Puyo Puyo

Everything About Fiction You Never Wanted to Know.
(Redirected from Puyo Pop)

Puyo Puyo is a series of Falling Blocks puzzles games created by the now-defunct company Compile. It is now owned by Sega, which distributes it internationally as Puyo Pop. The object of the game is to flood your opponent's board with Nuisance Puyo by making chains with several multi-colored Puyo which explode when four of the same color are connected.

Just how popular is this in Japan? A LOT of effort went into the Japanese Puyo Puyo Tsu Championship. Just look at the crowd eagerly watching the puzzle game (not quite a Korean StarCraft tournament but still). Keep in mind that this is televised. Hey, Fever matches can get at least 180,000+ views and Tsu matches can net 1,000,000+ views. If you know how to build some amazing chains, that's about 1,600,000+ views. Then many people hack the game to make their own mods, and that can get...not as many, though a still rather respectable number of views.

The games in the series are:

  • Puyo Puyo (1991; primitive version for MSX and NES)
  • Puyo Puyo (1992; Arcade Game that displaced the earlier version)
  • Puyo Puyo TSU (1994)
  • Puyo Puyo SUN (1996)
  • Puyo Puyo~n (1999)
  • Puyo Puyo Box (2000; largely a compilation of previous games, and the last one released by Compile)
  • Minna de Puyo Puyo (2001; first installment developed by Sega's Sonic Team, localized as just Puyo Pop)
  • Puyo Puyo Fever a.k.a. Puyo Pop Fever (2003; dubbed for the Gamecube)
  • Puyo Puyo Fever 2 (2005; featured a map system, which has yet to be done again)
  • Puyo Puyo! 15th Anniversary (2006; was the first where you could select characters without a given difficulty)
  • Puyo Puyo 7 (2009)
  • Puyo Puyo!! 20th Anniversary (2011)
  • Puyopuyo!! Quest (2013, free-to-play Puzzle RPG)
    • Puyopuyo!! Quest Arcade (2013, arcade version)
  • Puyo Puyo Tetris (2014)
  • Puyo Puyo Tetris 2 (2020)

Along side are a few clones and/or localizations:

  • Dr. Robotnik's Mean Bean Machine (1993; Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog-styled localization)
  • Kirby's Avalanche (1995; Kirby-styled localization)
  • Qwirks (1995; Windows and Mac game)
  • Kidou Gekidan Haro Ichiza: Haro no Puyo Puyo / Mobile Theatrical Company Haro: Haro's Puyo Puyo (2005: Gundam-styled GBA game)

Puyo Puyo takes its characters from Madou Monogatari, a series of RPGs also by Compile. Most games from both series star Action Girl Arle Nadja in some insane quest for the designated MacGuffins or something else.

Early Puyo Puyo games tended to be Nintendo Hard (especially the Nintendo versions). More recent games include more variation and, typically, less of a challenge. They're still ridiculously fun, though.

Puyo Puyo Fever has the honor of being the final first-party Sega Dreamcast game, some years after its death[1]

Expect the majority of this page to be on Sega's Puyo Pop Fever Series.

