I’m excited to announce that our latest PixelJunk title, All You Need is Help, is coming to Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One and Game Pass, and is available to play from today!

All You Need Is Help marks the 17th entry in the legendary PixelJunk series, which started 17 years ago. At its core, All You Need is Help is a puzzle game where you are unable to rotate your own character, so like the name suggests – you really need to help each other by rotating your characters and working together to find the solution.

With the global lockdowns, I became increasingly concerned about the lack of good co-op games. All You Need is Help was born out of the team’s inability to closely communicate with each other during the pandemic as everyone kind of got buried in their own bubble. For two weeks, we held a game jam at the office and made a variety of prototypes. All You Need is Help was the favorite and helped the staff come together at a difficult time, providing a sense of cooperation and camaraderie. I think this game will be a great experience for families and friends, and bring people closer to one another.

All You Need is Help features over 100 levels, and includes many refreshing mini-games. In most levels, your little creature will transform into a unique shape. Players will need to look around and figure out how to fit together into the various puzzle’s solutions. While your creature can move and run about freely, they are totally unable to rotate. Instead, everyone needs to help out their friends and push them around to the right angles. I look forward to seeing how players communicate with each other and all the chaos that will ensue!

All You Need is Help also has cross-platform support so players will be able to play with all of their friends, regardless of the platform they downloaded it on. All You Need is Help is a four-player game, so grab three friends and play together, via couch co-op or online play.

All You Need is Help’s title is inspired by the Beatles’ song, All You Need is Love. The game has a really unique vibe to it as the PixelJunk team incorporated influences from all over the world, including of course our beautiful home, Kyoto.

To match the game’s aesthetic, I contacted an old friend of mine, local folk musician Tomoe Watanabe and she agreed to take part! For All You Need is Help, Tomoe formed an exclusive band called Helper Skelters with some of her previous collaborators and friends and I mixed and produced the tracks myself.

The soundtrack is very unusual for a game; it is fully acoustic and incorporates a wide variety of percussion instruments, all played live. Tomoe’s vocals are very distinctive and perfectly match the game’s happy aesthetic. Helper Skelters recently performed the soundtrack live at the world’s largest indie game festival, BitSummit, here in Kyoto!

There are also a lot of customization options in the game. As you play through the levels, you’ll receive gacha coins to help unlock new skins, toys, furniture and even the odd musical instrument that can be used to show off to your friends.      

I’m excited to see everyone playing and enjoying the chaotic and fun world of All You Need is Help ! Download it and begin helping your friends today!