#cosmic shake gameplay

[imperotenebre]

SpongeBob SquarePants The Cosmic Shake PS5 gameplay 4K - prime impressioni

Meglio del previsto

[that-house]

The Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood

This game was so good I decided to write a review for it, which is,, not something I tend to do on here. My very subjective and enthusiastic game review begins here.

Cosmic Wheel Sisterhood is a visual novel where you play as Fortuna, a fortune-telling witch exiled from her coven and forced to sit around on an asteroid for a thousand years. This kinda blows, so she summons a Behemoth named Abramar (the big boy up above) to help her get free.

Abramar helps her make a new oracle deck with which to tell fortunes, and visitors come pouring in while Fortuna learns how to use her new deck and schemes to overthrow the leader of the coven that exiled her.

Gameplay: 5/5

It’s a visual novel, with no parts of the game requiring skill in anything other than decision making. This is not a game that is going to challenge any part of you other than your tear ducts. That being said, the specific mechanics brought to the visual novel by the addition of the oracle deck are fucking delightful. For any given choice, a card represents some subset of the possible answers for a choice, which you can then choose between. Sometimes you get unlucky, and pull a card that makes all of your choices shit. Sometimes you get lucky and can perfectly shape how a character’s arc goes. It’s really neat and can add a lot of replayability. Also, you get to custom-make all of your cards and some of mine wound up being really pretty. There’s no fucking feeling like drawing your favorite card that you spent 10 minutes designing while you’re tackling a tough problem. The game took me about 5 hours to beat.

Story: 4.5/5

I have a few minor gripes with the plot. Some of the characters and their arcs could have stood to have a little more time spent on them (the romance subplot in particular is… very fast). Besides that, the characters are all delightful, the overarching plot is FUCKING BEAUTIFUL and the setting is really fucking interesting. The game tackles things like gender, sexuality, fate/free will, and Lovecraftian gods. Their handling of these themes (besides fate/free will, which is definitely the core idea being explored here) isn’t anything revolutionary but it’s solid. I almost cried a few times, both during some conversations in the middle of the game and during the absolute beauty of a climax. There’s a decent number of possible endings the game can have (There seems like there’d be 6 main possible endings). As befitting a game that’s all about fate, your choices VERY early on will inexorably bind you to a given path, but the terms of how it all shakes out are up to you.

Art: 5/5

Gorgeous gorgeous pixel art. Phenomenal aesthetics. A variety of wonderful character designs. There isn’t much to say, it’s just pixel art executed flawlessly. There isn’t a ton of stuff going on, because it’s a visual novel about sitting on an asteroid in space, but god this game is so fucking pretty like jesus christ

Music: 6/5

Every character has their own theme that plays while you’re talking to them (and they’re all bangers). I will be listening to this soundtrack for a WHILE, and I will 100000% be stealing the climactic song for a D&D boss fight. It’s very Hyper Light Drifter: impeccable vibes and with a certain somber determination present throughout much of it.

Final Ranking: a very subjective 5/5

This game isn’t gonna be for everyone. Visual novels aren’t everyone’s cup of tea, and they aren’t necessarily mine. But this game was fucking awesome, and it’s currently $15 on Steam. If you check it out, I’d love to hear what you thought of it!

[obligatebureaucrat]

If TTYD HD truly marks the end of the “modern” style of Paper Mario, I’m sure a lot of people will frame it as “the devs finally listened to us and abandoned that crap” but I wonder if that’s really the case or if it’s that modern PM has simply reached its natural endpoint.

Origami King is, in my opinion, the perfect culmination of the exploration and setpiece focused style established by Sticker Star and massively improved on by Color Splash. Where do you even go from there? You could implement another craft-based gimmick, but what would that actually add to the formula. Heck, I’d argue that the series already saw diminishing returns with its gimmicks, as the origami mechanics didn’t add as much to the exploration as the paint hammer did.

