Before even getting into the thick of things I have something to confess, and that’s the fact that I’m simply not a fan of puzzle games that fall into the “box pusher” category. It doesn’t help that it’s among one of the oldest types of puzzlers I remember playing, and that their abundance on the eShop is staggering. I've just found that without radically new ideas being introduced, to try to make something more of them, that they quickly just feel like more of the same. With that said, on to Pixel Boy 2.

What you’ll pretty well immediately feel, assuming you haven’t just finished the original Pixel Boy, is a bit of a sense of whiplash. On the first level of the game, without any tutorials or instructions, you have some spikes present, torches that will apparently catch you on fire, a few different boxes, and a few different marked tiles. Nothing is clearly conveying what you’ll need to put where, or how anything works. Now, to be clear, you are able to complete the stage, likely without even taking much time, but it feels like bad form to someone who spends a lot of time playing and thinking about these sorts of things. Then, the second stage ends up being a bit of a marathon, where you’ll need to work out a pretty complex route, leaving a box in place to come at it from another direction to then push a bit further, and the solution is quite a long and painful route.

Exacerbating my issues with the lack of any warm-up, tutorial, or even simple instruction is then the lack of an undo option… and this would be an issue even if someone was up to speed. What this does is trap you into making no mistakes, and among its brethren this is actually unusual and for good reason. The second stage perfectly points out the issue. If you overstep a space you’ll need to start over. If you didn’t perfectly map out your route you’ll need to start over. Throw in the fact that with some elements like what appear to be steps there aren’t great visual cues for where you’re able to go, or what may be a barrier for a box, but not for you. Being able to move sideways off of what looked like a long stairwell in the middle of it wasn’t something I would have assumed was possible, and I only discovered it by accident, and yet that was crucial to my success.

I understand the desire to make a challenging game, and to some extent I even understand making a sequel that essentially picks up where the last one left off. That doesn’t excuse you from putting in the effort to serve everyone playing the title to the best of your ability. It would take little effort to introduce simple concepts, just a screen or two that could even be optional. I suppose the pain here could be alleviated by starting with the original game, in the hopes some simple instruction would have been introduced initially or over time, but as it stands this follow-up feels like it will only be enjoyed by a narrow crowd who played and loved the original.