The Alien Hominid creators make one of the best DL titles ever,
I’ve been going on Newgrounds for a long time now, and I still go on it daily. It really is the best flash animation site on the web. I remember when I first went on it and played Alien Hominid. That really was one of the best games I’ve ever played. I loved everything about it, the gameplay, the art style, and especially the character design. Now, the original Alien Hominid creator, and the founder of Newgrounds release an Xbox Live Arcade title. And man, it is definitely worth the money.
The story starts off as you and/or three other friends are the knights, and the kings four daughters are kidnapped. And to top that off, the giant crystal that lies behind the kings throne has been stolen as well. As the kings loyal knights, you must save the king’s daughters and obtain the crystal. A very simple story, but it is told with plenty of humor.
Castle Crashers is a somewhat basic arcade style beat em’ up type of game, but with some very nice RPG features, such as being able to buy weapons, leveling up your character, and having animal’s float with you along your journey, in which different animal’s have different ability’s. When leveling up, you can upgrade ability’s like Strength, Agility, Defense, and Magic.
Gameplay is basic, with X being your light attack, and Y being your heavy attack. You can also perform different combo’s as you level up. You can also use magic, which is different depending on the character you choose. You hold the Right Trigger to enable your magic, and you can either shoot a giant blast by pressing Y, or shoot a small long range blast by pressing B. Once again, different characters have different magic. Example, the Green Knight has poison, the Blue Knight has ice, the Orange Knight has fire, and the Red Knight has lightning. It’s all very enjoyable to pull off, and it’s what makes this game so fun.
Once again, I love the art style and character design for Castle Crashers. It has a simple look to it, but it look’s great and it runs well both offline and online, with some nice effects here and there. I also enjoyed the music, which fit’s the game really well. It has some enjoyable tunes, and some music you may recognize from the Newgrounds Audio Portal.
Different weapon’s have different takes on your ability’s. For example, one sword could bring up your attack and defense but lower your agility, and vice verse. You also may have to be at a certain level to use a weapon. There are ton’s of weapon’s to unlock along the journey, so there is plenty of things to come back for.
Don’t get me wrong now, this game has it’s flaws. Although it is awesome at first, after awhile the gameplay becomes repetitive and not as deep at first. It would have been great to have different kinds of magic, and more combos, and the game could have been a little longer and more rewarding. Achievement’s are a challenge, too.
Castle Crashers play’s very well, and although it may seem repetitive to some, I found myself really enjoying the game and I believe it is worth the 1,200 MS Points. There are plenty of characters and weapons and animal’s to unlock, you can battle other players on Xbox Live, and you can just enter the arena to either battle a horde or enemies, or your friends. It’s not the shortest game, but it’s definitely not the longest. It definitely has more replay value then you think, and if you can gab a group of friends to join in, then that just makes the game all the better.
