Pushmo

Genre: Puzzle-Platformer / 3D Platformer

Players: 1

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Review:

Pushmo is a family-friendly Puzzle-Platformer with some mild 3D Platformer elements released on Nintendo 3DS eShop in 2011. This is the first game in the _____mo series (followed by Crashmo, Pushmo World on Wii U, and Stretchmo). In this game, players take the role of Mallo, a guy charged with getting to the top of a structure of sliding blocks to rescue a trapped child. To do so, players must push and pull the blocks in the structure to create a path they can use to get to the top.

The presentation in Pushmo uses simple, colorful 3D visuals that are appealing but nothing impressive, backed by a lighthearted soundtrack that does a good job of fitting the game’s tone. Overall, this game does enough to present a friendly exterior, placing a large part of the focus on the puzzles themselves.

The mechanics of these puzzles are simple enough. Players can slide any block up to three spaces out from the background, or slide them back in. Players can slide from the front as long as they have space behind them to walk, and they can slide from the side as long as they have two adjacent spaces to walk between as they’re pushing or pulling. Players can hop up one space or hop across small gaps, and later you’ll find things like holes with ladders that bring you from one place to another, but otherwise that’s pretty much it.

Despite this game’s extreme simplicity, the core game design is so well-crafted that it makes it easy for anyone to understand the game’s basics while also providing a lot of potential for all sorts of different puzzles, and that is potential that the game takes full advantage of, with 162 levels (plus tutorial levels), including numerous levels designed to look like pixel art of classic Nintendo characters. For the game’s $7 price tag, this is a phenomenal amount of content.

If this was all that was included in the game, it would still be one of the best Puzzle games on the Nintendo 3DS, but Pushmo goes above and beyond by offering players a custom Puzzle creator where they can create their own puzzles as well. And while this game doesn’t include any direct mechanism to send these puzzles to other Nintendo 3DS systems, players can have the game create QR codes which can be used to send these puzzles to others, or even post online.

Taking all of this into consideration, Pushmo is proof positive that you don’t need to make something complex or graphically mind-blowing to give players a truly must-have Puzzle game. In fact, Pushmo succeeds largely because it is so very accessible, it’s easy to pick up and start playing, and yet it has gameplay that’s so well-crafted that it contains plenty of depth to keep more skilled players engaged, with tons of content and the ability to create and trade your own… all packed in a wonderfully inexpensive $7 package. If you own a Nintendo 3DS and enjoy Puzzle games, you should absolutely get this game.

tl;dr – Pushmo is a family-friendly Puzzle Platformer with light 3D Platformer elements that has players pushing and pulling blocks to climb a structure. This game has a simple concept and is extremely accessible, yet the gameplay hides a lot of potential depth, with a ton of content for the small $7 price tag, including a level builder. Puzzle fans should absolutely consider this a must-have, and snatch this game up quickly before the eShop closes in March 2023.

Grade: A

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