So where would the gameplay go? They could focus on incremental changes and improvements to level design, but Nintendo generally does t like to do that. They could lean more into the overworld action elements, but that would be a massive change that would make it feel more like a Luigi’s Mansion or Peach Showtime than a Paper Mario (though this does have precedent with SPM). They could lean more into the combat and the way exploration and combat feed into each other, but at that point they might as well just do classic PM.

My bet is that, if modern PM is indeed over, it’s because the team took that latter option. They saw that the modern formula had gone as far as it could, but that a more classic formula still has room to innovate, particularly using some lessons from the modern trilogy. TTYD HD would then be their way of gauging interest in a return to the classic formula and prepping the team for proper RPG development (we saw Purple Lamp do a similar thing with BFBB Rehydrated leading to Cosmic Shake).

Of course, all of this could be totally wrong. Maybe they really are caving to fan demand against their wishes. Or maybe Paper Mario 7 will be Origami King 2. Or maybe TTYD HD will sell like crap and the series will die forever. But this is my theory. The team clearly believed they were on to something with the Sticker Star formula, enough to make two sequels despite fan backlash.

[ghostthemaddhatter]

Spongebob Squarepants Cosmic Shake

Ahoy, Ghosts, Ghouls, and SpongeBob fans! Ghost is here after playing that new SpongeBob game that just came out. I've got to say, Cosmic Shake is money well spent, absorbing gameplay and hilarious writing perfect for fans young and old! Let's dive into the ratings before my wallet walks off!

Gameplay: 5/5 Hats. Running around stunning environments like SpongeBob is pure joy. Whipping out silly costumes and creatively using SpongeBob's moves kept me grinning.

Story: 5/5 Hats. The wacky cosmic adventure captures that unmistakable SpongeBob humor and heart. The plot twists and alternate-reality versions of Bikini Bottom had me chuckling.

Replayability: 4/5 Hats. With costumes to find and side activities galore, I wanted to explore every corner. May get repetitive after multiple playthroughs.

Graphics: 4/5 Hats. The game looks like a high-def episode with smooth animation and vibrant colors. Small graphical hiccups here and there.

Overall, I happily give SpongeBob SquarePants: Cosmic Shake a 5/5 Hats! Fans of the show shouldn't hesitate to pick this up for zany platforming fun. Now if you'll excuse me, I've got money to count! Arg arg arg!

[benis-chillin]

Backlog Reviews 2024: Metroid Prime Hunters

Platform: DS

June 19th, 2024-August 10th, 2024(didn't finish)

(Note: The only Metroid Prime game I have previously played is Prime 1. Review can be found in THIS post)

(Also, here's the previous backlog entry. I'm adding hyperlinks to all of the posts like, the night before this goes out)

So…This is awkward.

As I've stated before, Metroid is the series that resonates with me just as much as Sonic does. I love the lore, the(2D)gameplay, Samus as a character, it all just clicks with me.

And the PREMISE of this game is absolutely baller! Samus vs a bunch of other, considerably less scrupulous bounty hunters in a cosmic battle royale for an ancient treasure? Sign me up!

But the actual execution? Eh…

Now, I am not entirely unfamiliar with DS FPS'. I still love the DS version of Bionicle Heroes(which the Prime series definitely had an influence on, especially in terms of its BALLER soundtrack which is good for listening to while you read this review)to this very day, and I thought this was gonna be more like that. Hell, I even got the mod that lets me utilize the C-nub and the gyro on my modded 2DS XL, which made aiming in this version a lot of fun…For a few sessions.

But then I ran into the major problem with this game: Nothing really HAPPENS.

(not my screenshot, obviously)

Like, in most Metroid games, stuff is constantly happening. New upgrades and paths are being thrown at you every which way, it's bananas. But here? You've GOT most of your arsenal from the start, and paths rarely lead to anything but yet another artifact, or an attack by a mob of flying enemies that are hard to engage due to the lack of a lock-on feature.

