Hour after sleepless hour, the clock ticks on as I connect series of elements, treasures and experience stars to cast my attacks against my enemies. Finally all vanquished, there are no unexplored lands. I could return to my real life, see my kids, take a shower. Though defeated, there was still some repeat gameplay. Even playing around with some of the other characters, the lands of Selentia fell quiet. War was over. Now a plague has befallen the land in Puzzle Quest: Revenge of the Plague Lord. New quests, spells, characters and weapons are yours to use and explore. My wife and kids didn't need to see me for a few days anyway.

It is a very hard thing to pick or point out any big differences in a campaign expansion, visually. Nothing looks any different on a grand scale. There are new avatars to accompany the new monsters and final boss. Otherwise, it is the same great game with a new minty flavor. OK, hold the minty flavor. I was surprised that each of the new classes only had two portraits compared to four of each profession on the original.

This is the one area where I really wish they would have added something new. It is not that the music was bad, and it varied a little throughout the course of a game, so it wasn't monotonous. But, after hours of playing you need to hear something, anything, different.

Puzzle Quest: Revenge of the Plague Lord has a beautiful and seamless integration into the Puzzle Quest universe. Players who are new to the game are not going to even notice where and how it has come into the game. If it has been some time since you last played, even you may find yourself a little unsure of where this new land fits in. I made the effort to log into the original prior to downloading so that I could tell. The first and most obvious confirmation that you have the expansion is when, and if, you start a new player. Their are four new professions. They are Bard, Warlock, Ranger, and Rogue.

The Bards concentrate on yellow mana. With it you can use the new spell Inspire that adds +1 to all skills for the rest of the battle and adds another +1 for each 10 yellow mana, taking two turns to recharge. But there is no limit to how many times you can buff. Also, there is Performance, which destroys all gold coins in play and adds one yellow mana for each. Lastly, there is Song of Fear which inflicts fear on your enemy for 5 turns, plus one turn for every 5 yellow mana. The Ranger uses green mana.

Masters of the bow use archery spells like Wild Hunt that destroys all purple stars and adds +1 to battle skill for the duration of the fight for each three stars destroyed. My favorite spell name is Snipe which does 4 points of damage to the enemy, plus one for every 8 green mana.

The Rogue uses blue mana to perform their attacks. Their spells seem to center around gold with spells like Pick Pocket, which steals 20 of the enemy's gold and gives it to you, along with 1 xp per gold. And what would a thief or rogue be without a disguise that turns any one gem type (including skulls and gold) into blue gems?

Finally, our Warlock whose spells drain enemy mana such as Ice Bolt that deals four pts. of damage for every 8 blue mana. And, corruption that turns the tables by transferring all of your debuffs onto your enemy.

New spells, new characters, higher levels, and new lands. What could be cooler? How about a Pegasus you can capture. It is a welcome addition to the game, and well worth its more hefty expansion price on LIVE of $8.75.

Puzzle Quest: Revenge of the Plague Lord continues its perfect and seamless integration into the world through its difficulty. The balance of the characters was very exciting, technically. You could not just jump into the missions if you were a new or low level player, so it actually gave you something to work towards. But it also wasn't necessary to be a perfect level 50 player to get into the material. You would think it would be impossible to strike the kind of balance that challenged the upper levels, but wasn't so elite that you couldn't get into it with a mid-ranged character. Yet, they were able to implement a very good balance and make it accessible to many. This was a major feat, and they made it look easy. The MMO world would give their left arm to achieve this balance.

For those of you who have never had a chance to walk through Selentia, it is a simple game. All battle is done through the puzzle. You align pieces into groups of at least three, and then you receive the effect of those pieces. Lining up the multi-colored mana pieces adds them to your character. This mana is saved for use in magic spells and physical attacks you perform on your opponent. All you need to do is move the mana piece one space in any of the four directions so that it lines up with at least two other pieces of the same type. The same is true with the skulls, stars, and gold. The skulls give you an instant strike at your opponent. The gold adds to the reward you will receive when you defeat your opponent. The stars add to your experience. To select the piece, you will move the cursor with the left thumbstick over it, and then select it with (A). Now you simply move your left thumbstick in one of the four directions you wish move. Moving along the map works the same way. Move your cursor with the left thumbstick, over the city you wish to travel to, and press (A) and your character will take that path to get there. No wandering around aimlessly.

Soon I will have to return to the real world, and make sure that my kids don't think I am dead. I know that the attention of the development team is turning to their next project, Puzzle Quest: Galactrix, but I want to thank them for this little nugget of goodness. My real hope is that this original game doesn't get left behind in the company's future plans. I have no doubt the new game will be every bit as demanding of my time and the sacrifice of my personal life. Maybe even enough to make me forget my wishes for a continuation of the original game, but only time will tell.

The sun will be up soon. Plague Tasters and Plague Witches will probably show up somewhere in my dreams at one point or another before I wake up again. I half-heartedly came back to this game to try a different profession. Now with the new professions and the distinct way each profession plays, I will no doubt be making many returns to this game. There are a few more achievements to work on and up. OK, just one more monster then I have to go to bed, seriously! Of course, I have been saying that for a day or so now.