Killer Instinct Revisited

C-C-C-COMBO BREAKER! Killer Instinct, or at least this reboot of which I'm revisiting was a free to play offering on Xbox One when it launched with the console. The game featured a decent roster of fighters and was one of the best early games to play on the console. Since its initial release in 2013 the game has received multiple additional seasons and a number of complete overhauls. It's very much a different game today than it was back then and the evolution has been exciting. It's definitely my favorite fighting game at this point providing solid competitive play while still expanding its roster.

Being a fighter game the goal is to compete in 1v1 battles against a series of wacky characters. These range from a wolf guy (Sabrewulf) to a man of complete fire (Cinder). They've introduced a number of cameo fighters as well since then such as General Raam from Gears of War and The Arbiter from Halo. It's nice to see this cross-over happen and it's a wonder that Xbox doesn't have it done more. As mentioned before, the game released in 2013 for Xbox One and was later made available for Windows 10 with Xbox Play Anywhere. The core of the game is free with rotating fighters and characters that you can purchase to expand your choices. I've been lucky to own all the seasons and they've done an amazing job expanding on the core game.


With this being a fighting game the majority of what you do is battle. There was a story mode added later on, but at its initial inception it was purely about combat. You could fight it out online against others that were crazy, against friends for easier games or locally against the AI. I liked to do a mix as there wasn't a ton to play at launch so this took up some time against friends or with the survival mode. It was quick paced, exciting and I didn't get totally destroyed when playing it like in other fighting games. I also love the use of space having multiple angles from which players can actually land hits to build combos. I personally had issues getting my high streak combos going, but that's been made easier since which is nice.

Killer Instinct is also a very visually appealing game whether that's with the recent overhauls or even at launch. There's a clean look to it and getting it to render at 4k makes it very impressive to the eyes. Most of all, its still fun to play whether I want to grab quick matches or invest a larger amount of time into it. There's also such a varied cast of fighters available for whatever type of player you are and that's great. I like to aim for fast paced ones since striking fast is my goal, there's not just a single character but multiple ones that fill that spot. It's this range of diversity in the cast that makes it so interesting and I love how much the game has changed since its launch. Killer Instinct is always a blast and this free to play take on the series has worked well for it.

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Read our Killer Instinct Season 3 Review