Super Dodgeball Beats

If you don't think they can make a rhythm game out of anything, then let me introduce you to Super Dodgeball Beats from FinalBoss Games. This is a competitive music game where throwing balls at each other takes a back seat to tapping out beats and unleashing supernatural power-ups. It's a shallow yet enjoyable quest to the top with catchy tunes and a lot of imaginative opponents. Dodgeball will never be the same.

Don't let the name fool you, this is not a sequel to the Technos classic Super Dodgeball. What we get instead is a thoroughly original rhythm game that has almost nothing in common with the popular sport. This is an over-the-top and often silly team vs. team battle where we use the face buttons to tap out the beat in order to utterly annihilate the competition. But watch out, because the other side is looking to do exactly the same thing, leading to a fun back-and-forth with balls flying every which way.

The gameplay is all about tapping to the beat. Your four-person squad is arranged to resemble the controller's face buttons, so the idea is to pay attention to the circle outlines and hit the right button when prompted. This gets tricky as the beats will quickly bounce around the team in an effort to throw you off. You'll also need to hold certain notes and use the analog stick to drag the beats from one player to the next.

The real fun comes when you start throwing power-ups at the other team. You'll earn a wide variety of special abilities by hitting enough notes in a row, all of which you can unleash at the push of one of the shoulder buttons. These items include everything from turning your opponents to stone, covering up their playfield with tasty donuts, tossing out time bombs and making the other players sick (probably from all those donuts). The problem is that the other team will be throwing the same power-ups back at you, so you need to pay attention to what's coming at you and how to work around the handicap.

There's a story mode in Super Dodgeball Beats that sees a ragtag group of athletes known as the Sigma Nerds Club climb their way up through the ranks. You'll need to take on the opponents, which feature everything from Power Ranger-inspired dancers, the angry elderly, the ghoulish Danceferatu, a terrifying squad of cat dolls, and a very fancy Godzilla-type monster named Sir Goldzilla Pemberton. So much of the charm of this game comes from these different teams, all of which bring their own unique stage designs and music.

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This may be a delightful game, but it isn't very deep. Even as you work up the three difficulties, the tap mechanics don't change much. The problem is that there isn't much of a scoring system, so there's not a lot of incentive to play through the songs after you've unlocked all of the power-ups and cinemas. It's also disappointing that the higher difficulties don't add more to the story and gameplay. I couldn't shake the feeling that something was missing.

Part of the problem may be that there are only twelve songs, some of which you'll need to repeat in order to beat the story mode. I like a lot of these catchy EDM tracks, but I'm not sure I'm going to remember any of them a few days from now. About the best I can say is that the songs are great in the moment and help to highlight the different types of opponents and stages.

And speaking of the opponents, I wish there was a way to see their stories. This game sets up a killer lineup of amazing teams, yet we're stuck rooting for the lamest one. I want to see the story connected to Sir Goldzilla Pemberton. And instead of making us play the same songs multiple times, we should go up against powerful boss characters. For as great as most of this game is, I can't help but feel like Super Dodgeball Beats comes up short of its potential.

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Thankfully, things perk up quite a bit when going up against real opponents. The game doesn't have anything in the form of online multiplayer, but the local two-player mode is every bit as exciting as it sounds. Suddenly the power-ups and abilities make more sense and the way you use them becomes critical to winning. That's not a feeling I got from going up against the computer opponents. The story mode is fine, but the reason to buy this game is for the multiplayer fun.

It may not be very deep, but Super Dodgeball Beats is a charming rhythm game with a catchy soundtrack and a great sense of humor. Not only is the multiplayer action surprisingly exciting, but the fake sports teams are some of the best in video game history. Too bad the rest of the game doesn't quite live up to the incredible roster. This is a simple game with limited lasting appeal outside of the multiplayer modes. Furthermore, the story mode isn't fleshed out enough, the gameplay is repetitive and the songs won't stick with you after the game ends. Super Dodgeball Beats is a delightful play on the popular sport and one of the most original rhythm games you'll see this year.