Playstation All-Stars Battle Royale βeta 1st Impressions
Summary
Going into this game I wanted to have an extremely open mind, and not think of that other game. You know that other game everyone keeps saying this game is a rip off of, Cartoon Network Punch Time Explosion XL. Anyway, so this beta just came out and they have six characters to choose from. Kratos, Parappa, Fat Princess, Sweet Tooth, Radec and Sly Cooper. I tried out all six of them and will tell you my thoughts on each of them. But first the controls of the game.
The controls are quite well put together but the Ps Vita controls everything is the same except Special Attack is R1 + L1 and Taunt is still unknown but will probably be something touch related.
Kratos - He is probably the most fun to use in the beta. The majority of his attacks are worth using and have a lot of range to them. I probably used him the most when I was playing. His level 1 special which I basically abused like crazy has Kratos pulling out the Blade of Olympus and running it at foes in one slash. I wasn’t able to get his level 2 or 3 special which I have seen people use.
Parappa - He is really good although I didn’t think I would like using him as much as I did but he’s quite fun to use. He can summon a Boom Box that shoots out the source you need to get your special up. His level 1 special is a back-flip-kick which is quite unpredictable. More unpredictable than Kratos’s Lv 1. I was also able to use his Lv 3 special which goes into a cut scene with him rapping and then a giant explosion happens and everyone around me just died, it was quite awesome.
Fat Princess - I probably like this character the least since I only used her once. She has a lot of attacks I felt just didn’t connect well. She had one attack where she jumps and smashes downwards that in my opinion was the only move worth using. I got her Lv 1 special and a bunch of hearts came out and she ate them. I was quite confused on what it actually was supposed to do to the enemy but no one was around me during that time. It couldn’t have healed me since this game doesn’t work like that. Like I said, all of her other attacks were quite weak. I probably need to use her more.
Sweet Tooth - Starting off, I thought he was quite a stiff character. His shotgun attack is really worth using. I didn’t really get to use all of his attacks, but his Jump Triangle and down attack is quite strong. I found myself only using those to move and his Lv 1 special which I think he threw some sort of grenade and did a kick of some sort, very unclear but it was worth using.
Radec - Starting off I knew that this character was not going to play like everyone else. Obviously he doesn’t have that many good melee attacks but I did find that he does have a lot of counter attacks and tricky attacks. His Lv 1 was really fun to use. It’s a targeting system that comes up and you try to hit someone with in the target and press square. Radec definitely brings a different taste to the game. I found a lot of people spamming long range attacks with him on the other three people fighting and it was quite annoying but fair nonetheless.
Sly Cooper - He was actually the first character I used, because in terms of which character I like from their series, I liked Sly the most. Since I used him first I didn’t really know what I was doing. Sly also plays differently than the majority of the characters like Radec. And the fact that he doesn’t even have a legit Block threw me off. His attacks were quite weak and I soon figured out that you need to be extremely evasive which this character. You can’t be a powerhouse with Sly.
Final Thoughts
I sat there and played this beta for about 3 hours and the majority of the time I found myself using Kratos, like I said before, he was the most fun to use. And let’s be honest, you can’t sit here and not compare it to… Cartoon Network Punch Time Explosion XL, there are a lot of things these games do the same but the formula is so different from the ground up, that any type of strategy you bring from Cartoon Network Punch Time Explosion XL wouldn’t necessarily work that well in this game. And for that I applaud Sony for finding their own formula and by no means is it better or worse than any other game in this genre. My only problems with this game at the moment is the lag it has when trying to pick up an item, you can be right on top of it smashing R1 for days until finally pick it up just to drop it back down. There are also a couple of network error problems while trying to connect to a match and sometimes even leads to a light blue blank screen that ends up freezing you console. I’m also dissappointed just like the LBP Karting Beta that came out recently neither of these betas allow split-screen multiplayer.
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