Puyo Puyo/Trivia


 * Acting for Two: More like acting for three in the English dub of Puyo Pop Fever; Ali Johnston voiced Arle, Ocean Prince and Dongurigaeru in the game. See Talking to Himself below for some examples on the Japanese side.
 * Bad Export for You: The iOS Sega Columns Deluxe is a port of the Japanese Puyo Puyo~n & Columns phone game, except with the characters removed.
 * Casting Gag:
 * Despite the constant shifting of voice actors (see The Other Darrin below) the late Yuko Mizutani, who voiced Draco Centauros (among many other characters) in the PC-Engine Puyo Puyo games, returned to voice Witch in Puyo Puyo~n.
 * Likewise, Kazuki Yao, who voiced Satan in the PC-Engine Puyo Puyo games, returned to the series in Puyo Puyo Tetris to voice Ex.
 * There's also Kenichi Ono who voiced Satan in Puyo Puyo~n, and later returned to the series exactly a decade after Yo~n's release to voice Risukuma for every game following the latter character's introduction to the series in Puyo Puyo 7.
 * Cross-Dressing Voices: Carbuncle (except in the Saturn port of Tsu), Lagnus, Dongurigaeru, Klug, Ocean Prince, Sig, Rei, Onion Pixie, and CD Tsu's Nohoho and Baromett.
 * Fan Nickname:
 * "OPP" (as in Original Puyo Puyo) is the most common shorthand for the first arcade game.
 * For a time, Madou Monogatari I for the Mega Drive was referred to as Madou Monogatari: Genesis.
 * "Madou-era" is used interchangeably with "Compile-era" to refer to Compile's Puyo Puyo games.
 * Some fans like to refer to Strange Klug as Ayashii (inspired by his Japanese name Ayashii Kuru-ku), since the demon still lacks a proper name in canon.
 * "Pedobear" for Risukuma.
 * "Tara Stacking", "Harpy Stacking" and "Frog Stacking" refer to the act of mimicking the strategy of a CPU-controlled Suketoudara, Harpy, and Nohoho respectively.
 * Crossing this with Unfortunate Name is "Harassment", the name given to the act of sending small amounts of garbage to slow or stop the construction of the opponent's main chain. The fandom didn't really catch onto the "unfortunate" part until Sega's tutorial video covering this technique generated snark from the gaming community at large.
 * Fan Translation: A few of the Madou Monogatari games, Super Puyo Puyo Tsu, the PC version of Puyo Puyo SUN and the DS versions of Puyo Puyo 15th Anniversary and Puyo Puyo 7, as well as 20th Anniversary.
 * Right now a translation of Fever 2 is going on. For three, if not four, years.
 * Follow the Leader:
 * Puyo Puyo was Compile's answer to Tetris and Dr. Mario. The first two arcade games' successes saw dozens of competition-focused puzzle games featuring wacky casts of characters hit the market. Hebereke's Popoon and Konami's Taisen Puzzle Dama are particularly blatant from a gameplay standpoint (the main differences being that they are Match Three instead of Match Four). As mentioned above, Magical Drop F takes a lot from Puyo Puyo~n despite Magical Drop having fundamentally-different gameplay.
 * Much of Compile's 1999-2000 output was them desperately trying to apply Arle and friends to popular gaming trends, from Pokémon to Dance Dance Revolution to Super Robot Wars. They were going to try to imitate Puyo itself with Pochi & Nyaa after they lost the series, but went out of business before the game released.
 * Puyo Puyo!! Quest is a thinly-veiled take on Puzzle & Dragons.
 * Invisible Advertising: If there was ever an English-language Puyo Puyo ad prior to Puyo Tetris, the fandom sure hasn't found it.
 * Hilariously, SEGA themselves have largely not advertised Puyo Tetris, preferring to basically let the game advertise itself, to stunningly huge success!
 * Milestone Celebration: Three of them; special games were made for their 15th, 20th and 25th anniversary. Unfortunately, to date, NONE have been released in the West.
 * Newbie Boom: Sega has pulled this off at least three times, once with the first Fever (which also somehow managed to plant the seeds for a western fanbase despite being a flop in those markets), again with Quest and a third time (at least in the west) with Puyo Puyo Tetris.
 * No Export for You: Every game except the Dolled Up Installments, Puyo Pop on the GBA and Puyo Puyo Fever. The English version of the first arcade game could potentially be another exception. The Mega Drive port of Tsu is available (untranslated) via the Wii's Virtual Console.
 * Inverted with the N-Gage Puyo Pop, which was released everywhere except Japan.
 * Pre-Order Bonus:
 * Anyone that preordered 20th Anniversary was given "Puyo Puyo!! Anniversary Soundtrack Collection", a collection of the game's songs throughout the entire series, as a bonus.
 * For Puyo Tetris, a code that grants "Arle ver. Puyo Tetris" for Puyo Quest was included with the game. What is the code printed on? A physical Puyo Quest-styled card that's the size of a common TCG card, which can slip into a card binder or sleeve for safekeeping. The PS4 and Xbox One versions did the same thing, containing "Ringo ver. Puyo Tetris" instead.
 * Reality Subtext: Puyo Puyo BOX was blatantly designed as a send-off to the series, with Compile jamming in as much from the four mainline games as they could. Given that Compile still had time on their deal with Sega, either they flat-out couldn't make another Puyo Puyo game, or they realized that Puyo Puyo wasn't going to save them.
 * Remade for the Export: In a sense, the Nintendo Switch version of Puyo Puyo Tetris qualifies; see Screwed by the Lawyers below for why it took the Switch version for the game to be brought over.
 * Schedule Slip: Waku Waku Puyo Puyo Dungeon was slated to release in late 1997, but ended up getting delayed to spring 1998. What makes this delay so significant is that it allegedly played a role in forcing Compile to restructure.
 * Sequel First: Madou Monogatari II was actually the first game in either series to be released anywhere. A beta version was included in the Christmas '89 edition of Discstation.
 * Whatever game that you consider to be the first Puyo game to be released internationally (arcade translation, Mean Bean Machine, or NGPC Puyo Pop) definitely isn't the MSX or FDS game.
 * The Western world didn't receive a Madou Monogatari game until 2013, and, by that time, Arle wasn't even in it!
 * Sleeper Hit: By most accounts, Puyo Puyo Tetris is this. Given past localization efforts didn't sell well, many fans hoped, but didn't expect the game to do well, but it was one of the top selling games early in the Nintendo Switch's lifespan.