Thursday, September 18, 2025

Jigoku Meguri for PCE


Image: MobyGames

Jigoku Meguri

Gimmick meets Ghouls n Ghosts


Genre: action - gun

Publisher: Taito

Year: 1990

System: PCE


Gameplay Score: 3

Gameplay Notes:

Plays like Ghouls n Ghosts, with the bouncing ball weapon of Gimmick. Very slow movement means you need to kill enemies off screen whenever possible. Just mash and walk to the right. You can collect and upgrade three different weapons. Pickups appear everywhere but only score points. Other than the slow movement I actually really enjoyed this little game. It's quite simple but I played it all the way through. It's fiendishly difficult, since everything is a one hit kill, and the controls aren't perfect, but fans of run n gun platformers may enjoy it


Level Design Score: 4

Level Design Notes:

At first I hated the level design since there's so little platforming. Then I got to stage 5 and regretted asking for platforming at all. This game clearly understands its limitations and plans accordinglyz rewarding careful progression and tactical decision making.


Theme Score: 3

Theme Notes:

Generic Japanese folk horror setting. No story or cutscenes that I could find, just some Japanese text between stages.


Art Style Score: 2

Art Style Notes:

It's cute but 8-bit quality. A few stages have some horrifying backgrounds but most have little to no detail. There are only a handful of enemy sprites so no much to look at. No parallel or other effects. The only visual treat are the death animations which are surprisingly good, especially the lava drowning animation.


Audio Score: 2

Audio Notes:

I like a couple of the traditional Japanese songs, but they all look quickly and several have an annoying sound thrown in to distract you. Hate the sounds effects too.


Overall Score: 61

Review ID: 8068



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