And if you could just hold down the fire button for these sections, it would be fine! But due to the charge beam, which REALLY could've stood to be cut for this entry, you need to constantly tap the fire button to keep on shooting, which was absolute HELL on my carpal tunnel!

Oh yeah, and the mod maps jumping to either the D-Pad or the touch screen, so you can either not move while jumping, or not do anything else while jumping.

So basically…

In addition, the levels are VERY aimless and meandering, not helped by your ship being your only way to save, teleport points to bring you back for a save being VERY scarce, and overall, what little puzzle solving exists in this game is WAY below par.

All of this is piled on top of the game using the same map system as Prime 1, when the touch screen is RIGHT THERE for a real-time map! Why would you make a Metroid game with two screens, and NOT use a real-time map!? And you can only manipulate it via the touch screen, even though the map is on the TOP screen, so my swipes just get massively misinterpreted!

The story…Somehow exists less than the ORIGINAL Prime's narrative did. Like, I barely even register it outside of the, again, baller premise. Prime at least tried to compensate its weak narrative with more scanning stuff, but what I could play of this game showed very little scanning potential. I keep on being told that Prime is peak Metroid, but two games in a row, I have not yet been impressed.

(I'm still gonna give them all a shake, though. Because Metroid)

So yeah, that's my short and sweet review of yet another game I did not finish this year. Well, Fallout New Vegas was more like I lost interest in the path I was currently taking after completing the personal goal I set out for my character, but you get what I mean.

(probably gonna do another New Vegas playthrough eventually. replaying older games between your new games is healthy for the soul, I think)

At least my non-enjoyment of this game got me trying out Super Metroid Redux. I'll give my thoughts on that in the year end post.

3/10

And next up? Well, I'm gonna complete Super Metroid Redux, and my current recording of a Sonic Frontiers let's play first to see if the weather will cool down first(house air conditioning is still out, and the window unit we bought for the kitchen doesn't extend to my gaming area), but by mid-September, I plan on playing Resident Evil 2(original via Gamecube), for at LEAST Leon's story. See ya then!

[duckyfruitbat]

Spongebob: Cosmic Shake

There I was in the store when I spotted a copy of this game on the discount shelf and with baited breath I said out loud "yeah sure why not."

The Cosmic Shake is the first Spongebob game by Purple Lamp studios since Battle for Bikini Bottom Rehydrated. The story being that Spongebob bought a bottle of bath soap mixed with mermaids wishing tears from a mermaid who is described as a "snails oil saleswoman." She didn't think it would do anything until Spongebob started using it to try and grant as many wishes as possible. All these wishes create massive rifts in the fabric of reality that starts sucking nearly all of Bikini Bottom into multiple different worlds. Thus Spngebob and a now balloon Patrick must enter each world to save their friends and restore the town.

The game is set up like a metroidvania, each level has a main quest and many collectibles and challenges. There are multiple characters with set fetch quests in each level, there are challenges that can only be accessed by abilities learned later on. It gives you reasons to go back to each level, in a couple you actually get an optional quest after completing the story portion.

Gameplay is pretty straightforward and fairly easy to get into. For the most part it is building off of Battle For Bikini Bottom with some tweaks. There's the gliding move, which is a box of Krusty Krab pizza, a ranged bubble attack that stuns enemies, and a targeted karate kick that also acts as a way to move between platforms. The bosses are pretty fun, even if they are a bit simple and easy, King Gary forces you to use some strategy as he's sugar rushing. The final boss is a mutated Squidward that I'm starting to suspect was made using the scrapped Squidbot from BFBB. The most difficult one was against Pom Pom, a prehistoric Pearl, she has massive attacks that spread out across the entire arena and enemies spawn all throughout, things get busy.

This game does have a performance issue, at least on the PS4. There were many times when I'm going through a level, with no pop in, frame rate issues or glitches, when suddenly it freezes for a couple of seconds. This always made me very concerned, I was worried my play station was about to pop. It never crashed during those moments, so that was a relief, but it did like to test me with those freezes.

