2026-08-07 · retro-review
Klax (1990) — The Idea of "Matching Three" Was Invented Twice
In February 1990, Atari Games released Klax to North American arcades: catch colored tiles sliding down a conveyor and clear them by lining up three or more, horizontally, vertically, or diagonally. Born right after Atari's Tetris lawsuit, it is often cited as the origin of the match-three genre. But in 2020, Bejeweled co-creator Jason Kapalka himself described a lineage that never passes through Klax. This piece traces a case where the same idea was invented twice, independently, using the developers' own words.
