Gimmick!

The 10th of May, 2025

Gimmick is a game by much-beloved 8-bit legends Sunsoft that is oft overlooked. It’s really a shame that so many people sleep on Gimmick, but it’s fully understandable why they do. Firstly, the game was functionally exclusive to Japan and released in very limited numbers. There was a Scandinavian release as well, however, printed in even fewer numbers and all the woes of playing 8-bit PAL games are obviously present. Since it was released in 1992, it was also a very late Famicom title. I would say this is the first roadblock to people playing this game, but there is actually more! Gimmick is hard! I don’t say this lightly, I mean this game is very much seriously actually for real hard; even more so than contemporary hard games such as Dark Souls or Elden Ring. Gimmick is easily the hardest game I’ve ever beaten, it’s about 30 minutes long but it took me about 11 hours to complete it. It’s not really a surprise as to why this game is obscure these days.

However, there is hope. A high-quality faithful port of Gimmick was brought to PC, Xbox, Playstation, and Nintendo Switch! Look at that! One of the main deterrents to playing Gimmick was just eliminated! They also went in and added save states and a rewind function so you can play it without much difficulty!

But you said faithful…

That I did, dear reader, and faithful it is.

To unlock achievements, you have to play in Serious mode, which is the OG Famicom version 1:1 with no saving or save states and only 2 lives!

You’d have to be nuts to do that, right?

I actually did it. I played the first level so many times I can just fly through it now!

While you will be repeating the same levels over and over again in this game, it’s very enjoyable. Firstly, the game is just super fun, but Gimmick has one of the best soundtracks in gaming, full stop! The OST is a total treat with the Sunsoft extra channels you know and love. The composer for this game said that he worked as hard as possible on the OST for Gimmick because he wanted to enrich the lives of the children playing it. Some of the tracks on here just go unreal hard. Gimmick also has lovely graphics. This is easily one of the best-looking games graphically on Famicom. Coupled with the next-level OST and the physics of the gameplay, this game was extremely forward-thinking. It’s kind of hard to imagine this came out in 1992. I played this game on my Steam Deck and it was soo enjoyable!

I think you should play Gimmick as well! If the challenge of the game seems too much for you, there is an easy mode built in that is also enjoyable to play. If you are a real sadist, you can play it on Serious mode with no saving and get the achievements like yours truly!