Pushmo

Pushmo was always on my radar as an interesting Eshop title, but I ultimately ended up getting both of its 3DS sequels and never actually Pushmo itself. The closure of the Eshop pushed me to finally play it, and like its successors, it's a great mix of puzzles and platforming. I like to think that Pushmo is someone's answer to the question of what would happen if a simple puzzle was made to be the size of a house? Instead of solving these brainteasers with a pencil or a stylus, our protagonist Mallo must push, pull, and climb blocks using his own raw strength. What results is a cute puzzle game that stands out in a genre mostly known for purely logical, flat experiences.

Pushmo tells you right away that it isn't going to be like those other guys. Instead of a simple tutorial,  it treats players to a little story that establishes the importance of Mallo solving every puzzle. The puzzles in question are explained to be a type of theme park attraction that little children enjoy playing on, but a lonely and misunderstood little boy took out his anger on the world by trapping kids in every single one of them. Mallo's responsibility is to rescue each of these kids by opening the part of the attraction they are trapped in and pulling them out. It's this challenge that makes up the whole of Pushmo's gameplay.

Presented with a giant statue made out of colored blocks, you'll need to figure out how to pull the blocks out to create platforms for Mallo to jump between in order to reach the goal and save the trapped child. Blocks are always one solid color and are never adjacent to blocks of the same color, so it is always easy to tell what is connected to what. Blocks can be pulled towards the screen one level at a time and up to three levels deep. You can pull and push from the front or the sides, but only so long as Mallo has footing, which can be a real limiting factor once you are higher up in the statues. Mallo himself can only jump up one level at a time, but he can leap across small horizontal gaps as long as the landing point is at or below the height of his starting position. There are a couple more gimmicks that add to the complexity of each of the puzzles, but the concept is generally the same the whole time.

I really had a lot of fun with Pushmo for the first few sets of puzzles. There was a surprising amount of variety in the structures (some are abstract challenges, others are murals, etc.), and the unique premise kept me engaged for a good while. It's still a puzzle game though, and I have a problem with actually finishing puzzle games. Every so often, I'll manage to solve every puzzle, but most of the time the repetition gets to be too much, and I just start daydreaming about the rest of my backlog. That same thing happened here a little while after I broke the 150 puzzle mark, and I ended up shelving the game unfinished. Thankfully, the developers accounted for players like me and wrapped up the story before then, so I felt like I was allowed to move on.

Pushmo is a sleeper Nintendo hit I never would've expected. It's such a unique approach to an otherwise largely cut-and-dry genre, and the cute aesthetic definitely doesn't hurt. It's a shame that the whole series is locked away right now, but it's definitely something that could be translated to the Switch without compromise, so hopefully, we'll see some love for Mallo and the gang in the future. At least I have the other 3DS entries waiting for me if I get the itch to play some more, but I'm optimistic that this isn't the end for our little red-clad sumo or his favorite theme park.

Although the game is no longer being distributed, you can learn more about it here (as of 9/5/23): https://www.nintendolife.com/features/countdown-3ds-eshop-spotlight-pushmo-pullblox

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