Umihara Kawase Shun

The sounds of Umihara Kawase Shun are that of a children's cartoon, evoking a rose-tinted playfulness. Its clip-art visuals build upon this childishness, with the disjointness of its assets suggesting a youthful haphazardness. However, these are all a play to obfuscate the calculated villainy its architects endowed it with. I have few desires in life that are not now overshadowed by my urge to punt Umihara a distance exceeding that of numerous football pitches.

Umihara Kawase Shun’s main and only mechanic is a fishing hook. But this is one versatile fishing hook. Frankly, they just do not make mechanics like this anymore (and I can't really blame whomever *they* are). Its learning curve is at least 80 degrees steep, and its skill ceiling is unfathomable; the physics governing this damn fishing rod are inconceivable to anyone without at least some academic experience in the field. This tool is absurdly unwieldy, but when you finally nail that one bastard segment, it does indeed feel incredible. It is an experience akin to taming a wild beast, and I have never had that from a game before. The game design is untraditional, if I’m cushioning my words, but it gave me a completely new experience. Each day there are fewer and fewer games for which I can say that.

Its design is crude and hostile, but the jovial aesthetic and novelty of its movement are just rewarding enough to shocking leverage said design to its benefit.Its multiple path mechanic never pays off, the bosses are so absurdly obtuse, and if you run out of lives you have to start the game, but when I look back at my time with Umihara Kawase’s evil little game I see a pretty brilliant platformer. Perhaps, a platformer for sick, vile, freaks, but a brilliant one nonetheless.

Suffering

if any modders out there wanna make a mod that removes floor 12 from the game i will be forever indebted

Brilliant game. Highly recommend.

DS version lowkey better, you get a map on the bottom screen and you can continue after losing all your lives.
Oh yeah did I mention this game has LIVES.
You GAME OVER in this version like a damn CAVEMAN made this port.

Reportedly it checkpoints you after a boss battle to restart there after your game overs but the first boss is such a difficulty and knowledge spike, while we're at it listen up buddy, that big tadpole? You see that island on the right? Do not go on that island, simply stall out the tadpole and a ladder will reveal itself, intuitive right?

Anyways good game, pretty fun, cool that they made it English.

Like the first game but better in like every way, saying that I do wish there was something that really make a distinction in terms of like a new mechanic. I read that this was supposed to have like a wall kick move or something and that would have been really cool. I don't know, wanted like that extra step to really distinct itself besides the better visuals and tuned up gameplay. Still a great game though