Just two years after the release of Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl, the Nicktoons have been thrust together once again in the name of licensed platform fighting, of all things, in Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2. The original was a solid outing with deep mechanics, but was held back by a lack of polish outside of gameplay, and although history isn’t exactly repeating itself with the sequel, it certainly rhymes.
Anyone familiar with the first game will immediately notice something different about the fighters, they all feel a lot heavier. Rather than zipping around at lightning speed, each and every character has been slowed down considerably, giving more weight to each movement, but also a bizarre floatiness in the air with serious momentum on the ground.
It would be unfair to call the controls ‘slippery’, but the ultra-tight feel has definitely been lost somewhat. As we said, this does mean that attacks have notably more weight and impact to them, so there's something of a trade-off at play. Characters do have more abilities, though, now able to dodge left, right, or on the spot out of a shield, and a new ultimate attack that fills the screen and deals massive damage and knockback to any foe caught within its blast.
If all that sounds a little familiar, then you’ve probably played a game in the Super Smash Bros. series. The original Nickelodeon Brawl wasn’t shy about its inspirations, but it still managed to have its own identity and distinctions from Nintendo’s colossal crossover fighter. Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2, on the other hand, says ‘To hell with it’ and decides to mimic as much as it can.
That’s not to say there aren’t things that make it stand out; the new Slime Meter can give you more powerful attacks, save you from being unceremoniously yeeted from the battlefield, and enact that ultimate attack we mentioned that we promise doesn’t Smash and absolutely isn’t Final. It’s a neat addition that will raise the skill ceiling, but the fighters’ movesets have been altered so as to bring that skill cap down a bit.
Many of the madcap moves that the likes of Nigel Thornberry and Ren and Stimpy employed have been replaced by a more standard fare of clobbering techniques. This undeniably makes the game more straightforward and less confusing when picking up a new character for the first time, but it’s lost some of its originality and edge in the process. It’s still fun and responsive and no doubt makes balancing easier, but some of the chaotic magic is gone.
Where Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 does improve things is in its single-player offering. The new campaign mode has you trekking through a roguelite-esque series of levels in order to stop the evil Vlad Plasmius from controlling the minds of everyone in the universe, or something. The plot’s fairly thin, but there are some frankly delightful character interactions that can occur as a result. We particularly loved an exchange between the now (sadly) NPC Powdered Toast Man and a besotted Ren and Stimpy. There are at least a few long-time Nickelodeon fans on the writing team, and it shows.
The gameplay of this new mode is a slightly less exciting affair. It’s not bad by any means, but it wears thin disappointingly quickly after the sixth bout of fighting minor bot characters as they spawn repeatedly and sometimes don't even throw themselves to their own doom. Boss fights are a pleasant change of pace, but there aren’t as many of them as we’d like, so you’ll be fighting the Flying Dutchman an awful lot.
But there’s an enormous elephant in the room separate from the one used in Nigel Thornberry’s ultimate. The game runs at 30fps on Switch. For a platform fighter, this is bordering on a death knell. But the visuals have had a big step at least, haven’t they? No, they haven’t.
Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 looks rough and runs rougher. The static camera and limited models on screen should make optimisation a breeze compared to something like an open-world RPG, but that apparently wasn’t enough. Docked, the game is fuzzy at best, with no shadows and basic lighting. Characters look flat and lacking in detail, and when playing handheld you can experience all of the above, but at an even lower resolution. Loading screens for a single fight can take in excess of 30 seconds, and frame drops on certain stages are frequent and expected, even with only two fighters at a time.
The menu music doesn’t always loop properly, there’s no way to select custom controller bindings in certain modes, and as for the ultimate moves, they’re fun in theory, but seem to be missing certain sounds, lessening their impact considerably. The initiator’s one-liners often get cut off early, and NPC fighters from the campaign have zero animation when caught in the blast, making them slide around like confused chess pieces.
These issues reek of a game that is still in development, rather than a finished product. It’s a crying shame, as just like with its predecessor, there’s a really solid game under here, possibly even more matured (if a little less distinct), but it’s buried under so much chaff that it spoils everything and frustrates more than it entertains.
Conclusion
Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 has the potential to be a strong platform fighter, but on Switch it’s wrapped up in a frankly incredible amount of poor performance and presentation. Fighters feel weightier, and the new campaign adds context and charm to the package, but it'll take a miracle patch to save it from being a choppy, blurry, flat-looking barrel of disappointment on Nintendo's console.
Comments 47
Interesting Im seeing a lot of decent reviews for the PS5 version.
Oh well
It still appears to be a generic and lifeless game. The best game after Smash Bros is D.O.N Battle Stadium
I have 2 sides
Brawling Balling
And this neither of them. Shame, heard it was good on other consoles
GameMill was probably desperate to kick this game out the door before the Christmas season. It will probably somewhat work after a patch in December / January, at best.
What about voice over, did they even implement voice work to all the characters?
Keep in mind this is also a download code in a box on Switch. Shows you how much they cared about the Switch version.
30fps is plenty good enough. maybe they're rendering at 30 but sampling input at 60. there are very likely reasons it runs at 30fps and probably not the fault of "optimizations"
@marcelominucelli DON Battle stadium isn't even the best smash-like with those characters.
Jump Superstars and Jump Ultimate Stars were both better.
Ouch: I was actually pretty interested in picking up the Switch version myself but the performance/framerate issues have instantly turned me off. Seriously: if you can't get a FIGHTING game to run at 60FPS then what's the point in even bringing it over in the first place?
