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Castle Crashers
Publisher: The Behemoth
Developer: The Behemoth
Genre: Action
Release Date: August 27, 2008
Platform: XBL
Reviewer: Eric
Back in 2004 The Behemoth surprised the world with their first video game
release, Alien Hominid. In those four years the company has been keeping a
pretty low key, all they have done in this point was create Alien Hominid on the
Xbox 360. Will Castle Crashers bring back The Behemoth to the gaming world?
Castle Crashers takes everything you love from old beat-em-ups like the Teenage
Mutant Ninja Turtles arcade game and Golden Axe. The game doesn’t stop there
because Castle Crashers adds in plenty of RPG elements. This aspect opens up a
whole new world to these kinds of games. In a world that is fixed on 3D and lazy
mash-ups, The Behemoth have done what developers have wanted to do for years.
As one of the king’s knights you must find who kidnapped the king’s four
daughters. This pretty much makes up the games entire story. There are not any
real plot twists or major time frames that make Castle Crashers story something
elaborate. You really don’t need a huge story for a game like this; Castle
Crashers is trying to take us back to a day when video games were fun to play.
There isn’t a whole lot of creative design when it comes to the stages and
characters. Everything is kept to a few main designs and then the colors will
change or they’ll learn new abilities. Remember when video games were like this?
How about the fire, ice, forest, and sand stages? Yup, Castle Crashers has all
of that. If all of this is a problem to you then this is not the game for you at
all.
Combat is simple. You get two attacks, heavy and low. There is also magic for
your characters and items, but you’ll mainly find yourself hitting the same two
buttons. Castle Crashers is so simple anyone can play it. No matter how bad you
may be at video games you will be able to complete this game, it just matters
how much time you put into it.
Certain points in this game you will find yourself wanting to give up. This is
thanks to the long-ranged attacks your enemies will throw at you. Depending
where you are it seems like these attacks will hit you. Not only that the other
enemies will attack you at the same time, making it almost impossible to get
back up. If you do happen to die you will just have to start over in the stage,
but it is the principal how hard it is to dodge these attacks. Not even the
guard button can save you at points.
Role playing game fans will find themselves investing hours into this game. Each
character, even the hidden ones, can level up. When you gain a level you can
point a skill point into any of your characters stats. You can build your
character however you want, balance your character or continue to level up and
build a power house that can kill enemies in one hit.
Throughout the game you will find new weapons and animals. Both of these things
can either be found during the game or purchased at different shops. You’ll be
able to change what animal follows you and which weapon you use at your camp.
What doesn’t help too much is whenever you find a weapon or animal you won’t
know what it does. So if you are going to fight a boss or you’re getting pounded
by a group of enemies this can either kill you or help out. It is a gamble, but
your best bet is finding all the weapons and animals in the game.
During the game you will encounter arenas. By going through these you will
unlock new characters. There are well over a dozen characters in the game, some
of which can only be unlocked if you beat the game a few times. The secrets
don’t stop there either, you will literally spend more time on this game than
most next generation games, and the asking price of $15 seems too low.
Castle Crashers does have some online features. As of now it is nearly
impossible to join a game or even creating one with active gamers. There are
known problems and a patch is already in the works. I have only been able to
join a game once and everything was running smooth. It is just a real shame that
this game didn’t have perfect online gameplay, you are spending more than enough
on this game.
Final Verdict
All of the best elements from games from yesteryear are included in Caste
Crashers. If you enjoy mindless hours of beat-em-ups then this is the perfect
game for you. True Castle Crashers might be more than most Xbox Live games but
you get a whole lot more in this game than anything else out there today.
Rating
9.25 out of 10
Castle Crashers Trailer
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