Review of Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2

Playing Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 alone is boring, but with friends it’s an incredible homage to vintage Nickelodeon programming.

 

While many have attempted to imitate Nintendo’s Super Smash Bros. series throughout the years, not many have been able to achieve any success. The unexpected exception to the norm was the Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl in 2021. The idea of Nickelodeon characters facing off in a platform fighting game akin to Smash Bros.

 

created a lot of hype, even if the game’s debut received mixed reviews. A lot of people felt that the game established a strong base that a follow-up might enhance, and Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 aims to accomplish just that.

Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2, like its predecessor, is a fighting game on a platform where players take on characters from some of Nickelodeon’s most well-known titles. With representation from popular Nickelodeon brands including SpongeBob SquarePants, Avatar:

The Last Airbender, Danny Phantom, Hey Arnold, and more, the game is a tribute to the network’s greatest successes. Hardcore fans of the network’s programming will particularly like the game because it even makes references to some of the network’s lesser-known episodes, such as El Tigre: The Adventures of Manny Rivera.

Playing it makes it very evident that the creators at Fair Play Labs are huge fans of Nickelodeon, its programming, and its cult following of characters. For Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2, several of the voice actors that played the TV characters have returned, including Debi Derryberry, who is reprising her role as Jimmy Neutron, and Tom Kenny, who is back as the voice of the beloved SpongeBob SquarePants.

It’s entertaining to see these characters interact with one another; their witty banter will delight adults who grew up with Nickelodeon as well as children who watch the channel now. There are references to past episodes in several places, including the voice lines, different outfits, and move sets of the characters.

At debut, Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 had a strong cast of 25 characters, including both new fighters and fighters from the original game. There is a good assortment of stages for these combatants to compete on, many of which also honour iconic scenes from the many TV series that they represent.

It’s reasonable for some fans to be upset about the overabundance of SpongeBob SquarePants and Avatar: The Last Airbender. Three characters from the Avatar: The Last Airbender world, including Zuko and Iroh, are scheduled for DLC, while four of the Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 launch combatants are from SpongeBob, with Mr. Krabs arriving as DLC.

It might be argued that these spaces would have been better utilised for characters from the most egregious omission, The Fairly Oddparents, whose absence is due to licencing concerns, or for CatDog, a character from the original game who is absent from the sequel.

Even though there are a lot of SpongeBob and The Last Airbender references in the game, most Nickelodeon fans should still like what’s here, despite the regrettable absence of several beloved characters from the first installment.

 

When it comes to actually controlling these characters, Smash aficionados should be able to pick up on the battle and mobility quickly due to the user-friendly controls. Combat in Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 is undoubtedly much better than in the previous title.

Combat in Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 has a fascinating new twist thanks to its metre, which can be stored for ultimate smash-style special attacks or utilised strategically as in more conventional fighting games.

Though often clumsy and unimpressive in comparison to the otherwise smooth character animations, the metre is an intriguing concept for a combat game on a platform.

Although Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2’s fundamental gameplay is good, many of the features that have been developed around it—especially the campaign mode—fall short of expectations. Unexpectedly, the campaign of Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 has roguelike aspects.

As one of the Nickelodeon characters they’ve unlocked, players go on runs and finish a variety of levels divided into themed portions. Similar to an arcade ladder, but with branching pathways and more variety encounters than just one-on-one fights, is how things unfold.

Players will occasionally match up with another player on the Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 roster; if they win, they will receive a new playable character for the campaign.

At other times, their tasks include playing minigames, purchasing power-ups, resting to regain health, defeating waves of lesser opponents, and overcoming basic and stiff platforming challenges. All of these interactions lead to a boss battle against a major antagonist that isn’t available for play, such as SpongeBob’s The Flying Dutchman, with the ultimate objective being to take on Vlad Plasmius, the antagonist of Danny Phantom.

The drawback is that players begin the game with a single life and do not instantly heal while progressing from one level to the next. Here’s when the roguelike aspects come into play: dying means restarting everything from scratch.

During each run, players can gather cash that can be redeemed in the hub planet for permanent benefits that will facilitate subsequent runs.

Although this is a novel concept for a platform fighting game’s campaign mode, it isn’t very well executed. The fact that every encounter type proceeds much in the same way makes repeating significant portions of the campaign extremely tiresome.

Because dying in Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl 2 usually equates to failing an endurance test, the game falls short of providing the sense of triumphing over overwhelming odds found in other roguelikes.

For the great majority of the stages they finish, players should be alright. However, during boss battles, they’ll likely suffer a lot of damage, carry that damage into the following stage against an enemy that’s usually simple to defeat, be struck, die, and then have to do the whole process over.