A fun game with a dumb name. For anyone out there who grew up playing the super smash bros series, this is basically a knock-off "platform fighter." Being a knock-off doesn't necessarily mean that it is bad, quite the contrary, in fact. It adds a much-needed competitive atmosphere to the genre that smash bros defined, while allowing for (relatively) stable online 1v1s. The game is only in pre-release alpha atm, but there definitely seems to be a large enough following already in addition to a dedicated dev team to keep this game going strong until an official release. There have been plenty of sneak peeks and leaks at what is on the horizon, and it seems promising. Normally I don't buy into pre-release games, but this one seems certain to grow, and even if development ceases, I'd still be happy with my purchase.
Currently the game only has 6 characters and 5 stages to choose from, yet there are at least 2 more characters coming, with 3 more stages. The stages are fairly generic, but in a game like this the stage doesn't make the game, the controls/mechanics and characters do. This game's main inspiration was smash bros melee, which is widely regarded to have the best mechanics of the series, so it's instantly great in that department. While smash has many clone and pseudo-clone characters, each of these 6 are all 100% unique. Not only are they unique, but in comparison to the smash series, each of them feel and play entirely differently. Not everyone's recovery move just sends them upwards a little. One character creates a vertical pillar that he stands upon, and it will remain there as a solid object for the rest of the match until destroyed. A different character teleports to a puddle on the ground, while another can teleport to the enemy. Instead of all characters being able to only use their strong finisher attacks when grounded, one can only use them while airborn. Then there is another guy which can create a clone of himself at any time. Every character in smash follows the same fairly generic formula, while each of these challenge you to rethink how you play a "platform fighting game."
It only offers a training mode, 1v1 online, or up to 4 players local (with or without cpus) at the moment, but there are several different modes on the way, including some sort of singleplayer story mode and challenge mode. Even with the minimal launch content, I'd give it a solid 8.5/10, with a 10 being super smash bros melee and a 1 being that playstation one that I never even bothered to play it looked so bad. The only real reason it doesn't get a 10 imo is because sometimes the online matchups can be too laggy to even bother trying to play. Unfortunately the game doesn't tell you your opponent's ping (or yours), so you never really know what is to blame, the game's servers or the fact that you keep getting paired up with chinamen. Either way, hopefully matchmaking will prove to be smoother in the coming updates.
http://store.steampowered.com/app/383980/
