Any game with the name “Bros” in it may illicit thoughts of a different video game franchise, but these “Bros” are uniquely their own.
Super Dungeon Bros is an on or offline dungeon-crawling hack and slash brawler with a bro-like twist. Words like “dude” and “bro” are commonplace in these adventures supporting up to 4 players. While you bro-smash through waves of enemies and traverse your way through traps and puzzles, you can communicate with your fellow bros in-game using the “Bro Banter System”. So yeah, pretty big theme running here, but how does the game actually fair?
Kendo’s Impressions:
Super Dungeon Bros felt reminiscent of games in the Gauntlet franchise, or other similar ones, who honestly do the dungeon brawler thing a little bit more smoothly. My attacks were a bit sticky and choppy, effectively making it harder to really wail on the enemies. As I’d press a button to attack, the move just felt clunky and I found that my character would only stand in one spot or simply move in a straight line as I attacked, rather than being able to combo and chain attacks together while moving to hit enemies on all sides of you.
Some dungeon crawler/brawler games minimize the ways in which your “friends” can be a jerk and sabotage you, but in my gameplay experience of Super Dungeon Bros, one of my so-called friends completely lifted my character over his shoulders and threw me off of the level (killing me) with a feature of the game called the “Bro Throw.” The purpose of the Bro Throw, to me, was to kill off the enemies by throwing your homies down onto their heads… but hey, the team’s lives are shared among all players, so if you decide to be a d!ck to your teammates, you’ll be paying for it too.
Aside from these few gripes, I will say that this game still holds a valid place in the dungeon-brawling scene. The game does well with the Bro theme, and the quirky things each of the characters say while they do battle. One reason I complain about teammates being able to sabotage you is also because of one aspect I really enjoyed in the game: it emphasizes teamwork to solve various puzzles in the game. You and your bros will need to be in-sync to get across a huge gap with lava down below. One bro stands on one side of the terrain, holding down a button that magically makes a bridge appear, while you then run across the bridge to the other side where there is also a button for you to stand on, allowing your bro(s) to make it safely to the other side with you. I enjoy that aspect within games like this, but it shows that you’ve got to work together, instead of Bro-Throwing your bro off of the level for fun…
All in all, I would say that while some games in this genre can give a smoother experience, none of them will match the epic bro-like attitude that Super Dungeon Bros can offer.
Chris Newton’s Impressions:
First of all Super Dungeon Bros has a very nice appearance, in both the view of the game you play and the graphics. It has a cartoon style look but still modern with some shiny effects with magic and level mechanics. The UI is very simple so all the action is right on the screen, and it’s a blast with friends. Dungeon Bros brings back the classic couch gaming (or in our terms, Bean bag gaming!) that seems to be slowly dying, and it’s games like this that we need to bring it back. Although the game isn’t really special, and will probably improve upon release or with updates, it’s a lot of fun and really that’s what games are for.
I agree with Kendo the best part of this game is definitely the co-op experience of teamwork and completing puzzles. The ability to screw over your friends is a dangerous one, if you’re playing with good friends and are doing it for a laugh it’s a bunch of fun, but if you keep doing it… it can get messy and could potentially ruin the session for you. If you have three friends though you can trust, get this game and enjoy your gaming time, and Super Dungeon Bros is also cross-platform so it doesn’t matter which console they have!
Super Dungeon Bros is in development for PS4, Xbox One, Steam (PC/Mac), and Windows 10, coming out this winter!
You can sign up for the beta now: http://www.superdungeonbros.com/
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