A long time ago, there was a little game company known as Game Freak, who around this time hadn’t really done anything too noteworthy in the industry. Sure, later down the road, they would make some absolute, guaranteed everybody-knows-them-by-heart hits, like HarmoKnight, Drill Dozer, and Tembo the Badass Elephant, but around this time, they made much smaller and more simple games, such as original titles like Mendel Palace, or even games based on already established franchises like Yoshi for the NES and Mario & Wario. All of these games were good in their own way (I assume anyway, because who the fuck actually played Mendel Palace), but none of them would be anything that most would consider to be spectacular, able to stand on their own and be beloved by many to this day. That would all change though when they would go onto making one game, one game that would launch them into a string of successes that are still going on to this very day, and this game would simply be known as…………. Pulseman.

For a good while now, I have been very curious about checking out some of Game Freak’s lesser-known titles, because I hadn’t really played that many of them. I have obviously played Yoshi, as you can see here, and I also played this other thing of theirs called Pokemon, but you probably don’t care too much about that, which wouldn’t be surprising, since clearly nobody knows what that game is, but aside from those two, I haven’t checked out anything else they have made. Pulseman is one that I have had my eye on for quite some time, not only because I love the design of Pulseman himself, but also because it looked like a lot of fun from the brief bits and pieces that I have seen of it. Not to mention, it was only released for us Americans through the Sega Channel, and as we all know, all of the best games were locked behind that service. So, I finally decided to try it out, and yeah, I did end up having a pretty great time with it, with the game managing to keep things fun and engaging pretty much all the way through, even if there were several issues that did pop up from time to time, although none of that stopped me from enjoying myself.

The story is……… quite something, to say the least, where the world is thrown into chaos by the evil Doc Waruyama and his Galaxy Gang, so it is up to Pulseman to set out to stop this mad man from getting away with his evil deeds, which isn’t really all that creative or interesting, but the weird and stupid stuff comes in when you learn about how Pulseman was created, which definitely caught me off guard. So, apparently, there was this scientist named Doc Yoshiyama, who created an artificial intelligence named C-Life, who was able to feel, think, and express complex emotions much like a human. After some time passes, he ends up falling in love with what he has created, and since he probably is a big fan of the movie Her, he uploads himself into his computer, where he and C-Life then proceed to have passionate sex, and from this sex, Pulseman is born…………………….. yes, that is actually part of the plot of this game, and I don’t know whether or not I should be impressed by the fact that they put that in this game, or concerned about someone at Game Freak wanting to fuck their computer.

But anyway, the graphics are, to me at least, fantastic, not only having wonderful designs for Pulseman and several of the other characters, but also having plenty of bright and colorful environments pleasant throughout the game that you travel through, even if they can be a little too much on the eyes at times, especially for those with epilepsy, the music is pretty decent, having plenty of great tunes to listen to while running through plenty of these stages, even if it doesn’t reach the same quality as other soundtracks from the Genesis, and the gameplay/control is pretty solid all around, being very simple on the surface level, but having plenty of gimmicks and challenges that keep you on your toes and have you experiment with what you can do, which kept things fun and engaging for me all throughout.

The game is a 2D action platformer, where you take control of Pulseman, go through seven different stages through plenty of stand-out locations all across the globe, take out plenty of enemies along the way and conquer a handful of platforming challenges using your electrical powers for combat and transportation, gather plenty of different health items, extra lives, and temporary power-ups to help you along the way with whatever you are dealing with, take on several bonus stages to get extra lives by turning yourself into a game of Breakout, and take on plenty of bosses that will challenge you in plenty of ways, while still being pretty manageable to defeat. In many ways, it is just a standard platformer through and through, so anyone burnt out on the genre wouldn’t be able to get into it just from hearing a description like that, but like with several other games on this same system, the style and charm it has does most of the heavy lifting, while also still managing to keep the main gameplay fun, addicting, and, dare I say, electrifying.

Since this is a platformer that was made on the Genesis that was made after Sonic the Hedgehog, one of the key aspects of the gameplay is speed and momentum, which I think plays a huge part in why I was having such a good time with the game. Not only are there a lot of instances where there are plenty of narrow pathways for you to run down, gain plenty of speed, and blast your way through enemies and platforming challenges using proper jumps and attacks, but some of your more powerful attacks are charged up through running, where you can then launch a ball of lightning out of your hands to just obliterate your foes. This also manages to be a great way to aid you in proceeding through levels as well, as you can charge yourself up into being a ball of electricity that bounces around the screen for a good bit, which can not only allow you to reach higher places much easier, but also ride on electric currents that are pretty fun to grind along and jump to and from flawlessly.