Let's play Puyo!
  • Action Girl: Arle, Amitie, Feli, Raffine and newcomer Ringo.
  • Affably Evil:
    • Satan's plots involve doing something for a stupid reason or stalking Arle.
    • Ekoro is very goofy, but he's a huge threat.
  • Anvil on Head: Amitie once dropped a huge cooking pot on Arle's head in Puyo Puyo Fever 2. Arle was not happy.
    • A 24-ton weight drops on the Frankensteins father when large amounts of nuisance puyo fall on his field.
  • Arc Number: 24, a Japanese goroawase pun on "Puyo". Puyo Puyo Fever was even released on the 24th of a month for each platform. Moreover, nearly every Sega-made Puyo game before Puyo Puyo Tetris 2 has had a character roster consisting of no more than 24 characters.
  • Area 51: Is visited in Puyo Puyo 7.
  • Aren't You Going To Defeat Me?: Asks Strange Klug when Raffine and Sig take two of the items he had and leave him in Klug's body.
  • Badass Adorable: Arle and Carbuncle. Almost everyone in Puyo Puyo Fever counts as well just because of the art style.
  • Bad Powers, Good People and Bad People: Despite being half-demon, Sig doesn't care about it and seems to care only about his friends and bugs. It should be noted that, besides Akuma, most demons and monsters before are portrayed as Jerkasses or being Affably Evil, as well as Sig's remains being part of the demon within's Klug's book's orignal body. There's an unknown, but possibly good, reason that the demon was sealed away in the first place, something nobody even did to any previous demon. When the demon posses Klug, he intends to wound or likely kill Sig to get his remains.
  • Bare Your Midriff: Rulue shows off hers in Puyo Puyo~n.
  • Battle Butler: Butler for The Prince of the Oceans. Execpt, he doesn't really fight.
  • Be Careful What You Say: Because it ties into the trope below.
  • Be Careful What You Wish For: In Puyo Puyo! 15th Anniversary, the story mode has your chosen character playing through a Puyo tournament, and the prize is a medal that will grant one wish.
    • Ms. Accord's wish is a secret.
    • Akuma wished for no demons to be able to enter the town. While he is a demon himself, the wish only stopped demons from entering, so he's just fine.
    • Amitie wished to be a great spellcaster. She gets nothing, on the reasoning that she's already a great spellcaster, which she feels is a cop-out.
    • Arle wished to be able to travel freely between the two worlds. She got it, no strings attached.
    • Baldanders was ordered by Feli to wish for her and Lemres to be happy together. Ms. Accord informs him that he could only wish for one of them to be happy. We never find out who he chooses.
    • Dongurigaeru wished for a pond in the forest, which he gets just fine.
    • Feli wished for Lemres not to grow old without her. She got that, but then Ms. Accord revealed that everyone was using anti-aging spells anyway, and Feli would have been better served wishing a Plot-Relevant Age-Up on herself. Feli was not happy.
    • Klug wished for his success to get a 16-page spread in the local mages' magazine. Ms. Accord pointed out that this was dependent on him being successful in the first place, which he had completely failed to wish for.
    • Lemres wished for the beach to turn into candy, the sea to turn into jelly, the sand into cocoa powder with powdered sugar and skim milk, the pebbles into chocolates, and the shells into candy. He gets it.
    • Nasu Grave wished to be taller. No, wait, he wants to not wear spectacles. No, wait, he wants to not be an eggplant. The medal heard three wishes when it could only grant one, so it didn't grant any.
    • Ocean Prince wished for all his subjects to be his servants with free food and naps. Ms. Accord informed him that he could only get one of those (servitude, food, or naps), and asked him to choose, but he ran off without realizing his wish hadn't been granted yet.
