Castle Crashers Review

Castle Crashers

The Behemoth developed one of the most satisfying, unique and fun to play, 4 player co-op beat em ups ever! Released on the Xbox live market place on August 27^th 2008, Castle Crashers quickly went up to be one of the most downloaded XBLA games in its history of release. The Behemoth studios were vaguely known for their development of Alien hominid, another chaotic game but much more of a side scrolling shoot em up than a beat em up, released on the PlayStation 2 and Nintendo GameCube in 2004. A PAL Version for Microsoft’s Xbox was then released later on in 2005.The Behemoths first game ‘Alien Hominid’ was brilliant as it re-invented arcade games such as ‘Metal Slug’ which was a massive hit in the 90’s. ‘Castle Crashers’ much like ‘Alien Hominid’ is a classic side-scroller but this time a beat em up yet none the less fantastic and enjoyable to play.

 Credit to the originality of Castle Crashers as there are next to none other competitors to this game and its genre as its mechanics, colour, art and humour are stunning which makes this game a royal gem of the gaming world. Smashing your lollipop around a golem painter with a tool box for a head or using your magic to fend off a giant man eating cat are just a few of the ridiculous features of the game which make you want to come back for more and more. This carnage is best experienced with a group of your mates up for a laugh on a Friday night.

The Experience system is great and easy to use with their only being 4 stats you can upgrade after levelling up. This may seem like a small variety of choices but by using this system, not much time is wasted tweaking your experience bars post quest. Whether you want to be the tank of the group or a high hitting mage, there are various bonuses that allow you to monitor how your character is levelling and gaining his/her powers. Attacks get stronger and more magnificent as you bang more experience on each of the stats which is reflected by the combat text after each hit not to mention the weapon visuals. Progressively the enemies become a lot stronger as you level yourself while they also get crazier with their gimmicks and appearance.

References to other games are also included with the alien spaceship escape (Alien Hominid) and the similarities to Golden Axe where there are small grunt like creature running across your screen which carry treasure.  You will find yourself stumbling across many bosses along the way of the story and using a lot of health potions as you reach the final stages of the game. As you could imagine, there are plenty of video game clichés being thrown at you which can sometime be irritating like your average reincarnation boss battles which take a lot of your time trying to figure out their next gimmick to be able to take them out.

Gameplay itself is crisp and responsive making it easy to rack up a combo by using heavy, light, magic and bow attacks, not to mention the unlockable combos available by levelling your character. Another clever addition to the game is the pets you find by using your shovel to dig up treasure or defeating enemies. These pets usually give you a buff or an extra ability such as to move quickly through water or adding more points to your defence. These pets vary from seahorses to laser orbs, all useful in different combat situations.

The graphics are aesthetically pleasing throughout and are bright and vivid while keeping a natural sharp image during all animations. The cartoonish feel of the game works exceptionally well with the upbeat, fast paced music which puts you right in the middle of the action. The swishes of swords and the blasts of magic can be heard almost constantly when playing solo or with friends. The sound, much like the graphics are kept sharp and on cue in each individual game mode and stage.

Story mode or ‘Castle Crashers’ as it’s called in-game, follows your character trying to retrieve a magic purple crystal that is stolen from the king by a dark wizard at the castle at the beginning of the game. This crystal in the wrong hands could destroy anyone in its path. While searching for this crystal, the 4 princesses are also kidnapped and saved one by one after defeating boss monsters at the end of each themed level. Throughout the main story you find yourself fighting many interesting foes and collecting unique weapons where you can swap them at anytime by visiting the blacksmiths. Each weapon has different statistics which determine whether they have a critical hit chance or if they increase or decrease one of your own statistics. DLC can also be purchased to add more weapons which add an extra edge to you game when playing the harder stages online.

 There are around 24 different characters that can be unlocked by completing the game with the pre-unlocked ones or by downloading them online for a few Microsoft points. The Four main characters are the coloured knights Red, Blue, Green and Orange which all have different spells similar to most characters. The Red knight has an electricity spell which shocks opponents which can be a game changer when potions need to be used. The Blue Knight has the power to freeze enemies which is self-explanatory in how it’s used. The green knight has a poisonous spell which fires out a large burst of green gas knocking enemies backwards while the orange knight uses fire to his advantage. These characters, as you’d had thought are matched to each of the princesses making multiplayer have to indefinite objective of ‘fighting for your woman!’ The game has a face-off between all characters playing the game after defeating the main bosses making all of you fight against each other to claim the princess kept hostage by them. This is where skill and being competitive is introduced after playing casually for a few minutes.

The Features that you’d expect to be in a four player co-op game are all here. Local which enables four players to play the three game modes on one screen or alternatively for you to play solo through ‘castle crashers’. Xbox Live multiplayer which allows four players to play through Xbox live on different consoles. The three game modes available to play are ‘Castle Crashers’ the main story, ‘All you can quaff’, a button bash game mode to prove who has the quickest fingers and ‘Arena’.

Another really cool feature is how the games saves cache files to your profile which allows you to play with your character on any console after recovering your account if you travel a lot. Each individual character has their own level but gold, weapons and pets are shared so starting a new character isn’t such a drag.

At a steep price of 1200 Microsoft Points (£13.50) for an Xbox Live Arcade Game, Castle Crashers is definitely value for money and will have you playing for hours on end alone or with friends. An easy ten out of ten for this absolute magical and inspiring arcade game which gives us hope that something even more special may be yet to come from The Behemoth!