Koro Koro Puzzle Happy Panechu! is an exclusive Gameboy Advance puzzle game exclusive to Japan. It is one of three GBA games to use the TILT SENSOR (the other two being Yoshi Topsy Turvy and WarioWare Twisted).

We can easily take motion sensing for granted today as it is everywhere including our phones, the 3DS, Playstation controllers, and even the DS had a Motion Pak cart that plugged into Slot-2 of DS and DS Lite consoles. Having tilt sensitivity in a GBA game, especially in 2002, was a big deal back in the day.

In this video, I wanted to walk through the menus since they are all in Japanese. If you are an English-only speaker, this can be used as a guide since there are many modes/menus to navigate.

Then, I wanted to demonstrate gameplay and how the tilt sensor works. I know recording footage off a GBA isn’t the best but this cannot really be captured through emulation or awkwardly holding a Gamecube through a Gameboy Player. So I used my backlit GBA.

It is possible to play this game using a GBA SP even though the controls are reversed. Thing is, this game was released BEFORE the SP model was made available but the devs had the foresight to include this feature. To play using a GBA SP, follow these steps:
-Choose the OPTIONS mode (far green icon on first main menu)
-then choose the BLUE icon (tilt sensitivity)
-press and hold these buttons in this order: Up (d-pad), L button, R button, B.
-listen for the chime to confirm, press A to confirm
-*this setting will be saved when you turn off the power. Repeat these steps to go back to original GBA mode.

Let me know what you think. Are you into weird handheld games? Did you know about this tilt-sensor Japan exclusive GBA title?

Thanks for watching.