Random: Switch Exclusive "Watermelon Game" Goes Viral, eShop Downloads Skyrocket

Haha, you can never predict what goes viral out of nowhere. It's nice when a small game gains some appreciation.

Got this lined up for when Nintendo deigns to accept my absolutely-fine-EVERY-frickin’-where-else debit card and/or PayPal account. Should be about Thursday.

Unless anyone has suggestions for what I can burn the rest of a .jp eShop card on…?

This reminds me a bit of Stick and Spin, Trash Panic, and "No Puzzles either". Seems OK, I'd probably already own it if they had released it here.

@Coffeemonstah @RubyCarbuncle I haven’t been able to buy from other eShops for ages now (probably a few years) despite it always being fine before. Always have to wait a month to use my card again on the eShop, and even when I try to use it in my actual region it often declines it and I have to wait a month (PayPal is always fine in my region though). I don’t get it

Oh good lord. 😣

I've never heard of or seen this game. However, there is literally a mini game (which then unlocks a full game of it as a bonus mode!) which is EXACTLY the same as this in my Hazel Witch game... except instead of small fruits turning into watermelons its different colours of magic bubbles that grow bigger when combined.

The reason I added this mini game is that this is an original game that I literally designed and made in the school holidays circa 1995. Genuinely thought I invented a unique puzzle game.

I'm not saying they copied me, its a coincidence some japanese person obviously had the same idea. I never uploaded the game anywhere in 1995, and my Hazel game isn't out yet, and only a small handful of western publishers have even seen it. Now I'll have to alter the game mode so it doesn't look like a straight clone of this! lol

That said, I'm not mad that so many people are enjoying "my" game. It really is very fun! 😂

Hopefully it gets a release over here cause this sounds fun.

I saw a bit of this game being streamed today. It seems like a reasonably clever little puzzle game. Something I'd normally either find to be an underrated gem (because people don't usually respect puzzle games, I feel like), or an ok game I played a few times, once.

It seems like the game managed to sell 1 million copies as of a few days ago:
https://www.aladdinx.jp/pages/suika-game

Spotted this on a friend's play history who's more into streamers than me, and wondered what it was as he hasn't otherwise played any Japanese titles. Now I know.

I buy Japanese gift cards with an Amazon Japan account. Straight to my email in seconds, and no upcharge.

Hey does it all have to end up in a random-physics game like this for a success? We got tetris, fgs

@Bass_X0 it seems to be random and boring. Go for Tetris.

Pass, too much effort to get this!

Yeah that's a paid version of a free game Microsoft makes too

...Saw someone uploading a clip of their own version of the game over on twitter...Think it was based on food/snacks or something. Decided to try that free web version...huh. lol

...No gold coins on my Japanese account, wtf? I imported a couple of games before, I should have something! >:c

Decided to look at that video and...it looks worse than the free web browser version.

I am very patiently waiting for this game to be added to the NA eShop which I hope is very soon cause i do not wanna go through the hassle of having to buy a Japanese eShop card.

Thanks for this feature. I happened to have some credit remaining on the Japanese eShop from previous purchases, and decided to download this. (Found it on the “popular downloads” page, I think in first position.)

Lots of fun! No English in the game, but I found it entirely intuitive to understand. Basically combining two of a smaller fruit into a larger one, as shown on the circular guide on the right, until any of them come to rest “breaking the plane” of the top of the container.

FYI - the Japanese eShop currently has Falconeer for 100 yen. Grabbed that also.

@larryisaman Oh it’s not that, Larry, they just up and blocked both my debit card & PayPal on my NATIVE eShop. Everywhere else there’s no problems at all.

Got three £1-or-thereabouts games in the Autumn sale, saw SuperHot at a record low, went for that and they just said LOL NOPE. Nothing but error codes for days. Called up Support and they said to give it a full 30 days before re-linking both.

@Coffeemonstah It’s bizarre. Only platform/service I’ve known to do it and it doesn’t seem like a common thing, I don’t think I’ve ever found a thread online or anything of people having the same issues

Okay the web version just keeps freezing on me now, ugh...

Mario Party 10 on Wii U had this as a bonus game. Or something like it. Balls would drop in and you have to get four of the same color touching to make them smaller and get rid of them.

Guys, I'm hooked. I can't stop playing. Help me.

I legitimately thought this was a mobile game I used to have called Bag It! haha

Ironically this is very similar to the dice game Yuji Naka made a year ago which he did as a small personal project. This has far more personality and polish though.

@samuelvictor This makes me think what would have happened if something popular like Tetris or Puyo Puyo was just randomly stapled onto the end of a completely different game instead of being a standalone. Would be mental.

@Bass_X0 This game released in 2018. And it's very different from what you just discribed. Two fruits of the same type always merge to a bigger one until it's a huge melon. You gain points through merging them and you win when getting 3000 points before overfilling the tank.

Surely they will release it in the USA now?

I saw Anya Melfissa play this. I've watched it for like 5 minutes but it looked fun.

Thanks Anya/Terima kasih Anya

@Deviant-Dork what's the microsoft game?

@EarthboundBenjy I actually think going viral is a very intentional process. Those influencers get paid to promote these products, there's nothing organic about any of it. The only question is how viral something goes.

@JokerCK Me too

@larryisaman I dunno, I seem to remember some shenanigans from the Xbox 360 store some years back, but it’s been that long since I even turned on the old CrossCrate there I can’t remember the specifics.

