Cartoon Network: Battle Crashers is a side-scrolling beat 'em up video game developed by French studio Magic Pockets and published by GameMill Entertainment in North America and Maximum Games in Europe. It was released for the Nintendo 3DS, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One on November 8, 2016, with the Nintendo Switch version on October 31, 2017.
Contents
- 1 Plot
- 2 Why It Crashes
- 3 Reception
- 4 Trivia
- 5 Videos
Plot[]
The protagonists of six Cartoon Network shows must defeat the shard creatures.
Why It Crashes[]
- It is an extremely obvious rip-off of Castle Crashers by The Behemoth. It even has a similar-sounding title.
- It contains unnecessary padding, as you have to replay certain stages just to get a hidden item.
- You can only play as six characters (Finn & Jake together as one, and Mordecai & Rigby together as one) and only six shows are represented in the game, those being Adventure Time, Steven Universe, Clarence, Regular Show, Uncle Grandpa, and The Amazing World of Gumball.
- Speaking of the characters, Steven Universe (currently one of Cartoon Network's most popular and well-reviewed shows) isn't really represented well in this game. First of all, only Steven (the main protagonist of that show) is playable, one of Steven's attacks in the game is a bubble, even though it is only used for defensive purposes in the actual show (though to be fair, the devs didn't really have much to work with in regards to Steven's abilities from the show). One of the game's hidden items is a map to Beach City, even though Steven already lives there. Finally, Frybo (a one-off antagonist in the actual show) was used as the boss for the SU-themed levels instead of any of the show's recurring antagonists (such as the Homeworld Gems).
- Related to the above, the game lacks any characters from the 1990s and 2000s Cartoon Network shows such as, Dexter's Laboratory, Ben 10, Johnny Bravo, The Powerpuff Girls, Ed, Edd n Eddy, Samurai Jack, Codename: Kids Next Door, and Foster's Home for Imaginary Friends as the game only has characters from 2010s Cartoon Network shows (except the four described below).
- And remember to keep in mind that Apple & Onion, Summer Camp Island, Victor and Valentino, and O.K. KO Let's Be Heroes! all didn't exist at the time, because they were not on the air yet.
- It feels like a Flash or Unity browser game that someone decided to greenlight as a full console release, according to PlayStation LifeStyle.
- Bland and uninspired boss battles that often rely more on enemy hordes than being challenging.
- No online co-op.
- The game is a big grind-fest.
- Enemies take too much damage before they die.
- There's no voice acting for the characters; the game resorts to using text boxes.
- Cheap graphics that look like a free Flash game on Newgrounds made by one person, even though it partially went for a 2.5D look.
- Even after the overwhelmingly negative reception the game received, it was ported to the Nintendo Switch nearly a whole year after it was released, but that version wasn't an improvement in the slightest.
- The Nintendo versions of the game are notably inferior to the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One versions, with no multiplayer support for the 3DS version (it would've required 2-4 3DSs, each with their own copies of the game, either physical or digital) and no Pro Controller support for the Switch version.
- Dumb final boss concept. The final boss is disguised with several masks faking random characters until it gets down to Uncle Grandpa. Uncle Grandpa is actually one of the characters that confront this masked final boss. In fact, this whole scene is a cliched reference to Scooby-Doo.
- Terrible animation in every way possible, especially since all the respective shows this game was based off did this better.
Reception[]
Battle Crashers received extremely negative reviews from critics and fans alike. A reviewer for Daily Mirror described it as a "glorified browser flash game", and wrote that "real talent goes into making something this bland out of characters as interesting as these." PlayStation LifeStyle was another publication that wrote it had the feel of a cheaply-made flash game: "Quite frankly, this feels like a Flash or Unity game, that someone decided to greenlight as a full console release."
Some reviewers also criticized the padding of the game's length due to the fact that the player has to replay certain stages just to get a hidden item. Jed Whitaker of Destructoid was one of these critics, and was especially harsh towards the poor grasp of Steven Universe source material in the game.
Trivia[]
- The website of the game shows a DS version, but this version does not exist, meaning that it was probably planned but never released as the DS was no longer supported by the time the game came out. The PlayStation 3, Wii, Wii U, and Xbox 360 might have seen similar, despite the game was not being planned for those systems.
