Gimmick! 2

Back in 1992 Gimmick was released for the Famicom in Japan. They story was simple: a small green yōkai named Yumetaro was accidentally gifted to a young girl. After the girl was taken to another dimension by her toys that had come to life, Yumetaro goes after her in an attempt to save her. While the story was simple, the game was not and is considered to be one of the more difficult games the Famicom had to offer. While we never had an official release of the original game in the U.S. (a remastered version was released in 2023), a sequel was announced this past June 20^th 2024 and not even three months later, Gimmick 2 arrived. Is Gimmick 2 as fun or, more importantly, as difficult as the original? 

To better understand Gimmick 2, I’ll briefly explain how the original game worked. The primary mechanic of Gimmick is the ability to create a star and throw it at enemies, or you can bounce it against the floor and walls, hop on it, and ride it. This allowed you to get to higher locations and find the occasional secret. It sounds simple but takes a lot of practice and skill to master, and master it you must if you wish to succeed because, as stated, the original Gimmick was one of the more brutal Famicom games despite its cute appearance, bright colors, and amazing soundtrack. So what about the sequel? Is Gimmick 2 as brutal as the original? Thankfully it’s not.

The story of Gimmick 2 is basically a repeat of the original, except instead of the toys taking the girl to another dimension that Yumetaro has to then go into and save her, the girl has grown up and it’s her daughter who gets taken. The primary mechanic remains the stars that Yumetaro can make and throw around to defeat enemies, traverse the land, and solve puzzles with. You can only have one star on screen at a time which will come into play quite a bit, especially with the puzzles you’ll come across. In short, Gimmick 2 works pretty much the same way as the original, but the difficulty has been turned down a bit.

For starters, there are no lives. Each of Gimmick 2’s six levels has many checkpoints and auto-save locations throughout, as well as four fast-travel points that you can jump between when you find them. For an easier time you can also choose from two difficulties, with the main difference being the amount of hit points you have, and that difficulty can be changed at any time. When you first begin, you may notice the first stage isn’t all that long, especially if you’re not actively looking for any secrets. Don’t let that make you think this will be a short game, because the stages do get longer as your progress, and later stages also require you to become more proficient at using the star to get around. Sure you won’t necessarily need to ride on it, but you’ll have to master throwing the star off walls, the floor, and at different angles, as well all of that while moving, by around the third level. That was about the time that I realized this game means business.

While you’re busy throwing stars and warding off little black blobs and other oddly adorable enemies, you’ll be doing it all in some colorful worlds that look really nice. I don’t need a game to have realistic high-def graphics to enjoy it and the aesthetics of Gimmick 2 work great for the type of game it is. On top of that, the music is very enjoyable to listen to and matches the aesthetics of whatever level you’re in. If you do happen to enjoy the music, that’s great as you will be listening to the same songs repeatedly because you will die over and over again, especially if you plan to seek out all of the secret chests.

I’ve mentioned these chests a few times now, so what exactly are they? To be honest, nothing Earth-shattering. Each area has a certain number of chests you can find and you can hit pause to see how many chests are in each section. Now you know the reason for those fast-travel stations; they’re so you can go back and forth through a level quickly to hunt down any chests. The chests themselves contain various aesthetic options you can use for Yumetaro such as changing his color, some accessories he can wear, and even the color of the star he throws.

There is a catch though. While the chests aren’t required to finish the game, especially since they just contain appearance-related items, finding all of them is required to get the best ending, which is a nice nod to the original game. Now you know where a lot of time will be sunk into with Gimmick 2, because if you want the best ending, you’ll have to search every nook and cranny for each chest, and some are pretty difficult to find. I started my playthrough trying to find every chest and I did for the first level. For level two, I found a decent amount of them, but then after getting through the first two sections I noticed I had missed several, and I was doing my best at keeping an eye out for secret areas. That was when I realized if I wanted to get this review written in a timely manner, I might want to just focus on completing the stages and avoid looking for chests unless they were in obvious to spot locations.

The best way to sum up my time with Gimmick 2 is deceptively cute with a fair learning curve that’s more accessible than the original. I never finished the original game, let alone getting the best ending, but I jumped at the chance to check out the sequel and I don’t regret it one bit. At first glance, six levels might not seem like that much for a twenty-five dollar game, but as the stages begin to increase in length and each one having more and more chests to find, this is not a game that you’ll be able to finish quickly, even more so if you haven’t mastered using the Star. If you want a game that looks adorable and plays the opposite without kicking your rear too much, Gimmick 2 is definitely a sequel that was worth waiting for.