Shrek SuperSlam
Trust us, it’s better than you could possibly imagine. Hands-on impressions reveal why.
Published: October 20, 2005
The free-for-all melee fighter is something of a coveted genre for those that have come across titles like Super Smash Bros. or even the PowerStone games back in the day. For many, they represent the closest thing to the classic beat-em-up while still retaining all the stuff that the shove into 3D really offers in terms of environmental interaction and character detail.
In both respects, Shrek SuperSlam is a stunning piece of work, and this is coming from a bunch of guys who thought the game would suck (like most, we’re sure) without ever having picked up the controller (shame on us). We were wrong and we’ll happily eat all those bad words we made about the game after finally checking it out.
The SSBM and PS influence is strong, and it’s something that developer Shaba Games freely admits. By biting the style off one of the most addictive party brawlers around, they’re setting a great benchmark for themselves, and believe it or not, it’s genuinely close. Through close involvement with Dreamworks Animation, the teams have whipped up some hilarious and often times original takes on the bent fairy tale characters the Shrek movies have birthed.
The result is a game that channels the speed and frenetic pace of the aforementioned inspirations, but does it with a nice little twist. In addition to the normal button mashing attacks in weak and strong combo mixes, all the characters have the ability to power up their attacks and turn a hit into a SuperSlam (why yes, that is where the game’s title comes from, you get a cookie). SuperSlamming someone sends them flying into a pre-set part of the level, which then causes a ridiculous amount of environmental destruction.
Thanks to a Havok-powered physics system, anything that’s broken (or any of the 20 stan—uh, non-standard weapons in the game) can be picked up and used against the other players. Since the game moves at a gorgeous clip, it’s often an all-out rush to grab stuff, chuck it, and then combo into some simple button presses.
There is a deep fighting system in place, but it’s just below the surface of the simple button mashing mechanic, and while that sounds like a company line, it really is true; air dashes, counters, advanced combo strings, all of it is in there, but the game’s still completely playable as nothing more than a button masher.
There’s also an unerring sense of humor that perfectly fits with the movies. From the character designs to the attacks to the environments, even the Shaba-created entries to the series meld so perfectly with the kind of dual humor that the movies operate on that it’s impossible not to fall in love with the characters. Then, as in the case of a mini-game shown to us in the Mega Challenge mode, you can toss them into the oven.
We desperately need to get our hands on this, since we didn’t allocate nearly enough time to playing the game, and it’s a shame. Just when you think you’ve played enough games to make assumptions purely on screenshots and movies, the actual game runs up and bites you on the ass, begging to be played. Rest assured we will indeed be getting more time with SuperSlam, it’s merely a question of when.
In both respects, Shrek SuperSlam is a stunning piece of work, and this is coming from a bunch of guys who thought the game would suck (like most, we’re sure) without ever having picked up the controller (shame on us). We were wrong and we’ll happily eat all those bad words we made about the game after finally checking it out.
The SSBM and PS influence is strong, and it’s something that developer Shaba Games freely admits. By biting the style off one of the most addictive party brawlers around, they’re setting a great benchmark for themselves, and believe it or not, it’s genuinely close. Through close involvement with Dreamworks Animation, the teams have whipped up some hilarious and often times original takes on the bent fairy tale characters the Shrek movies have birthed.
The result is a game that channels the speed and frenetic pace of the aforementioned inspirations, but does it with a nice little twist. In addition to the normal button mashing attacks in weak and strong combo mixes, all the characters have the ability to power up their attacks and turn a hit into a SuperSlam (why yes, that is where the game’s title comes from, you get a cookie). SuperSlamming someone sends them flying into a pre-set part of the level, which then causes a ridiculous amount of environmental destruction.
Thanks to a Havok-powered physics system, anything that’s broken (or any of the 20 stan—uh, non-standard weapons in the game) can be picked up and used against the other players. Since the game moves at a gorgeous clip, it’s often an all-out rush to grab stuff, chuck it, and then combo into some simple button presses.
There is a deep fighting system in place, but it’s just below the surface of the simple button mashing mechanic, and while that sounds like a company line, it really is true; air dashes, counters, advanced combo strings, all of it is in there, but the game’s still completely playable as nothing more than a button masher.
There’s also an unerring sense of humor that perfectly fits with the movies. From the character designs to the attacks to the environments, even the Shaba-created entries to the series meld so perfectly with the kind of dual humor that the movies operate on that it’s impossible not to fall in love with the characters. Then, as in the case of a mini-game shown to us in the Mega Challenge mode, you can toss them into the oven.
We desperately need to get our hands on this, since we didn’t allocate nearly enough time to playing the game, and it’s a shame. Just when you think you’ve played enough games to make assumptions purely on screenshots and movies, the actual game runs up and bites you on the ass, begging to be played. Rest assured we will indeed be getting more time with SuperSlam, it’s merely a question of when.