Writing wise, It is more of a piece of modern SpongeBob media, or in layman's terms, it's pretty up and down in writing quality. There were a few lines that made me laugh out loud, in the Halloween level there is some gag writing on a tomb stone for the persons famous last words, being "watch this!" A moment at the end of the western level had Mr. Krabs trying to stay until he started facing consequences for his actions and he turned on a dime.

You may have noticed that there is a lot of parody in this game, each level is parodying the genre it's themed after. For example there is a level that is a movie set for a karate movie, and each level also has its own version of the characters. The Squidward in this level is just Michael Bay, it fit his character really well. Each level does this in some way where it uses the setting to work off of the characters. It doesn't always succeed but when it does it's a lot of fun.

One place I want to point at where the writing falls a bit short is with the Glove World level. Here Glovy the park mascot is going a bit crazy from the isolation of falling into an alternate dimension. He kid naps Patrick in an attempt to get a friend all the while losing it. The level is full of pictures of SpongeBob and Patrick with Glovy's face pasted over SpongeBob's. My issue is that Glovy doesn't feel very unhinged. He's a bit too calm for someone who's supposed to be going insane. There are more scenes of SpongeBob going batshit insane in the actual show.

There are plenty of other writing issues like the continued flanderization of the characters, but the game is also very dependent on references. Sure all the games have plenty of these references, but this is getting a bit much. Sure they do stick out quite a bit, but they're gone as fast as they arrive, so it is not a deal breaker by any means.

It's not as good as Battle for Bikini Bottom, but this game is still pretty easy to pick up and play with plenty of fun to be had. If you can overlook some of the writing issues, enjoyment can be found here.

[gamekhalsher]

SpongeBob SquarePants: The Cosmic Shake - 4K 60FPS Gameplay Part 1 (End)...

[nickymortis]

A Blast from the Past: Alone in the Dark 2024 Edition

The phrase "alone in the dark" seriously gives me the creeps, especially when I'm trying to resist the urge to buy Xbox games. Watching The Shining again recently, I couldn't shake the image of Jack Nicholson standing solo in a totally dark ballroom, chatting with invisible folks, vibing to silent tunes, and sipping on imaginary drinks. It's terrifying to think any of us might be clueless about what's really going on around us, stuck in a whole universe that exists solely in our heads. When I started playing Alone in the Dark, I wondered if it would mess with these ideas. Turns out, yeah, it totally does. I've played tons of cool survival horror games, but I've never tried Alone in the Dark, the OG that inspired pretty much every game in the genre. While my gamer pals know all about Detective Edward Carnby and Emily Hartwood's adventures, this is my first dive into the spooky Derceto mansion in Louisiana. And as I played Detective Carnby for the first time, it was clear he was tripping, seeing and hearing things that weren't real, and sipping air. He was definitely alone in the dark.

Reviving Classic Horrors: Alone in the Dark

In Alone in the Dark, you get to pick between two main characters played by David Harbor and Jodie Comer, who deliver top-notch, movie-worthy performances that make me want to buy PS5 games. The game is set in the 1920s, following Emily Hartwood and her detective sidekick Carnby as they investigate her missing uncle at the spooky Derceto mansion. My first go-round as Carnby took me about 12 hours, with plenty of time spent staring at puzzles and scratching my head. The second time was way quicker since I already knew all the game's tricks. As a newbie to Alone in the Dark, I was a bit surprised by how cliché the Lovecraftian storyline felt. It's cool and all, but anyone familiar with cosmic horror will spot a lot of familiar beats from other stories, movies, and games. It wasn't until after finishing the game and looking into its history that I realized it's a modern remake of the original Alone in the Dark, which explains a lot. Even though tons of games have covered this ground since the early '90s, this one retells a story that was groundbreaking back in its day, about 35 years ago. So, I'll hold off on criticizing its predictability too much since it's based on a tale that's been around for ages.