    • Onion Pixy wished to be with Onionette forever.
    • Oshare Bones wished to meet "that person" (his lover?) again "someday". Popoi points out that this is a poor choice of words, as it doesn't specify an actual date. Even so, they are now guaranteed to meet again... eventually...
    • Raffine wished to be more beautiful. The medal did nothing, which Ms. Accord claimed was because it believed Raffine was already the most beautiful. Raffine accepted this explanation happily, but after she ran off, Popoi suggested that maybe the medal just couldn't do that.
    • Rider was going to wish to get rid of her horns, but after meeting Satan, she grew to appreciate them. Since she didn't have a backup wish, she wished for world peace. Ms. Accord said it would be granted, but we don't ever actually see it. It would make Puyo Puyo 7's The End of the World as We Know It plot impossible, but nothing in Puyo Puyo! 15th Anniversary is treated as canon anyway.
    • Rulue was going to wish to be Satan's wife, but that wouldn't stop him from going after Arle. She was going to wish for Arle to be taken out of the picture, but then she realized that would be essentially admitting that Satan loves Arle more than he loves Rulue, and she could never do that. Unfortunately, she said all this out loud and in front of the medal, which decided to grant her "wish" of never admitting Satan's love for Arle. As Rulue immediately points out, this doesn't make any goddamn sense.
    • Satan was going to wish for a honeymoon under the stars with Arle, but first he felt he had to chew out Ms. Accord over her students' disrespectful behavior toward him. The medal heard him say he ought to teach them manners and granted that wish.
    • Schezo wished for everyone to stop calling him a pervert. It was granted, but everyone called him a weirdo instead.
    • Sig wished for new insects in the forest. The medal flat-out refused, as it dislikes insects due to not having hands to brush them away.
    • Suketoudara wished for anyone to be able to do a solo dance at a dance party.
    • Yu and Rei both wished for the same thing, to swap places for a day. The medal granted both wishes, for a net result of not doing anything.
    • Zoh Daimaoh wished to be a king who would bring peace in a rich country, in a future with hope. He got that... as far as anyone knows.
      • To sum up, 22 wishes were made in total, 8 turned out fine, 4 were corrupted by poor phrasing, 4 were flat-out not granted, 2 were ruined by thinking out loud, 2 were caught on a one-wish technicality, Nasu Grave's was not granted due to thinking aloud and the one-wish technicality, and we never learn Ms. Accord's. If we throw out Ms. Accord's wish, that's a 62% failure rate.
  • Berserk Button: Schezo really wants everyone to stop labeling him a pervert. Also, don't taunt him about not having a healthy image.
    • Panotty doesn't like it when people ignore or don't appreciate his music.
  • Big Bad: Varies per game. After the original series, the villains got less effective.
    • Most, if not all, of the games before Puyo Puyo Fever had Satan as the final boss. If he wasn't, it was likely due to someone overshadowing him (take Doppleganger Arle).
    • Puyo Puyo Fever technically had Popoi, a talking cat-puppet-shadow.
    • Puyo Puyo Fever 2 had the very popular Strange Klug, though he didn't do much as a villain.
    • Puyo Puyo! 15th Anniversary and Puyo Puyo!! 20th Anniversary don't have a villain to speak of.
    • Puyo Puyo 7 had an effective villain in Ekoro.
  • Bishonen: Satan, Schezo and Incubus among others.
  • Biting the Handkerchief: Raffine when she loses a Puyo match.
  • Blinding Bangs: Maguro's cover both his eyes, while Lemres's covers one.
  • Blush Sticker: Appears more often on more characters than you think.
