Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl Reviews
As someone who grew up with all of these characters, it’s beautiful to see them re-contextualized in a game that shows them the love and care they deserve. While it lacks content and a key component of Nickelodeon’s formula in the absence of voice acting, it is a fun, inviting fighting game. If you’re someone who holds Nickelodeon and it’s character’s close in any way at all, or if you’re just a fan of the Super Smash Bros. style fighters and need a break from them specifically, I would pick this one up.
Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl contains the beginnings of what may end up being the most unlikely competitive fighting franchise ever conceived. It knows its audience and it has been able to appease them, garnering a lot of excitement along the way. However, where Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl missteps is in the handling of its properties. It's easy to get excited about the thought of Reptar dash-dancing across Jellyfish Fields, but it's tough to buy into the idea when there's a rogue ukulele serenading the mute dinosaur while it happens.
Sweet childhood, welcome back. Crashing its way onto the Playstation 5 this October is Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl, a partnership and collaboration between Ludosity and FairPlay Labs. It’s the very first console title they are bringing into their newly procured Nickelodeon Brawl franchise which is otherwise focused on mobile gaming titles.
Unfortunately, Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl is simply punching well above its class. While younger kids might get a kick out of its cast of characters (although they’ll likely be wondering who in the world Powdered Toast Man is), there are far better family titles and platform fighters than this. Most of these shows were full of life and this game fails to capture almost any of that charm through its unrewarding gameplay and cheap presentation. While F is for friends that do stuff together, those that play Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl won’t find much F.U.N. here.
Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl is clearly a clone of Smash Bros. which ends up pleasing for its solid gameplay and flawless online. However, the single-player content is basically non-existent and the multiplayer is very competitively oriented – those looking for something "chaotic" may be disappointed.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
Probably the most fun you can have in a Nickelodeon videogame, this is a derivative but fun fighter that kids will enjoy, but will probably do quite well in the competitive community too.
Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl is full of quirky references, easter eggs and cameos of many popular Nicktoons franchises. But once you manage to see past that, it's easy to notice what a shallow and empty game this is. Sure, it can be fun at times, but the magic dies down quite easily.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
For a fighting game, Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl is superb for its genre. Its gameplay and combat are fun in all the correct ways. Nickelodeon fans will most certainly enjoy playing as their favorite characters growing up, including Spongebob, Aang, CatDog, and Danny Phantom, among others. However, you can only play the game for so long before you run out of content to play around with. I’m sure there’s more in store for this title down the line, but for now, your experience is limited to 20 characters and only about four game modes.
Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl attempts to follow the Super Smash Bros. formula, but it just doesn’t take things far enough. There’s a general lack of polish to its presentation and its physics, making it hard for even the most diehard Nicktoons fan to get engaged. Not even Nigel Thornberry and his smashing antics can save this platform fighter.
Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl is a love letter to those of us who grew up watching the famous television channel and its most iconic series. It has a good roster of well-balanced fighters and is quite fun to play. Its main problems are the limited number of game modes, the absence of certain emblematic characters of the company and a handling that would need to be patched to solve certain bugs.
Review in Spanish | Read full review
Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl has the potential to be great, it just doesn’t quite reach that level. What’s there is pretty good, but the lack of polish and small amount of content makes All-Star Brawl fall short of the excellent party fighter that it could be. Hopefully, the devs continue to support the game and polish it as time goes on, as it could be a diamond in the rough given a bit more time in the oven.
All Star Brawl runs and plays absolutely fine, and probably has just about enough to keep itself interesting for the younger gamers with its extras. As long as you don’t expect something on the scale of Smash, in terms of content and replayability, this is a really well made and built fighter that will definitely offer lots of laughs and plenty of fun.
You might be able to stick around for long enough to choose your own main (mine’s Oblina, just FYI), but once you’ve done that, Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl will have nothing else for you. Even playing with friends can’t manage to make the game exciting or engaging, and chances are, it’ll end up at the bottom of your gaming pile before you can say “smashing!”.
If developers Ludosity and Fair Play Labs can stick with the game post-launch and build it up, it could end up being a completely different story in a year or so, but as it stands, Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl feels like the shell of what it could be.
Those looking for a fun experience will likely find it here, but it may be short lived if you aren’t into the game competitively.
Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl is a solidly built platform fighter, hampered by connectivity issues and compelling solo modes.
Nickelodeon All-Stars is an obvious yet forgivable clone the manages to squeeze tiny sprinkles of originality in to its mix. However, the chasm left by what is missing from the game at the moment is almost irredeemable. Whilst the actual fighting mechanics of the core gameplay are well worked for competitive play, the lack of voice acting, game modes and general party utility leaves much to be desired. The general zaniness of Nickelodeon carries reasonably in the game, but certainly not enough to warrant purchase by casual players who are fans of the franchise.
Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl simply feels like a barebones platform fighter. Combat is pretty decent, but there’s just so little surrounding it. The game’s greatest sin is how little it leans into the over-the-top zaniness that is Nickelodeon and its extensive history of memorable characters and moments. It lacks identity while being based on some of the most unique entertainment properties of the past few decades.