Gameplay and Surprises

Instead, let's talk about how lit some of the lore drops are in Alone in the Dark. I've run through the game twice now, once with each character, and even on my second go, I'd pause to let the dope voice cast narrate all the clues, diaries, and notes. Normally, I'm all about hitting that "skip" button and reading stuff myself, but the voice acting is so fire it adds a whole new level to the game. Plus, there are some juicy extra details thrown in for those patient enough to listen, which totally hooked me even more. I won't spoil the story twists for newbies, but I'll say the gameplay mechanics stay pretty similar no matter who you pick. Each character's storyline has its own surprises that make a second playthrough worth it. And let me tell you, I was low-key hoping the game would go big at the end, and boy, it delivered. Most of the game kept it PG-13 with the violence, but the ending takes a sudden dive into Mature territory in the best way possible.

Storyline, Acting, and Puzzles

Alone in the Dark's visuals are a mixed bag. Some parts look absolutely stunning, with killer lighting effects, legit functioning mirrors, and details that pop. Then, out of nowhere, you're chatting with a flapper straight out of a PS2 game, dropped into Derceto's mezzanine like a glitch from the gaming gods. Plus, there's this weird section where the game suddenly switches to '90s tank controls for no good reason—it's jarring and almost unplayable. It's like 80% awesome and 20% meh. Now, is Alone in the Dark scary? It's got a spooky vibe for sure, but I found it more suspenseful than scream-inducing. The few jump scares it tries fall flat for me, and being a cosmic horror buff, that's a letdown. But hey, the story's solid, the acting's on point, and there are some killer puzzles to solve. So, come for the performances and brain-teasers, enjoy the storyline in bits, and ignore the clunky combat. Spending a couple of afternoons playing as David Harbor in a dark mansion isn't the worst way to chill.

[hellman55]

SpongeBob The Cosmic Shake Switch - 100% Walkthrough Gameplay Part 8 - Jelly Squidward Boss Fight

[321spongebolt]

"The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie Adventures" Video Game idea

With "The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie" turning 20 years old on November 19th of this year, I have this idea for a "SpongeBob SquarePants" video game that Purple Lamp Studios should develop.

TITLE

"The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie Adventures"

ESRB RATING

Probably E or E10+, you decide.

PREMISE

You play through the events of SpongeBob's adventures on the big screen, from his first movie to the upcoming "SpongeBob SquarePants Movie 5: Search for SquarePants" (that or higher depending on if it'll ever be made).

The events of SpongeBob TV movies like "Atlantis SquarePantis", "Pest of the West", "WhoBob WhatPants?" (albeit rewritten), "SpongeBob VS. The Big One", and "SpongeBob's Big Birthday Blowout", as well as spin-off movies like the upcoming "Saving Bikini Bottom: A SpongeBob SquarePants Movie" could be available as possible DLC levels.

GAMEPLAY

Like the latest SpongeBob video game, "The Cosmic Shake", the game would be an open-world sandbox game where you can explore the locations from the theatrical films. Unlike "The Cosmic Shake", the costumes you unlock for SpongeBob (and Patrick, depending on if he should be playable for all the movie adventures) have special abilities you can spend Goofy Goober dollars on. For instance, by completing the storyline of the first movie, you'll unlock SpongeBob's Goofy Goober Rock attire, which allows SpongeBob flight mode and perform his sonic wave guitar while hovering. He can also fire blue lightning bolts. For another example, by completing the storyline for "The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie 3: Sponge Out of Water", you'll unlock SpongeBob's Invincibubble form, which allows SpongeBob some sort of bubble-themed upgrades. Other costumes can be unlocked as just cosmetics, even after wearing them once depending on the level, like SpongeBob's visor glasses (even though they were black and purple in the original version of the first movie's licensed video game) when he fights the movie version of King Neptune, who is under Plankton's mind control via his Bucket Helmet.