Of course though, this game isn’t a Sonic the Hedgehog, so it doesn’t focus primarily on speed, and there are still plenty of different platforming challenges to take on, and for the most part, they were great to take on. Some of them can get pretty repetitive, such as having to constantly break these walls of bricks to proceed forward at plenty of moments, but thankfully, this is interrupted with plenty of other sequences throughout the game. They manage to keep the gameplay consistently exciting and engaging, while also being properly mixed with the more speedy sections of the game. Also, one other part I also really enjoyed is whenever you are fighting the Dark Pulseman boss, and you have to defeat him by stunning him by clashing with him in mid-air before hitting him, complete with slowdown and sparks flying to emphasize the impact. It isn’t much, but that shit makes my brain go brr in the best way possible, and made that entire boss fight much more enjoyable, even if it did get somewhat tedious after a bit.

I won’t lie though, this game is far from perfect, as despite how much fun I was having with the game, I can see plenty of its imperfections clear as day. The level design for some of the stages could definitely be improved on, such as with plenty of instances where you need to get through these very narrow gaps in order to proceed through the level, and it can take a little bit to get through them. Sure, you can always just turn into a ball of electricity to bypass these sections, but doing that can be pretty clunky at points, so it does slow things down to a halt, which I wasn’t a fan of whenever that kind of stuff popped up. Not to mention, there were several glitches that I ran into while I was playing the game, such as instances where I would walk through walls, get stuck in some parts of the ground, and even one or two instances where I was thrown to the other side of the screen for seemingly no reason. I’m not sure if that is just because of the fact that I was playing this on the NSO, but even then, it is clear that this game needed a little more polishing up before it was shipped out to the market.

Overall, despite some clunky level design here and there, as well as those few glitches that I did encounter, I ended up having a great time with Pulseman, being one of the most fun, fast, and engaging platformers on the system that doesn’t involve any blue rodents, and it is definitely one of the best late-release games for the system. I would definitely recommend it for those of you who are a big fan of old-school platformers, as well as those who only know Game Freak for Poke- I MEAN, uh, frantically looks through list… Little Town Hero (sure, why not), because if you think they are merely a one-trick pony and nothing more, this game can truly show just what kind of other games they are truly capable of. Just, you know, ignore that part about the story where the man fucked the computer, and it gave birth to a creature. Definitely wasn’t expecting to learn that myself today.

Game #554

Pulseman is one of those cases where they came up with a neat and appealing character (as well as a gimmick) but stuck them in a painfully mediocre game. Being able to juice a platforming hero up with an electrical charge that can send him richocheting off walls and annihilating enemies is cool in theory, but the level design is often bland and uninteresting.

Stage 7, the finale, is a prime example of this. You would think chasing the bad guy down inside an arcade game would be awesome...but GameFreak decided to make the whole ordeal one long auto scroller where all you do is jump from platform to platform for five God damned minutes.

At least the game looks great and has all sorts of Treasure-like special effects (especially with the final boss- to my shock the game actually ends on a high note), but it is just not enough to carry a game. Especially not in 1994, when we had amazing platformers such as Sonic 3 and DKC coming out left and right. It's not a terrible game by any means, but you can do so much better when it comes to the Genesis.

Constant slowdown, sluggish yet slippery movement, garish visuals, a grating soundtrack, and a frustrating bounce mechanic all add up to make Pulseman one of the worst Game Freak games I've ever played, and I played Pokemon Stadium with rentals!

I remember seeing Pulseman years ago in best of lists for the Genesis, and I've always maintained a level of curiosity about it simply for being a non-Pokemon Game Freak game, but I think it was probably better left in the pages of EGM and now defunct websites. It starts out fine, you run around and you shoot electricity at enemies, bounce around after launching into a charged jump once you've built enough speed (and static), but your movement is also super weighty and Pulseman always slides a little bit when you come to a stop, so early on you can tell he's not really suited to precision platforming.

And, sure enough, the game eventually takes you to levels that expect just a bit more than Pulseman is willing to give. The actual ice stage punctuates how rancid Pulseman feels to control, water levels disable his electrical attacks and require you to get right up on enemies, stage gimmicks like gears don't quite work right and have wonky collision that sometimes just sends you clipping through them, and hell, that occasionally just happens with the floor, too. Enemy hitboxs are sometimes more narrow than they ought to be, and many of the mid-to-late game levels are rotten with bottomless pits and blind jumps into hazards and enemies. None of this ever really compounds to such a degree that Pulseman becomes too difficult, but it does get increasingly annoying when tepid stage design clashes so consistently with the game's unpleasant controls.

My breaking point was when the game required me to charge a jump and bounce vertically through a single-block wide hole which took a good fifteen minutes of trial and error before I gave up and watched the previously linked longplay to find the exact angle it expected of me. I then encountered another section like this which sends you through several chambers, only I accidentally disengaged the bounce and got softlocked. I tried the level select cheat and played a bit more beyond that, but it was clear Pulseman was never going to get better. I could be doing something else with my time.

