pushmo was a series that at the start of last decade was pushed very heavily by nintendo, showing up on both wii-u and 3DS in a bunch of games, both free to play and premium, he really seemed like a potential new hit for the company, he's adorable, a cute chibi sumo friend, and his games have super fun puzzles, the aim of each stage, weather abstract or a mural, is to free people that are trapped by pulling and pushing blocks in order to climb up and free them, it's simple but it leaves a lot of room for very fun puzzles.

now back to the vibes, they're perfect, the game has that sega-blue skies aesthetic down to a tee, jeffry's stage just has it in spades, my favourite by far, from the coconut trees that react to your hits to the little gazeebo on the hill, 10/10 stage, kage's stage too is great, a little forrest temple surrounded by trees, peaceful and nice and not to forget about my other favourite stage, shun's raft, this one i could just watch for hours, it's so pretty and it has the funniest ring outs, shoutout's to wolf's mountain too, very pretty and colourful. the music adds to this massively, shun's theme and sarah's theme being major standouts, it's all very memorable and some of sega's best at the time, though not quite on the level of the likes of daytona or gale racer, there's a little too much rock for me, but it's a banger ost all around, very listenable, the few more chill tracks have absolutely made it into my playlists.

gameplay wise the game is very simple for its time, very few moves, many of which are shared, no supers or meters beyond health, it reminds me a lot of street fighter 2 or bushido blade, simple but with a lot of death and much like bushido blade, a very quick time to kill. you can be taken out in 2 to 3 hits by characters like jackey or jeffrey it almost feels busted, especially in the arcade version where the AI can read your hits and it makes those characters feel very unbalanced, but you can generally beat the game with everyone, i tend to stick to sarah and jeffrey myself. in general i do not reccomend the arcade version, even the one inside of yakuza kiwami 2, it's just too difficult and i don't find it very fun, where i love the much easier sega saturn version, which even ads extra modes and a remixed OST. it has a lot of depth though and you can easily spend dozens of hours perfecting your characters, i know i did so i could beat the arcade mode with sarah.

the game had quite a few ports as i mentioned, there's the nearly perfect sega saturn port which i consider the definitive version, a ps2 sega AGEs version based on both versions with various options, as well as a PC version also based on the sega saturn version specifically, though later ports like the XBLA and yakuza versions are based on the arcade mode, and they're all brutal, though the ps360 version does have some very easy achievements. there was also a demake for the genisis which i'd love to try sometime, it seems very neat. the game had quite a legacy too, spawning sequels all of which improved on the formula i think, though 3 is considered to be a black sheep in the series, though it's saturn port was cancelled so it did not appear on the same system. it's super accessable these days and can even be played for free in various yakuza games, there's no reason not to at least give VF2 a try and see how you feel, i think you'll get some fun out of it.

index

+ main page + guestbook