Pipe Mania doesn’t refer to a new kind of drug epidemic or burgeoning fad that has hipsters accessorizing with corncob pipes. It’s a classic puzzle game, first developed 20 years ago for the Amiga, and recently released for the Mac and iPhone by Virtual Programming. But even now, it’s got druglike addictiveness plus retro cool.
In each of Pipe Mania’s 70-odd boards, you lay pipe pieces on a grid to complete a pipe from the start point to the end point. After a head start, a bright liquid called Flooze emerges from the start point and flows along your pipe, so it better all be in place or the Flooze will leak and you’ll lose the level. Special pipe pieces, obstacles on the grids, tunnels, and even “hand of god” attacks make things more difficult as you progress. For such a seemingly simple game, Pipe Mania is hard. It starts being a major challenge about 7 or 8 levels in and never lets up.
Pipe Mania's addictive puzzles are way more fun than real-life plumbing.
Completing a level awards you points for how many pipe pieces you used versus how many you wasted, plus bonuses. Then you get a medal based on your score. And that’s it--but it was enough to compel us to replay almost every level looking for the elusive gold medal. You have to unlock the levels as you go, but you can skip around a little bit, thankfully, if one level is giving you major frustrations.
The old-school graphics look good on any Mac, with cartoony 2D pieces on brightly colored backgrounds. The sing-songy music can get a little irritating, but when it changed urgency before disaster struck, we really felt the tension.
Co-op and versus modes let another player get in on the action, one person on the mouse and another on the keyboard. There are also treasures to unlock, detailed game statistics, and bonus single-player modes after you’ve beaten the World mode. It’s enough to keep anyone playing for days.
Classic puzzle game. Two-player co-op and versus modes. 70-plus levels. Rated for ages 3 and up. Universal binary.
No way to ramp the difficulty up or down.