Shoutouts to the horrid art direction. Just a ton of strobing neon colors and effects that badly want to be like something out of The Adventures of Batman and Robin yet which look more rudimentary and come at a high cost to performance. I am not kidding when I say the slowdown is constant. It is prevalent to a ridiculous degree and is actively detrimental to playing the game. The casino level is just a bunch of noise. I would've been better off hitting the slots and wasting the money I spent on this game. Or, better yet, sticking a fork in an electrical outlet and turning myself into a pulseman (see: corpse.)

I hate how this game looks, I hate how it plays, I hate how it sounds, I hate Pulseman, I never should've trusted the same publications that said Aero the Acro-Bat was the best new character of 1993 with a god damn Genesis recommendation.

In a world
Where arcades and film studios only exist in Japan
And Alaska is not a U.S. state
Only one man can stop evil
By giving as many seizures as possible
Pulseman

This is such an interesting game. From concept, to gameplay, to history, to what the developers went to do afterwards, and especially aesthetically. I've been wanting to play Pulseman since I've learned about it, and the wait was more or less worth it! Levels have such an eclectic and electric atmosphere that I've not seen replicated anywhere else, and I love the idea of using static and TV errors as a part of the game's identity and not just a fourth wall break like other games would. Movement is a bit wonky in some areas, but it has an identity all its own, along with moves that were fun to just accidentally discover in the middle of gameplay. I also love how the game takes place in various nations across the world but there's no real identifying features to make you relate each level to their respective nation. The USA has a more western theme, but all the others I'd never be able to guess what they're supposed to be - which isn't a complaint, I actually just think that's really funny.

There's a lot good about this game and it's very inspired, but at times levels were kind of annoying to go through, and in some cases I could imagine them being nauseating for some people. There's a decent bit of exploration that you can do in each level, but Pulseman's moveset just doesn't really work with exploration, so I would give up half the time I tried.

I'm not sure if this game is safe for those prone to seizures, I would say to look into that if you're susceptible to them. But everyone else I think should definitely try this one out.

Let me get this straight:
- when SEGA and Game Freak collaborate they deliver average but enjoyable platforms
- when TPC demands new mainline Pokémon games from Game Freak we get technical disasters

Seems fair.

It's OK. Nothing special. Did get a bit better once I realised you can instantly charge by double tapping a direction instead of having to run far enough.

The stages go through a lot of aesthetic variation, many of which are pretty cool, if a bit seizure-inducing. The actual layouts feel somewhat randomly generated at times.

The stages, despite having absolutely nothing to do with them, are all set in countries, such as Japan, USA, Thailand, Japan again and everyone's favourite country, Alaska.

I doubt the devs would find much success after this game unfortunately.

Pulseman é um jogo peculiar, disponível originalmente apenas pelo Sega Channel, o aparelho de streaming de jogos da Sega no Mega Drive, e criado pela Game Freak, aquela mesma que criou hoje a treinadora Pokémon escocesa.

O enredo do jogo é estranho, e bastante errado, mas vamos lá: um cientista cria uma Inteligência Artificial, se apaixona por ela, se transforma em dados para entrar no computador e ter um filho com esta Inteligência, porque sim.
Aí depois esse cientista fica louco e biruta das ideias, e sai do PC pra destruir o mundo. E você, como filho dele, deve parar seu pai. Essa é a parte mais normal do roteiro.

O jogo todo envolve a manipulação de energia que Pulseman tem. Sem carregar, ele consegue criar uma pequena lâmina de energia com a mão e se transformar em uma esfera de energia, a voltekker ou sei lá como se chama, por um milésimo de segundo, para entrar em correntes que estiverem por perto, e também ficar invencível durante isso! Se você ficar apertando o botão, seu hitbox não volta até parar, bem loko.
Depois de correr um pouco (ou apertar pra frente duas vezes), você criar fricção suficiente pra ficar carregado de energia e pode atacar um projétil ao socar, ou, ao virar a esfera de energia, você sai em disparada na diagonal, podendo rebater em paredes e chegar em lugares mais altos, além de várias outras mecânicas. Tem uma fase de água em que nada disso é possível porque a água te cancela no twitter, então tem que se virar como pode.

É um jogo bastante difícil, por causa da gameplay e plataformas que são difíceis de alcançar pelo seu pulo falho. Embora isso, devido a apresentação de lindos gráficos que emulam até 3D em algumas partes, é possível relevar alguns de seus problemas e se dar conta que é um bom jogo, só muito difícil de zerar.

As said by many, this is a game riddled with flaws but equally filled to the brim with heart. And (for me) if your game has a lot of charm and is mostly playable, I am willing to overlook the flaws.

Here were my 3 major issues:
1. The game is a bit on the buggy side. I came across many glitches and a lot of slow down. The hit detection is a bit wonk, with attacks either missing when it looked like it should hit and vice versa.