  • Bonus Boss: Masked Satan in Puyo Puyo Tsu and Carbuncle in Puyo Puyo Fever.
  • But Your Wings Are Beautiful: Rider eventually appreciates her horns after meeting Satan.
  • Calling Your Attacks: Actually useful in competitive play, since it gives you an idea of how big your opponent's chain is (and yours too) and how close it is to finishing.
  • Camp Gay: Oshare Bones. There's aalso the Madou Monogatari-exclusive Gay.
  • Canon Foreigner: Characters before the fever series come from Madou Monogatari.
  • Caramelldansen Vid: You will need to look through Nico Nico Douga though.
  • Cats Are Mean: Popoi.
  • Circus of Fear: Minus the fear. Except the Big Bad from Puyo Puyo~n wants to replace Arle from reality.
  • Color-Coded for Your Convenience: The Puyo, natch.
  • Cute Monster Girl: YMMV on Draco, Harpy, Seriri, the Banshee Trio and so on.
  • Cute Witch: Witch.
  • Dark Action Girl: Rulue.
  • Deadpan Snarker: Ringo.
  • Defeat Means Friendship: Somewhat, in Puyo Puyo~n and Puyo Puyo 7. You get to use your friends' powers in Puyo Puyo~n, and a defeated person might tag along with your group for the story in Puyo Puyo 7, take a few heroes and, for a short bit, Satan.
  • Dem Bones: Oshare Bones and Skele-T.
  • Demonic Possession: Well, what did you think was going to happen when you carry around a possessed book? Some people just have to learn the hard way.
    • ...and with Strange Klug filling in for Klug's adult transformation in Puyo Puyo 7, I guess he never learned.
    • It also seems like Ekoro managed to take over Arle and decided Ringo a good substitute.
    • And waaaaaay back before all of this, we had Satan being possessed by Doppelganger Arle.
  • Detached Sleeves: Raffine in Deka mode.
  • Difficulty Spike: Frustratingly common in many of the installments. The first arcade game is already blisteringly fast by the fourth level. The dolled up installments tone it down somewhat, though.
    • One such spike accompanies Klug's transformation into Strange Klug. Klug himself was already pretty high-difficulty - Strange Klug just kicks it up a notch.
    • HaraHara courses aren't called "hard" for nothing.
  • Dolled-Up Installment: Kirby's Avalanche, Dr. Robotniks Mean Bean Machine and... Timon and Pumbaa's Bug Drop?
  • Doppelganger: Doppelganger Arle from Puyo Puyo~n as well as Doppelganger Schezo from Waku Waku Puyo Puyo Dungeon.
  • Dreadful Musician: Harpy, oh so much. She turned the mermaid into one, too.
  • Dub Name Change: All over the place in the bootleg English translation of the first game. Arle is called Silvana, Nasu Grave is called Blue Ghost (despite being neither), and Satan is called Dark Prince. That last one was repeated in Puyo Pop for the Game Boy Advance, and is the only official Dub Name Change in the entire series.
  • Dumb Blonde: Amitie.
  • Dysfunction Junction: Nearly everyone except Arle has some serious problems, though they're usually played for laughs.
  • Easy Amnesia: Just add a hammer!
  • Empathy Pet: Popoi, when Ms. Accord has him.
  • Everything's Better with Spinning: The animations. Right now, the sprites have animated limbs.
    • And with Puyo Puyo!! 20th Anniversary out, we have fully animated sprites!
  • Evil Costume Switch: Well, Strange Klug doesn't have a costume, per say; it's just Klug's outfit dyed red with a cape.
    • In Puyo Puyo 7, Arle changes her costume from the school uniform and a pink skirt to a black and blue robe when possesed by Ekoro.
  • Evil Laugh: (Un?)Surprisingly, Klug.
    • Evil Is Hammy: Almost all of the villains, past and present, have an evil laugh somewhere in their combos or shout into their mic.
  • Exactly What It Says on the Tin: Many, many examples, always in names. The aforementioned Witch is a start.
  • Excuse Plot: Puyo Puyo 7 has something along the lines of "The 7 wonders of the world, to play Puyo with 7 players." Turns out it isn't much of an excuse, though.