At least the other console versions seem to be fine so I'll probably just grab it on one of those eventually. Massive shame the Switch version ended up like this 😔
@FuecocoBoi09 Would you say you're bawling?
They definitely rushed this for the holiday....hopefully they can at least patch it to fix/improve it but geez...so tired of seeing games launch in this state.
Just lost all interest in the game, then rofl. Too bad, I was kinda looking forward to it. Hopefully it gets fixed up a bit later down the line.
I still believe all of this should've been DLC for the first game.
If it goes the way of the Nickelodeon racers by GameMill, I expect to see All-Stars Brawl 3 by 2025.
@HammerKirby : Are you sure about that? I'm aware that the US release is digital only, but there has been no such disclosure for the European/Australian physical releases so far (which are still over a month away).
Imagine owning TWO of these middling, mediocre games when you can get Smash Ultimate on the same console.
They can never get out of Smash Bros' shadow.
Welp, one more reason for me to wait to get this other than the "physical" being code in a box, but if they eventually patch it to improve it then I'll definitely get it as I really like what I've seen of the game in the character spotlights and the single player appeals to me despite its faults!
Damn imagine botching on the platform that has your greatest target audience (smash fans/players).
Everything about this sequel left a bad taste in my mouth. Characters getting dropped for no reason, the more weight feel, and the roster feels overall worse then the last game.
Nobody still can replicate the success of Smash.
RIP. I genuinely considered getting this at some point, but the first red flag was when they removed CatDog. I didn't get the first game, but they would have been my main.
@HammerGalladeBro
but the gameplay is quite a bit better in this. Also a full campaign.
DLC would have had the same gameplay pretty much
Its just the switch version which is bad
Download code in box?? damn.
I feel like nickelodeon really misses the mark on why super smash bros became successful between fun single player modes like break the target, homerun contest, classic and adventure also all stars mode etc.
But the nickelodeon version it failed first game taken too long implementation of voices and lackluster game modes and controls are terrible so its not surprising the fact second one repeating same mistakes means they haven't learned nothing its boring soulless game and not even good smash clone.
That's an ouch, but I'll probably look out for a sale anyway. Still need to get the first game as well, so looking for a sale on that game is probably the way to go for me for the moment.
Another game where the Switch port was rushed out and not properly optimized for the console. I'm getting real tired of this...
Suppose I can always wait and see if they improve this version with patches or just buy the game on another system when it goes on sale.
@HammerKirby Seriously? That's both greedy, lazy, and contemptuous.
@anothergamer100 so buy this for PS5 instead? Got it lol
30fps? Oooooof. Absolute deal breaker for a fighting game. How on earth did they think that was acceptable? Genuinely broken and shocking for the genre. 5/10 is too generous.
@Serpenterror All the playable characters have it, at least. The first game has had voiceover for over a year, too.
Based on this review, I get everyone wanting to give this game a pass, but keep in mind that NL understandably reviewed only the Switch version. The game's getting quite a few 8/10 reviews, presumably from outlets that played on other consoles (IGN even gave it a 9/10).
Fingers crossed that Switch performance gets patched, because I doubt my PC will run this any better.
This is the type of game I would enjoy if I didint have smash bros. like my friends were begging me to play brawlhalla on pc with them the other day and I did. It was fine but it felt like diet smash bros
I was going to get this on switch🤔
Might have to get it on ps5 instead 🤔😊
From what I've played. I rate this a least a point higher. The gameplay has improved though the slime mechanic takes some getting used to, a bunch of voice lines , and a single player campaign which has a few elements that Smash Bros World of Light needed (like having random mooks to fight) IMO. But yeah the Switch version while nothing too debilitating defiantly needs more optimization. The load times needs shorting (the loading music loops twice!) and the fighting gameplay (at least outside campaign mode and maybe bosses) needs to be 60 fps. Any fighting game worth their salt IS REQUIRED to be 60 fps.
@timschel 30 fps is disgusting for a fighting game, the standard is 60 fps across almost any fg, no higher, no lower
I’d imagine this’ll go on sale pretty quick with all the DLC included.
@marcelominucelli For GameCube?
@Sisilly_G Sorry I should've specified. I assumed it would apply to Europe as well. But I was talking about the US version specifically.
In general provided it's relatively stable I really couldn't care less about 30 vs. 60.
@Arawn93 pc is definitely the biggest platform for the game since it was the biggest for NASB 1 and it’s the biggest platform for almost every other good platform fighter. Still a shame the switch port sucks though
I still might get a complete/gold edition on sale in the future since Plankton is a playable character.
I wasn't going to buy this version anyway but still a shame for those who have no other way to play it. I'll be playing it on Steam Deck myself.
I recommend not buying game mill ports on switch, they do not care anymore.
Strong showings on other consoles. A shame about the Switch port... but I was planning on getting this on Steam anyway.
Well this is disappointing to see. I did like the last game, it and rivals of aether were pretty good at being a smash bros like game. I will get this on Xbox then. It does seem like a good game on other platforms at least.
@Serpenterror VO is in the game day one.
Wanted this so badly. If they don’t patch performance I’m out though.
@Sisilly_G Rivals of Aether is also really good! It’s the only other platform fighter I have on Switch. I also heard Slap City is awesome, too
I’m waiting on the physical. But if it is indeed a code in the box here in Australia also, they can stick it. It’s a shame though I was genuinely looking forward to this.
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