Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl debuted in 2021, a worthy, albeit underpowered, Super Smash Bros. Offers an alternative to popular platform fighters like Ultimate. Smash Bros. The premise of taking heavy inspiration from the gameplay but replacing gaming icons with the most popular Nickelodeon characters of generations is appealing, but the launch product didn’t quite live up to the lofty expectations Nintendo had set. style leader. Although post-launch updates and DLC brought the product closer to what fans were hoping for, the differences were still massively apparent. Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 incorporates all the lessons that developers Ludosity and Fair Play Labs learned from the first title and hopes to develop fans of the Nickelodeon crossover fighter.
This reconstruction effort began with characters. Every character in Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 has been recreated, recreated or completely remade from the first title. In addition to 14 returning characters, Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 adds 11 new characters, including The Angry Beavers, Donatello, Raphael, Plankton, Squidward, and Jimmy Neutron. All of the characters on the roster feature more differences in play style than the first title, helping All-Star Brawl 2 come closer to the game that clearly inspired it.
On top of more special moves to use, the characters have more distinctions, such as Raphael’s increased speed or Jimmy Neutron’s ability to call his robot dog Godard and switch between controlling the two. Speaking of characters you summon, Zim can summon Gir, which mirrors Zim’s attacks. Perhaps the most impressive addition on this front comes with The Angry Beavers, who are packaged as a fighter, but play much more complex than that. Their tag-based mechanics call back to games like Marvel vs. Capcom, where you can call on others for help. However, it doesn’t stop there, as you can freely switch between which of the Angry Beavers you’re controlling to experience their unique movesets. In my hands-on session, I got a good sense of the strategies you can use, but I know I was only scratching the surface.
Gameplay in Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 aims to be competitive yet accessible. A training mode complete with easy wave dashing, auto L canceling, analog movement conversion, and hit/hit boxes and trajectory data tools will appeal to die-hard players, but there’s plenty for the more level-headed player. Well Ludosity and Fair Play Labs aim to give players the ability to express what they want to do without making it overly difficult or technical.
One way to do this is through a new meter system that borrows heavily from Guilty Gear. You build one segment of your slime meter at a time, with a maximum of three. For a one-time expenditure, you can modify a special move with extra vigor or Slime Cancel out of any attack; Both of these strategies are easy to pull off and will be extremely useful in competitive play. For two bars, you can do Slime Burst, which is the equivalent of a Combo Breaker. Finally, if you want to use a full slime meter, three bars will allow you to pull off a character-specific super, complete with a quick cinematic. While they are powerful, they are balanced for competitive play and are not intended for one-hit KOs (although they will KO the target if their damage is high enough).
All of this carries over to every aspect of the signature multiplayer experience, which can be enjoyed by up to four players, but this time another big addition comes in the way of extensive single-player content. The campaign lets you go through node-based challenges featuring various marquee and minion characters in various situations in Roguelite mode. As you make your way, you unlock power-ups and other bonuses, some of which carry over into later runs. I really enjoyed the creativity while playing this mode, which made me hope that Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 would be more fun to go to. Outside of the campaign, players can work their way through a standard arcade mode, various mini-games, or the challenging Boss Rush, in which you fight all over-the-top boss encounters from the single-player campaign.
These changes are on top of other improvements made to Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl since its launch, including an update to the much-requested voice acting that was previously added to the game. Now, all the characters are fully voiced in All Star Brawl 2. I really enjoyed my time with Nickelodeon All Star Brawl 2. The characters feel more distinct than ever, and the campaign introduces some neat elements that I can see myself coming back to. over and over again.
Although it’s unlikely that any platformer will follow Super Smash Bros. in the near future. , Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 feels much better positioned than its predecessor to carve out its own niche in the genre. Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl is set to hit PS5, Xbox Series X/S, PS4, Xbox One, Switch and PC on November 7th.