    • Most of the plots are excuses for the Puyo Pop Fever series, as they're all done to play the named game; Puyo Puyo Fever 1 has finding Accord's cane (which no explanation why and how she lost a flying wand), Puyo Puyo Fever 2 has little to no plot, Puyo Puyo! 15th Anniversary is a tournament...
  • Expressive Hair: Ringo.
    • Expressive Accessory: Strange Klug has two - the red shadow-thing behind him shares his facial expressions, while Klug's purple spirit that's trapped within the nearby floating book is often seen sobbing, smiling, and shares Strange Klug's expression of surprise when two of the heroes leave without saving him.
  • Eyes Always Shut: Ms. Accord and Lemres.
  • Eyes of Gold: Arle.
  • Falling Blocks: The blocks are called Puyo.
  • Family Business: Sasaki's Fishmonger, Andou's Greengroceries
  • Fashionable Asymmetry: Oshare has one intact eye, while his other eye is simply an eye socket featuring Glowing Eyelights of Undeath.
    • Then there's Sasaki, Arle, Strange Klug, recently Satan, and by an extent, Sig.
  • Fire, Ice, Lightning: Arle and Amitie use these three elements as their major spells (Fire, Ice Storm, Thunder Bolt). Rider uses lightning for one of her spells, and Schezo uses lightning for almost all of his spells.
    • Abnormal Spells: However, Klug and Popoi use the names of objects in the sky, Ms. Accord uses music notes and writes on her chalkboard for animations, and Raffine, Sig and Rulue use martial arts with magic. And this is just to name a few.
  • For the Evulz: Ekoro wants to bury the world all existence under Puyo. How fun that must be...
  • Freaky Fashion, Mild Mind: Akuma seems mean, but he helps Sig (sorta) in Puyo Puyo Fever 2. Sig himself is half-demon, but doesn't harm anyone.
  • Frogs and Toads: Nohoho and Dongurigaeru are frogs.
  • Game Mod: Making your own characters is popular, and some have even drew Suzumiya Haruhi in the Puyo art style.
  • Genius Ditz: Amitie. Being one of the heroes, she beats everyone else at puyo in the stories.
  • Giant Space Flea From Nowhere: Carbuncle, as the True Final Boss of the first Puyo Puyo Fever game.
    • After the Tournament Arc that was Puyo Puyo! 15th Anniversary, the next game would naturally have a storyline that has the fate of the universe in the balance as the next game!
    • Played with for Strange Klug. If you play Raffine's or Sig's HaraHara courses (or read the translations), Strange Klug just seems to be this trope. It isn't until you play Amitie's that you learn what exactly Strange Klug is, what Klug did, what the items you got are, and why he was in the ruins at the time.
  • Giggling Villain: Dark Arle in Puyo Puyo 7.
  • Girlish Pigtails: Ringo has pigtails with curls.
  • Good Is Dumb: Amitie should start carrying around a dictionary...
  • Good Is Not Nice: Raffine and Klug, despite being heroes, are mean-spirited.
  • Gosh Dang It to Heck: Every now and then...
  • Gratuitous English: A good amount of the called attacks use this, and most even manage to get out close-to-correct pronunciations. Incubus lives for this and is known for his infamous "Oh, Shit!" in Puyo Puyo SUN.
  • Harmless Villain: For someone named Satan, he usually has different plans than being evil. If he is doing something "evil", the choice he has in mind isn't.
  • Henshin Hero: Puyo Puyo 7 has the Henshin mechanic, which transforms characters into their younger or older selves.
  • Honest Axe: Played with before battling Popoi in Puyo Puyo Fever for Amitie's course.
  • Horny Devils: Incubus. Gee, I do wonder why that's his name! Not that any sex is mentioned, though.
  • Humanity Ensues: Ocean Prince and Ekoro.[context?]
  • Hyperspace Mallet: Ms. Accord has one.
  • Idiot Hair: A few characters. Sig has two strands that even twitch.
  • Incredibly Lame Pun:

Skeleton T(ea) Trio: "It's 'T' time!"
Ringo: "That's just lame!"

Amitie: I never knew that you read this kind of book. (blushes) Gee...
Klug: What, no! That's the wrong page!

  • I Was Quite a Looker: It was inevitable, but Oshare Bones gets a couple lines like this in Puyo Puyo! 15th Anniversary.
  • I Will Wait for You: Oshare's backstory. He's waiting for the day he meets his former love.
  • Jerkass: A lot of characters. Raffine takes the cake though, but Klug's attempting to beat her.
  • Kawaisa: The art style from Puyo Puyo Fever and on.
  • Kick Chick: Raffine and Rulue.
  • Kid Hero: Arle a couple times, especially in Madou Monogatari: she's in kindergarten.
  • Killer Rabbit: Carbuncle in at least one of the spinoff RPGs has a super powerful random gem laser attack, which is carried over into Puyo Puyo Fever and beyond.
    • He's also the hardest boss in Puyo Puyo Fever.
  • Large Ham: The higher the combo goes, the louder the character can get (Akuma in particular starts screaming).
  • Leitmotif: In Puyo Puyo! 15th Anniversary, every character as their own theme. Bosses also have their own theme used exclusively when you fight them in story mode.
  • Lighter and Softer: Considering that Madou Monogatari had a headless Schezo among other Nightmare Fuel...
  • Limit Break: Puyo Puyo Fever introduced Fever Mode, which a player would enter when their power bar was full. During Fever Mode, sets of already-built chains drop into the playing field, just waiting for you to pop them and unleash a HUGE attack on your opponent.
    • Puyo Puyo 7 adds Henshin mode, which actually causes your character to transform, along with all their Puyo. Chibi mode is like Fever, only the Puyo are tiny, whereas in Deka mode you play with huge Puyo that pop in groups of 3 and every match counts as a chain.
  • Little Miss Badass: Feli, Yu, Rider (if a human plays her) and so on.
  • Loads and Loads of Characters: Just LOOK AT THIS! That's not even all of the existing characters. Yeah, sure, most of it's composed of characters unimportant to the plot, but just counting those that actually matter, there are over 45+.
    • So far, only eight of the original characters show up in the Fever Series. They cut the cast into fourths doing so.
  • Love Dodecahedron: Minotaurus wants Rulue, who wants Satan, who wants Arle, and Arle isn't interested. Most fans add another line by making Arle interested in Schezo, who has shown no (real, intentional) affection ever. On top of that, Incubus wants Arle, though it's not clear whether it's for real reasons or just because he's a Horny Devil.
  • Luck-Based Mission: Puyo Puyo! 15th Anniversary adds many new battle modes. One of them is Non-Stop Fever, which is Exactly What It Says on the Tin. While it's appropriately awesome to be in Limit Break mode all the time, you're basically clearing the warning Puyo you start with and then hoping your opponent gets a Puyo they can't match before you do.
    • In Puyo Puyo! 15th Anniversary, there's a chance that all eight levels on any storymode will be different; a lottery is done to decide the games, which can be any (including No Offsetting, which is done to get fever, which is done to make you fail less).
    • Fever itself is this. If you have bad luck, you'll end up getting the wrong type of Puyo. If you're smart, you can build onto the chain, but if not, then you're pretty much screwed.
  • MacGuffin:
    • Satan's evil plot of the day.
    • The Lantern of the Stars and the Rock of the Moon in Puyo Puyo Fever 2.
    • The wishgranting medal of Puyo Puyo! 15th Anniversary.
    • Arle for Puyo Puyo 7.
    • Ekoro in Puyo Puyo!! 20th Anniversary.
  • Man Behind the Man: Satan's the man in Puyo Puyo~n, and Doppelganger Arle's behind him.
  • Mascot: Carbuncle, and Arle to an extent.
  • Match Three Game: The "Match Four" varient.
  • May-December Romance: Lemres (older) and Feli (younger), except Lemres doesn't reciprocate.
  • Meaningful Name: Several of the cast. For example, Amitie is French for "friend", and Amitie is a friendly character in the Puyo Puyo Fever series.
  • Million-to-One Chance: Klug discovers how to unlock the power of his book and release the demon inside, which posseses him. Conveniently, during that same day, Klug's hero Lemres is delivering the exact items needed to unlock the book to Ms. Accord with no protection on them, and you can see where this goes afterwards.
    • Convenient Questing: All three playable characters were hunting for the items Lemres was delivering for their own uses - of course, they end up in Strange Klug's hands; recovering the items depowered him.
  • Mini Game: Puyo Puyo appears as a minigame in Sega Superstars and Sega Superstars Tennis.
    • And that's saying nothing of the other mini-games at Puyo Puyo Fever's websites.
  • Mismatched Eyes: Sig has one red eye and one blue eye due to his demon side. Oshare's right eye has a pink pupil with yellow sclera, while his left eye is merely an eye socket with a yellow pupil.
  • Narcissist: Hohow Bird, Incubus and maybe Raffine
  • Nerd Glasses: Klug, though they make him creepier when they flash.
