Luxor Evolved

The objective of Luxor Evolved is similar to other marble-popping matching games such as PopCap Games's Zuma.[1] Typical of the Luxor series, each stage includes a series of scarabs pushing a line of marbles along a path toward an open pyramid. The player must rescue the marbles, using a marble-launching "winged scarab" which moves across the bottom of the screen, by matching a chain of three or more of the same color marbles, or by using various power-ups, which are dispensed randomly when the marbles are rescued. If any marble completely enters the holes, the player loses a life.

Luxor Evolved is a video game that presents several noteworthy changes to its gameplay mechanics and style. In contrast to its predecessors, Luxor Evolved boasts a significantly faster pace of play. One significant change includes reversed chains of marbles that leave some behind when the player loses a life. Additionally, the game has implemented new survival stages where losing a life will result in immediate termination of the stage. Power-ups are unlocked and upgraded by achieving a minimum high score or by defeating a boss. The game also features "super power-ups" that are unlocked by conquering the first, third, and sixth bosses. Once a super power-up has been unlocked, emblems will appear periodically, and filling up the corresponding meter will activate the power-up automatically. Alternatively, a super power-up can be activated by shooting six shards that will create a gap among the spheres.

The graphics of Evolved are reminiscent of vector graphics commonly used in video games of the late 70s and early 80s.

Luxor Evolved includes multiple different types of stages: classic, survival, bonus, secret, and boss. Many levels from previous Luxor games but are instead mirrored or rearranged. If the player outlasts the timer on a survival stage, they are rewarded with a bonus stage where they must clear all the marbles using a certain power-up, these are not special stages; those are different. The player is faced with a boss stage when they complete a group of stages, the boss that they must destroy being a giant robot named after an ancient Egyptian god, such as "Mecha-Sekhmet" or "Mecha-Horus". During stages if the player collects enough falling treasures, they will immediately unlock a secret stage which they can beat along with the normal stages. The player is informed on the amount of gold to collect in between stages. The spheres are shaped as octagons, with shapes inside the octagons being: a blue 5-shaped star, a red hexagon, a green square, a yellow triangle, a purple triangle, a white 4-shaped star, a black star (shown as pink in-game), a turquoise plus, or an orange plus.

Evolved features references to numerous video game tropes of its time. All of the secret stages pay homage to classic arcade games such as Asteroids and Pac-Man. The pause menu features a Qix that flies across the menu screen. The game's ending sequence is a simulation of a kill screen and error handler, "rebooting" into a playable credit roll thereafter and acting as a final bonus stage that awards points for successful completion. From there a tally of the player's total game stats are shown such as total shots, misses, max chains, and treasures recovered.