2. Because the game takes on a computery/digital aesthetic, there's a lot of flashing colors. I got a headache when I first played and there were many times when I had to take a step away just to rest my eyes.

3. Game concepts were half baked. Some level designs felt like randomness to the point where it was either boring or infuriating.

But in spite of these 3 issues, the soul and passion behind the game saves it.

1. The presentation... MY GOD! It's fun, exciting and so cool. Ken Sugimori's art and character designs are so awesome, unique and always a treat to see it outside of Pokemon. The sprite art and backgrounds were varied and the game has a lot of cool ways of portraying ideas, mostly in boss fights. For example, in one fight you play as Pulseman from an over the shoulder view of the main villain, looking like you are behind the villain watching him try to defeat Pulseman.

2. A lot of potential behind the game concepts. Volteccer in particular is a really great idea. Its a move that turns your into a ball of electricity and launches you diagonally. It has a short travel distance but if you hit a wall or surface, you bounce off of it and extend the distance of the move. This has a lot of versatility for movement, attacking and can serve as somewhat of a comeback move for if you miss a jump or fall down a death pit. I would really love to see this idea explored more.

Pulseman's existence represents something a bit tragic to me; that being GameFreak and it's notable figures like Tajiri, Sugimori and Masuda were a group full of ambitions and ideas, but we only ever knew them for Pokemon. So many times has the company tried to do other games but none of them ever became anything more than just attempts. I genuinely love Pokemon, but it's clear that it's shadow has grown too large for the company to escape. I hope they continue to try new things because Pulseman is a clear example that the brilliant minds at GameFreak have untapped potential.

So according to the manual, Pulseman the character only exists because a scientist got so horny for a literal e-girl that he digitised himself so he could bang her.

90s Japan was wiiiiiiiiild-

Pulseman's game design is especially interesting to me - its visual style effectively harmonises both reality and cyberspace as you flip-flop your way past this dazzling palette of vibrant colours that aims to stimulate your brain at every given moment. The backgrounds are astonishingly filled to the brim with detail, with the external environments depicting bright, colourful casinos and skylines, as well as glittering coral caves; while the digital environments have a more abstract feel to them, sometimes depicting a trippy rotating group of trees, and sometimes just displays eerie, pitch black environments occasionally illuminated by abstract shapes that constantly shift in hues. Towards the end of the game, Pulseman really leans into its futuristic, cyberspace aesthetic by thrusting you into the setting of a video game (complete with a credit count!), and then the constantly flickering coloured scanlines of a CRT, and finally plunges you into an area consisting of nothing but pure static at the beginning of the final fight.

Even the level design does a great job distinguishing the blend of synthetic and natural environments, with real environments utilising real objects with uneven terrain and things such as cameras, tree branches and cacti that you can platform on. These areas encourage players to use Pulseman's natural speed and jump to reach the goal.

On the other hand, cyberspace areas take advantage of, well, artificial terrain, with the level design being incredibly blocky and rigid, standardised as a digitalised setting would realistically feel. In these areas, players are instead incentivised to interact with their environment using all of Pulseman's artificial Voltteccer attack to traverse the narrow mazes scattered throughout the digital landscape. This sort of synchronised game design is a sight for sore eyes in modern gaming, especially with Pokemon, so to see Game Freak pull it off in 1994 is particularly astounding.

Of course, this being a 90s platformer, players can always opt to forgo the thematic significance of Pulseman's moveset and instead learn to master the surprisingly intricate mechanics laid within. By double-tapping the left/right directional keys, Pulseman does a dash forwards. More important than the dash itself is the pulse charge that is generated from it, allowing players to immediately get off a Slash Arrow or Voltteccer as soon as their dash animation ends. This little quirk allows for a significant amount of movement optimisation, giving players the chance to think outside the box and find opportunities to use their dashes and Voltteccers optimally to beat the level in the most stylish, fastest way possible. Much like the classic Sonic games, Pulseman movement has a low skill floor and a high skill ceiling, making full mastery of the game's ins and outs satisfactory.

However, while the game's visuals push the boundaries of the Genesis' hardware, perhaps it was a bit too ambitious for its own good. I'm not sure if its just my emulator, but I noticed a concerning number of frame drops throughout my playthrough when a lot is happening on the screen, which alongside the fact that I can accidentally clip through certain assets (mainly the gears in the Thailand level) tells me that the game could've used a bit more polish.

Between this and Drill Dozer, I find it extremely disappointing how Game Freak now chooses to churn out shitty quality Pokemon games on a yearly basis rather than actual good games. We may never get a game like Pulseman ever again, but honestly? I'm perfectly content with that.

Final score: 9/10
(Partial) Focus: The synchronicity between reality and digital environments in Pulseman's visual design, level design and movement.