January 21, 1999 marked the release of “SUPER SMASH BROTHERS” on the Nintendo 64. At the time, it was a low budget game with humble beginnings but fast forward to 2017 and you would be hard pressed to find a “gamer” who hasn’t played or at the very least heard of this iconic party fighting franchise. Brawlout, which is currently available on Steam early access and releasing on other platforms later this year, is an indie title very similar to Smash Brothers and is currently making a bit of noise due to a recent announcement of a Nintendo Switch release. The game looks competent, has a colorful cast of characters to choose from, and plays, again, a lot like SSB. But why would this game work when so many other “Smash Brothers Clones” have failed? Well for one, indie games are more popular than ever at the moment. Not to mention it’s releasing on multiple platforms. One of them, the Switch, is also without its mainstay party brawler, yet.
Back in Nov of 2012 Sony Computer Entertainment published and released “PLAYSTATION ALL-STARS BATTLE ROYALE” for the Ps3 and PSVita. As you might expect, the game had a diverse cast of fighters, Kratos from God of War, Fat Princess from “Fat Princess” all the way to “Parappa tha Rappa”. Sony fans were borderline floored at the games announcement but almost simultaneously the game was met with controversy. The general consensus seemed to be: “Boo it’s a Super Smash bros clone”.
The game eventually released, had a small following and was ultimately tossed to the wayside after a few DLC characters, and hasn’t been supported since. Now, I have to admit I was a little hurt the morning I woke up and saw the praise this new indie darling was getting on Twitter. “Brawlout releasing on Switch” the head line read, “play as Drifter from Hyper Light Drifter”, others were saying. The game had been announced a year previous and is gaining a bit of traction as we get closer to its release this fall.
Brawlout is going to do well for simple reasons. Along with its good, party based gameplay, its doing one major thing that All Stars didn’t: releasing multiplatform. Although it doesn’t have the recognizable cast, aside from Drifter, it isn’t limiting its player base to a single platform. Not to mention one of the platforms it’s releasing on, the Nintendo Switch, has a player base that is (without any disrespect) desperate for more games, namely the next Super Smash Brothers. The red carpet has been laid out for this indie darling and I hope is does as well as it looks like it should. Am I a bit salty that I never got that Smash Bros vs All Stars mash up? Maybe, but it probably never would have happened anyway. Brawlout will be out this fall, and releasing on Switch probably closer to Winter 2017.
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