Shantae: Risky's Revenge - Director's Cut Reviews
Shantae: Risky’s Revenge clearly isn’t as featured-filled, polished, or exciting as its more modern counterparts, but it’s still well worth your time if you’re curious about the wonderful history of the Shantae franchise, or if you’re just a fan of 2D platformers in general. Why did this specific version need to have a brand new PlayStation 5 build is beyond me, as there is very little in here that justifies it being a “next-gen” game, but that doesn’t affect its overall quality.
"Classic revenge story, but just a bit better than last time."
Review in Finnish | Read full review
Overall, I quite enjoyed my time with Shantae: Risky’s Revenge – Director’s Cut. It was a fun little Metroidvania-style adventure that took me the majority of 10 hours to complete. I collected all of the Magic Jams and got all of the abilities and perks from the shop. I had a lot of fun with the game, and it still holds up pretty well by today’s standards for the most part. The biggest flaw is probably just that it could use a better map system. You can download a copy from the Nintendo Switch eShop for $9.99. Can you put a stop to Risky Boots’ evil plot in order to save Sequin Land, Scuttle Town, and your uncle?
Shantae: Risky's Revenge - Director's Cut brings back an old school and very challenging platformer, improving it with a new hi-res presentation layer. Other than this it doesn't change or improve the original game, but it remains a suggested buy for all lovers of the saga and action-platformers in general.
Review in Italian | Read full review
Risky’s Revenge is a traditional Shantae experience, on a smaller scale. This is indeed a fun metroidvania with all the humour and charm of the latest Shantae games, a well-built world, and a unique cast. However, it’s difficult to forget we’re face to face with an old game, as compared to later entries Risky’s Revenge features less variety, an annoyingly simplistic map system and, of course, the several small improvements that WayForward made to the series with this game’s successors.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
If our review convinced you, I wholeheartedly recommend giving Shantae: Risky’s Revenge – Director’s Cut a try. And if you like it, I even more wholeheartedly recommend Shantae and the Pirate’s Curse (also available on Nintendo Switch). It does everything Risky’s Revenge does but even better — with a few gameplay changes, too.
Shantae: Risky's Revenge - Director's Cut is not just “another one” in the Switch library: it's a game with its own style, charisma and identity that arrives at the hybrid ten years after its original release and relives the magic of one of the best adventures of the half-genie without giving up the charm of the 16-bit era.
Review in Portuguese | Read full review
This is a little on the short side, taking me five hours to beat (more or less depending on your need to collect everything or desire to look up information). I find it’s priced reasonably and there is a post game magic mode. Enabling you to use more magic at the expense of half your defense. Which of course requires you to wear a very interesting outfit. If you like achieving things you do get the extra end screens based on your time and how many secret items you’ve found. Outside of some slippery monkey business, a difficult to read map and some annoying layers to jump through, this is a pretty good game.
Delightful spritework, fun characters, a phenomenal soundtrack, and so many poor design decisions it just makes me sad.