Cassette Beasts Reviews
Cassette Beasts has a lot of promise, but bugs and stuttering drain the fun from the Switch version at the time of this review.
The double-battle nature of the game and the beast customization offers players a great deal of strategy to engage with while listening to an excellent soundtrack.
I had a great time with Cassette Beasts, but it was undeniably frustrating in places. It iterates on the Pokemon formula in nearly every possible way, and exploring the world via companion quests rather than just doing a big circle on your Gym challenge creates a wonderful sense of adventure. Cassette Beasts tries a lot of new things and most of them are successful. The story is compelling, the characters are engaging, and the battle system is one of the best I’ve ever used. It doesn’t pull everything off, but I’d much rather play a game that takes risks, rather than one that rehashes the same old formula time and time again.
Fun take on the monster-catching genre that suffers from performance issues
Cassette Beasts, in essence, extends the mechanics of Nintendo's IP and gives the player a wide range of customization combined with the open world concept that many games currently offer. While the audio-visual presentation might not appeal to everyone, this RPG captivates with its well-executed story and diverse elements that evoke nostalgia for the 1980s and 1990s. It's true that the Switch port deserved more polish in technical aspects, but Cassette Beasts doesn't disappoint when expanding on the mechanics introduced by Pokémon. Certainly, the game is a hit for those who like collecting and lots of fun and cute little creatures.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
Introducing interesting and original mechanics, Cassette Beasts revamps the monster collector genre with a much-needed fresh coat of paint.
Cassette Beasts is one of the best and most entertaining monster-collecting games outside of Pokémon.
A fun and charming monster collecting game with an eye-catching aesthetic and wonderful soundtrack that is dripping with style and personality.
Cassette Beasts is a fresh take on the monster collecting genre, featuring both whimsical creatures and actual floating nightmares in its surreal world. A double battle system with dozens of different buffs and debuffs creates a need to be more strategic and its story goes far beyond a desire to become champion or to just catch'em all, but you can still do that too if you want to. A few shortcomings in the quest systems and platforming hold it back, but only slightly. Cassette Beasts proves itself as far more than just a knockoff, and is instead a brilliant game in its own right.
We still have a lot of adventuring left to do in New Wirral, and we're in no way upset about it. More monsters to record and remaster, a few more mysteries to uncover, characters to grow fond of, and about 13,970 more fusions to see. Some (hopefully pre-launch-only) performance issues, wonky balance, and overly complex battle mechanics did little to affect how much we enjoyed Cassette Beasts. In fact, it's one of the better monster-battling games not starring a little electric rodent that you can enjoy on your Nintendo Switch.
The best Pokémon clone by a significant margin and arguably a more enjoyable experience than the more recent 3D games, with some clever new ideas and fantastic visuals.
Cassette Beasts succeeds as a monster fighter designed for those who grew up on Pokémon Red and Blue. While it could benefit from fewer of the mildly irritating puzzles and a story that’s slightly snappier, it’s well worth playing if you have any degree of nostalgia for Pokémon, Shin Megami Tensei, or those long childhood nights you spent playing your Game Boy into the wee hours.
Granted, in many ways it’s another variation on the “creature collector” RPG subgenre, but it is able to differentiate itself nonetheless
Finally, the music in Cassette Beasts is excellent. A large portion of the soundtrack is made up of catchy synth rock, that brings to mind 80s soundtracks like the original animated Transformers movie. There are also lots of background songs that feature full vocals, which was a real treat. The issue with this was that some of the music transitions were quite jarring. Background music is sharply reset by opening menus, talking to NPCs, and entering new areas, and this is very obvious when vocals are cut off. But I still commend Cassette Beasts for trying out vocals on their soundtrack. The music itself is truly memorable.
Cassette Beasts is an addictive and fun videogame that pleasantly engages and excites. It offers a fascinating story and context, as well-implemented sensitive themes. A must have especially for the play structure.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Cassette Beasts is a creative and fast-paced RPG that sends players on an adventure to collect monsters, build relationships, and explore a colorful new world.
They say that if you come for the king, you best not miss. Which is why I’m so amazed to say that Cassette Beasts not only stood tall in its own right, but managed to knock Pokémon down a notch or two in the process. While it’s true it doesn’t do everything right, and I’m still a little annoyed by how open world it is and how vague the type interactions can be, there’s so much to enjoy here. Throw in a lengthy playthrough and postgame content, and you have a game that’s well worth your money. If you’re at all a fan of the monster collector genre, you need to play this. It’s just that simple.
Cassette Beasts is a wonderful time. When it comes to monster capturing and fighting games, I'll take Cassette Beasts over anything else.
Cassette Beasts manages to iterate on Pokemon in a meaningful way. The fantastic music, A+ monsters designs, and fun characters are only slightly held back by the overly-complex combat.