(NOTE: The only thing I debate on with this idea is if you play the movie in their chronological order, or if the player should be given the creative freedom to play any movie's events in the order they choose.)

CREATIVE CHANGES

For the badly received movies like "The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie 2: Truth or Square" and "The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie 4: Sponge on the Run" (and some of the badly received TV movies), I have a list of changes I would make for those movies to connect the movies better, but still be faithful to its original source material.

For "The SpongeBob SquarePants Movie 2: Truth or Square", simply have the 2nd movie take place about a day or so after SpongeBob was given his new manager position at the end of the first movie. It would be revealed that Plankton escaped from prison and is plotting revenge for SpongeBob and Patrick ruining his Plan Z.

For "The SpongeBob SqaurePants Movie 4: Sponge on the Run", SpongeBob will not have problems being courageous. And instead of Plankton arranging for Gary's kidnapping (since "Sponge Out of Water" confirmed Plankton's heel-face turn, despite the ending and post-credits scene.), Dennis will have kidnapped Gary instead (just have Dennis be voiced by whoever can do a good impression of Alec Baldwin). On top of that, all the "Kamp Koral" references will be removed. Because of this, Sandy reveals that she first met SpongeBob when he rescued her from the clam she was wrestling with (from "Tea in the Treedome") instead of first meeting each other at camp. Squidward (who by this point no longer gets mad at SpongeBob and Patrick's antics) shows his rock-hard abs from the last movie, and tells everyone about how SpongeBob came through for him at the Bubble Bowl (a reference to the episode, "Band Geeks".). Patrick reveals how he's always known SpongeBob since they were babies (a reference to the episode, "The Secret Box"). And even Mr. Krabs reveals how great of a fry cook SpongeBob's been since the anchovies stormed the Krusty Krab (a reference to the premiere episode, "Help Wanted"), and after SpongeBob returned the movie Neptune's Crown, Mr. Krabs no longer acts as the stingy tightwad he once was after being frozen. Another change I would make for SpongeBob and Patrick to never argue, not once, as it was really pointless.

With the DLC level based on "WhoBob WhatPants?", simply rewrite the story with Patrick, Squidward, Sandy, and Mr. Krabs never getting angry at SpongeBob. Instead, SpongeBob will have won a trip to New Kelp City, but gets lost while trying to find the airport and loses his memory, not knowing he wound up in New Kelp City.

(I have a bunch of other creative liberties I would take. To view them, click here to visit the page.)

MULTIPLAYER

For the game's multiplayer mode, I was thinking some mini-games would be based on some of the challenges from the first movie's licensed video game, like the combat challenges, SpongeBob's ball challenge levels, and Patrick's platforming challenges. But there can be other challenges too, with some of them supporting 4 players.

This is all I've got, but while I may early to celebrate SpongeBob's 25th anniversary, I still think this would be a great video game if Nickelodeon or even the folks at THQNordic or Purple Lamp Studios took the time to read my idea. If you guys have additional ideas for this post, feel free to comment your suggestions.

[hoagmaster]

August 1, 2023

You get first glimpse of it in this report: my Switch gameplay data from July! Persona 5 Royal was my most-played game last month in large part to it kinda dragging its feet getting to a conclusion but maybe that will change this month. New Mario Kart 8 Deluxe tracks explain its place. Then the others all had marathons throughout the month.

As for today's games, I got some time in with Star Wars Jedi: Survivor, SpongeBob SquarePants: The Cosmic Shake, and a few matches of Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl to remind myself how it plays ahead of the new one. Speaking of which, the roster may have leaked and I decided to rip the bandaid off because why not. My reaction: yeah that doesn't sound too bad.

Work stuff got a bit grating after starting well enough with writing stuff, but soon I got a passive aggressive sort-of invitation to a meeting where I'm pretty sure they can handle it and that I did not receive any agenda or logistics to that requires hours of driving and likely lodging. Someone has to man the place and make sure other stuff around there gets done!

