"If it feels like you're suffering, you're probably missing a movement item," my friend Aura tells me as I throw myself against a nearly-impossible platforming section. "Oh, I know," I reply, "but what if I can do it anyway?" And, dear reader, I could.

If you play Pseduoregalia and unlock every movement mechanic in the expected order and solve every puzzle using the intended solution, you are experiencing a fundamentally different game than I. To me, this is a game of getting away with something, piecing together the tools you have on hand to sneak through challenges designed for different tools and steal rewards meant for another you in another time. The movement is so deep and so powerful once you push it to its limits that you can go almost anywhere with only a few mechanics.

This makes me wonder: why are there so few 3D games that really focus in on the technical complexity of motion in 3D space? Where is the evolutionary branch of 3D platformers that zoomed in on the platforming instead of the world around it? Did I miss them, or does Pseudoregalia really stand alone?

One thing's for sure: this is going to have the absolute sickest low% speedruns you've ever seen.

Reviewed on Jan 04, 2024


2 Comments


3 months ago

Adored this aspect of the game. Even better was that I thought I was doing things in the intended order until I watched other people played it. Unbelievable stuff

2 months ago

I think it's just an underrated sub-genre of 3D platformers. Like Super Mario 64 basically invented it and then they went and made the blandest collectathon with Odyssey and everyone raves about it like it was 64's successor. Yes, Odyssey do has a deep movement set, but it doesn't do anything interesting with it and most people don't seem to care. Maybe it's a niche or most people don't understand it. Anyway, Pseudoregalia is amazing.