooting”). The closest point of comparison is ADK’s Twinkle Star Sprites, but while that was a shoot-em-up with some puzzle elements, this is more of a puzzle game a la Puyo Puyo with some vague shoot-em-up influence.
You control a flying character over your side of the playing field, able to shoot in four directions using the PlayStation face buttons. Numbered balls will fall from the top of the screen, as typical for most of these types of puzzle games. The Triangle button shoots upward, which will destroy the ball and send it onto your opponent’s playing field as a solid block, potentially messing up their combos. However, trying to overwhelm your opponent like this is horribly inefficient. The other controller buttons will shoot to the left, right, and downward, knocking any falling balls in that direction. By matching the numbered orbs together, you’ll clear them from the playing field, sending them to your opponent’s side and increasing your special attack meter. When it’s fully charged, you can execute one of these super moves, which can disable your opponent by freezing their character or reversing their controls, or help you out by clearing parts of your field. When a character’s side is overwhelmed and the orbs reach the top of the screen, they lose. You can pick from several different wacky characters, including a succubus jester named Typhoon (who also appears on the cover), a crocodile pirate named Largo, a grim reaper named Lafarl, and snowboarding penguin named Eeny.
Even though it’s pretty unique as far as falling puzzle games go, Calcolo is just kind of boring. The default falling block speed is extremely slow, and you’ll likely be speeding them manually just to keep up the pace. Since your character floats right through the balls and can’t be harmed, they feel more like targeting cursors. The special attack meter builds up slowly, and they rarely seem powerful enough to turn the tides of battle unless you store them up and use them back-to-back. The speed does increase the longer you play, which is ultimately where most battles are decided, but it takes a few minutes to reach that point.
Calcolo is one of the only games by Clef, the other being the Saturn quiz game Brain Battle Q.