Downer note with a pair of pants I quite liked being put out to pasture, so it should be time for a new pair soon.

Other than that, pretty solid start to the month!

[gthebumblebee]

patrick is smol boi

also is that larry the snail

BANOOGA READY

why do they look familiar

KRUSTY KRAB PIZZA IS THE PIZZA FOR YOU AND MEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEE

COWBOB ME BOY

also slime creature

also western krabs

here's some front facing Pearl for you all

totally not cursed in the slightest

I can't believe spongsebaob and smol partick are going to New Mexico!!!!! 😲😱😲😱😲😱😲😱😲😱

ROCK EM OUT

I think they're high on the "juice"

great gameplay 10/10

[dashielvlup]

MY BOY SPONGEBOB GOT A NEW GAME!! [Cosmic Shake] (x)

[spongefessions]

My autism cannot deal whit how battle for bikini bottom gameplay (because i have problems when games aren’t linear or a life sim) so it prefers cosmic shake

[breadknight-likes-things]

I Bought "Spongebob Squarepants: The Cosmic Shake", For Culture.

The Culture I am of course referring to being the hyper specific cross section of people who were the exact right age in the year 2003 to rent Spongebob Squarepents: Battle For Bikini Bottom from Blockbuster, or Hollywood video if you were fancy. If you happen to be in that tiny little sliver of humanity, you probably at least know that Battle For Bikini Bottom is a genuinely great game. So great, in fact, that somebody actually wound up remembering the thing fondly enough that it received a mid budget remake a few years ago for then modern consoles and PC. Well, here we are a little over two years on from Battle For Bikini Bottom Rehydrated, and now we have Cosmic Shake. Cosmic Shake's status is odd, sure. Being a spiritual sequel, to a remake, of a game from 2003 based on Spongebob. That said I'm happy to say that, thus far, Cosmic Shake is a lot of fun, and a worthy successor to that rental classic we all (Read: dozens of us) loved. Gameplay is hardly changed, albeit the game is less focused on collect-athon aspects and is more linear than it's predecessor. It's still largely a straightforward platformer set in the world of Spongebob, and you know what? It still works. A lot of the fun, for me anyway, of Battle For Bikini Bottom, was being able to walk around in the world of Spongebob. Getting to explore all the familiar locations from the show first hand. Cosmic Shake approaches this a little differently. Rather than re-hashing the same basic locations, Cosmic Shake essentially explores alternate reality versions of the level concepts you'd be familiar with from the first game. For example, Jellyfish Fields is now Wild West themed, and Downtown Bikini Bottom is set in some kind of weirdo Karate Universe. The game manages to reuse the same basic locations as the first game, but adds enough of a fun twist that it doesn't just feel like you're playing the same levels over again, not that the actual level designs are all that similar to the ones in Battle For Bikini Bottom. The rest of the gameplay is honestly almost a carbon copy of Battle For Binkini Bottom thus far. Spongebob has the same basic spin attack, same double jump, even a lot of the same animations. Though with the caveat that a lot of the animations in this game are far cleaner and more expressive than in the BFBB remake. It was obvious in that game the new models were papered over some older animations, this one at least allows itself to move beyond things that were set in stone shortly after Heavy Iron Studios made the worlds best Scooby-Doo game in 2002.

So far I'm having a really good time with Cosmic Shake! Every once and awhile it's nice to remember that video games can be both this type of mid budget platformer, and AAA action horror games (I'm also playing Dead Space! It's still great!). Hopefully Spongebob keeps up this pace and I can get in and get out with this delightful little multiverse adventure. Or, honestly, maybe this thing will just inspire me to watch "Wet Painters" again, a perfect episode of television.

[savingcontent]

SpongeBob SquarePants: The Cosmic Shake gameplay trailer shows ten languages that are all spoken by the original voice actors

SpongeBob SquarePants: The Cosmic Shake gameplay trailer shows ten languages that are all spoken by the original voice actors

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