Skelattack Review
"Platforming Bones"
Campaign
This is a really strange sort of platformer game. It’s to the point; which is fine, but it has the weirdest take on difficulty. At times this is a very casual sort of experience that anyone could play, at other points it’s incredibly frustrating and difficult. There really isn’t any sort of consistency to this one. It’s as though almost every area was designed by someone different, it’s just odd. There’s no consistency if you get what I mean. Past that, I actually did for the most part enjoy this. I was just having a hard time getting into it with the bizarre difficulty spikes.
That aside, it’s a shorter game without any sort of extra content to the package. I mean that in the sense that you won’t replay sections as there really aren’t new things to do or to discover. It’s mostly a play and move on sort of thing, which is entirely fine. I thought the general narrative was alright, following a skeleton becoming a warrior to some degree. I really enjoyed the dynamic of narration through the main character, and the bat pal he had.
I thought the two were fun together with some good jokes throughout. There are some neat characters that you’ll meet, and a few distinct areas. These vary in terms of design, and flow. I did like the aspect of exploration, having you rework through certain areas in different ways once you gain something. Nothing too advanced to confuse you, but enough that it feels distinct as you return. There are very minor side things to accomplish, and a number of bosses to deal with along the way.
Gameplay
This is a fairly basic sort of platforming experience. You’ll hop along objects and occasionally perform basic melee moves. The game does have a wall sliding mechanic that is just awful and awkward in its implantation. It has a sort of burst upwards mechanic to it that always ends up getting you killed.
There’s zero cool in regards to how certain areas cause damage, and that’ll force you to redo certain areas a couple of times. It’s just weird, as some areas are super easy whereas others are very difficult. It’s so strange, it can’t decide if it’s a hardcore platformer or an easy going one and that creates some very all over the place gameplay. There a sense of freedom since you can go back to camp using some of the rewards you’ve collected.
They have fast travel, but that takes some decently lengthy loading screens to use. The visuals are generally solid, I really liked the animation style that they were going for with this one. It wasn’t too detailed, but the character models looked great and the environments were mostly interesting. Some of the trap based areas were a tad bland however. The insta-kill objects were particularly boring to look at.
The Conclusion
Skelattack is an okay platformer, it has some very strange difficulty spikes though generally charming characters that are backing it. I would have liked a bit more out of the experience, though it’s fine as a precise play. You won’t really get any benefit out of going back after completion, and it’s just a play to complete sort of time.
Again, I definitely had some issues with how the difficulty, and certain areas in this were handled. It’s as though it couldn’t decide on what sort of game it wanted to be. At times it was so easy that anyone could give it a whirl, whereas other times it felt like it had an insane spike to it. The visuals definitely didn’t lean towards being too difficult, at least in my opinion.
The wall jumping wasn’t very well implemented, though basic platforming elements were alright. I liked the visuals, at the same time didn’t find them to be anything too particularly wild or unique. It’s just a generally fine sort of time. It gets the job done, but doesn’t really excel at any particular aspect. Perhaps, aside from the skeleton and bat duo, those two were fun to see in action together.
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Skelattack Review on Xbox One X
Review Code Provided by Hill+Knowlton Strategies
Rating Overall: 6.0
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