I've played it for a good few hours and it's fun. There's a great deal of luck involved, which isn't something I like in a puzzle game. Seems to me... play this long enough and you'll get your Watermelon eventually - whether you play well or not.

Surely they will release it in the EU now?

Glad I saw this yesterday; it was just the push I needed to finally create a Japanese account. This is the finest falling puzzle game I’ve played since Super Puzzle Fighter.
Plus, I’ve rekindled my irresistibly abusive love affair with Knights in the Nightmare, thanks to the new account! Cheers for posting!

@Supaguy Haha yeah! I personally lean more towards making games that I feel will give good value at around the $15-25 mark, and have a decent length story/campaign mode for people to play with.

But I also personally really love early 80s Namco style arcade games, and early 90s style puzzle games, the kind of short pick up and play experience that you can come back to for a few minutes and try and beat your high score.

So rather than make loads of simple arcade like experiences that I would either give away free or sell for $2 each, I like to include multiple mini games with different playstyles in my bigger games... and then have an unlockable mode where people can play a full dedicated version of that mini game with multiple levels, endless high score chase modes etc. Perhaps the reason I like this approach better is as a kid I adored Fantastic Dizzy - a platform game with 5 different arcade style minigames along the way, and to me it felt like I'd got really good value for money as it was like several games for the price of one!

However, that does mean it spoils the chance of one of those minigames accidentally going viral like thais one did!! I'm slightly sore that I never had enough confidence in my little game that I made back in 1995 to ever release it publicly - its crazy that such a simple game is making millions. Congratulations to them I guess! 😂

@samuelvictor No offence, but I would personally suggest changing that mentality in terms of game design and marketing. The current market has changed so much and if you have the ability to produce several smaller games that can bolster your catalogue, especially if the game type it comes with appeals to a different audience, I'd recommend just making standalone versions. If you want, you could then make a collection later on or have variations hidden in your other games, but pick-up and-play games have a dedicated audience. It could also help with funding.

I'd even go as far to say that most people these days desire games with a tight focus rather than the scattershot design in games of old purely because there are so many games so easily available these days. Heck, even Kirby turned all the 3DS minigames into standalone experiences. I wouldn't be surprised if Kirby Dream Buffet started out like that.

@Supaguy Thanks for the feedback, in many ways you are right. However, my main focus is on 2 big games which will be worthy of full physical releases and have loads of replay value. I already have publishers interested in both. I'm also going to be doing the same as Shovel Knight, Stardew etc all and regularly releasing free dlc that significantly expands the story mode and content over time. This is where my real interest is, in creating long term experiences for players that become fans of the IPs so that eventually when a sequel is released, there is a fanbase and reputation of teh games being quality and worth supporting.

Also bare in mind that my main job is producing movies, tv, animation and comic books, and promoting them at comiccons, selling merch etc, so having substantial story content for the new characters and worlds we create is very important, and to me is the most fun part of my job 😀

However, each one has around 20 minigames that I think could genuinely have been standalone arcade / console titles back in the 80s. Its certainly occured to me that I could also release them as $1-2 standalone digital only titles, and perhaps also as free mobile games with ads. No extra work, and these titles will act as advertising for the full games. 😀

My childhood example of Fantastic Dizzy is an interesting one, as it was a multiformat console release (albeit with budget prices for £15-25 depending on format) but several of the mini games were popular enough to spin off into their own standalone £2.99 budget titles for home computers. Thats a fun equivalent of me putting the minigames out for mobiles and eshop.

@samuelvictor Oooooh very interesting. As someone who's been a big fan of the film and webcomic scene that job sounds very interesting.

Also unfortunately Fantasy World Dizzy is a bit before my time. I only really know about it thanks to Yahtzee Croshaw/Zero Punctuation. I just remember a lot of licensed games like Madagascar 2 for PS2 always having a bunch of different mid minigames so your experience is probably more positive than mine.

Good luck with your game and all the best in cultivating a fanbase. I'll check them out when they release.

@Supaguy Thanks so much!

Yes I love Yahtzee, he very often references both Fantasy World and Treasure Island Dizzy during the "Slightly Something Else" livestreams, it always makes me smile that he remembers them so fondly. These were probably the 2 most critically acclaimed Dizzy titles for the 8bit home computers and both were #1 sellers in the UK. They are essentially platformers but with Resident Evil style inventory puzzles, and stories based around traditional European folk lore and fairy tales.

Fantastic Dizzy was the first Dizzy game for consoles, and therefore had a higher price and higher expectations, so they made a much bigger game that was sort of a "greatest hits" all all the best ideas, puzzles and characters from all previous games into a large open worldish map, plus they added minigames which each cover completely different genres and styles. Its worth checking out (strangely, the excellent Master System version is the most fully featured, rather than the 16bit versions which are missing some stuff).

Bought it some days ago. Oddly satisfying game and quite calming. Well worth 240 YEN!

Ahh jeez, one of my students talked about this game today. I bet it's just the start of a deluge. I try SO HARD to tell them that there are lots of amazing games on the eShop that deserve more love, and most of them don't even have the words "Human" "Fall" or "Flat" in the title!

@samuelvictor eh, don't change the minigame solely out of fear that ppl will perceive it as a clone. if it's fun, it's fun, and as you're saying, it's not a clone, you came up with the idea (even if somebody else did as well). you have just as much right to share that work with pride