  • Nice Job Breaking It, Hero: In Puyo Puyo!! 20th Anniversary, Ringo basically tells an amnesiac Ekoro that people don't enjoy pranks, but really enjoy Puyo matches instead. Bad idea. Ekoro soon gets bored with making people happy through Puyo matches one person at a time and tries to find a way to make everyone happy on a large scale, eventually going as far as to try to possess Satan himself.
  • Nintendo Hard: Earlier games. The original Puyo Puyo, which most people in the US experienced as as Mean Bean Machine or Kirby's Avalanche, didn't have the offset rule.
  • Noblewoman's Laugh: Raffine and Rulue have very impressive examples when they get high chain combos. Oshare also has his own that pops up sometimes.
  • No Name Given: The demon in Klug's book, despite becoming an Ensemble Darkhorse and having subtle history within Puyo Puyo Fever 2. We don't even know what he originally looked like!
  • Not Himself: Satan in Puyo Puyo~n, Klug in Puyo Puyo Fever 2, and Arle in Puyo Puyo 7.
  • Odango: Rider's hair style
  • One-Teacher School: In the original series there was a preschool, but the rule seem to have stuck. In Puyo Puyo Fever, Ms. Accord's the only teacher to ever show up.
  • Our Monsters Are Different:
    • Our Mermaids Are Different: Seriri, although she seems to believe in the eat-the-mermaid myth.
    • Our Monsters Are Weird: Satan and Ekoro aren't the only weird ones; you also have a gay skeleton, skeletons who drink tea, off-tune harpies, lovelorn minotaurs...
  • People Puppets: Ekoro loves this trope. His victims are understandably frustrated.
  • Pillar of Light: The strongest final chain finisher for Amitie and Arle in Puyo Puyo Fever 1 and Puyo Puyo Fever 2.
  • Power Floats: Strange Klug's strongest final chain finisher, Hydrangea[3] has him floating inches off the ground.
  • Pride Before a Fall: Klug looks unhappy about being sealed in a book. When he's released, he brushes it off like nothing happened. He does learn from this though; he ends up giving the final item used to break the book's seal to Amitie rather than keep it.
  • Pun-Based Title: The "Tsu" in Puyo Puyo Tsu means "master" and is also the number "two" spoken with a Japanese accent. Likewise, the "SUN" in Puyo Puyo SUN means "three" and also references the new Sun Puyo. Finally, "yon" means "four", hence, Puyo Puyo~n.
  • Red Eyes, Take Warning: Strange Klug's infamous for this. Satan and Sig subvert this, though - Satan WAS threatening once, but has since mellowed out. Sig's case is unemotioinal, even as Black Sig, and he takes everything in calmly and in stride.
  • Red Headed Heroine: Ringo.
  • RPG Elements: Puyo Puyo BOX featured a Quest Mode in which you fight monsters Puyo-style; equipment would boost attack and defense, and heavier equipment would make your Puyo fall faster. Heck, the Quest Mode itself has examples, given it has a lot in common with the Nazo Puyo spinoffs.
    • Heart Container: They're sprawled around the world and must be found.
    • Broken Bridge: The bridge isn't broken, Schezo's sleeping on it!
    • But Thou Must! Not: You cannot say "Yes" to Satan at the end of the game. Yeah, we probably DON'T want to know what he's asking.
  • Satan: The bad guy of the first three games, and a regular character in the series. Tends to be the Final Boss (or at least one of them), as well as a cheater. Thankfully, he's not as threatening or evil as his namesake, and is instead a Stalker with a Crush.
  • Scary Shiny Glasses: Klug has a tendency to get this with a flat-toothed grin. Strange Klug cuts this in half by making only one lense flash whenever he's on screen.
  • Schoolteachers: Ms. Accord.
  • Sealed Evil in a Can: Doppelganger Arle in Puyo Puyo~n.
  • Serious Business: Everyone is determined to play Puyo to solve their problems. Ringo lampshades this a lot.
    • And yes, every problem. It doesn't matter if it's information to bodies, this is the rule to their world.
  • She's Got Legs: Rulue.
  • Shout-Out:
  • Shrinking Violet: Rider.
  • Soul Jar: Klug carries around a possessed book. Yes, bad things happen as a result.
    • And he continues to carry it, now with knowledge it IS possessed. As a result, Puyo Puyo 7 and Puyo Puyo!! 20th Anniversary had appearances by Strange Klug as bonuses; Future Klug in the Deka Fever for Puyo Puyo 7 and as an unlockable character with his own voice clips in Puyo Puyo!! 20th Anniversary.
  • Spell My Name with an "S": There are fans who call Sig "Shigu".
  • Spin-Off: Puyo Puyo is a spinoff of Madou Monogatari, and has had a list of its own spinoffs that are as extensive, if not moreso, than the number of entries in its own series.
  • Stalker with a Crush: Satan always comes up with some insane plan to get Arle to go out with him. Ever tried just walking up to her and asking, dude?
    • Played creepily straight in Puyo Puyo 7. He randomly appears at one point, entering with something along the lines of, "Did I hear my Arle just now?".
  • Summoning Artifacts of Doom: The Bookmark Of The Sun, the Lamp of the Stars, and the Rock of the Moon AKA some moisturizing cream. They're used to unseal Klug's book. See Million-to-One Chance above.
  • Super Senses: Ringo apparently has 20/4 vision.

Ringo: "I can sight the Andromeda Galaxy in the daytime."

  1. For the record, Karous is the final Dreamcast game period.
  2. Or talking to Oshare at one point, or beating Raffine's WakuWaku Course.
  3. See the Strange Klug on the left here for an example.