Review: Override: Mech City Brawl – A Mech Brawlin, Kaiju Stompin, Okayish Time

Remember Those Old Godzilla Fighters?

You know those bad boys like Godzilla: Destroy All Monsters Melee, Godzilla: Save The Earth, and Godzilla: Unleashed? The games where the objective usually consisted of “You, monster! Destroy any other monster on the screen while also destroying the entire city surrounding you. Oh and have fun!” Did you enjoy those? Well if you did or you’re a kaiju, sentai, Pacific Rim, or Power Rangers fan like myself you’ll probably also be a fan of Override: Mech City Brawl. Oh, wait. You didn’t enjoy the barebones combat of the Godzilla games? Well…..

Game Name: Override: Mech City Brawl 
Platform(s): Steam/PC, PlayStation 4 (Reviewed), Xbox One
Publisher(s): Modus Games
Developer(s): The Balance
Release Date: December 4, 2018
MSRP: $39.99 Super Charged Mega Edition / $29.99 Standard Edition (digital only)

 

Little Things Come In Big Packages

Override sports quite a few different modes that are perfect for any amount of time-wasting. The game sports a single player story mode, your standard local and online versus modes, and a co-op party mode that I’ll get to later. There’s also the garage where you can use unlocked assets to customize your favorite mech’s skin and accessories to your liking. The number of modes surprised me and I felt very welcome after starting the game up and being greeted by so much. With this and the pretty impressive visuals, I was excited to step foot into my mecha and get to battle.

Huge Combatants But No Impact

The gameplay didn’t have as much variety as the menus before it as it felt very bare bones when I finally hopped into my mech and took on the tutorial. Once you pick one of 12 different mechs (each with very nice designs might I add) then you’re thrown right into battle with multiple attacks at your disposal. You control your different limbs with your controller bumpers and triggers (R1, R2, RB, RT, etc.) which allow you to punch and kick. Holding these commands allow you to charge these abilities release a stronger variation. Each version of these melee attacks has it’s own strengths, weaknesses, and opportunities for best usage. However, these moves don’t seem to pack much a punch and present the player with no satisfaction when landed like expected in a fighting game which seems to be a running issue of the game. There are also jumping melee attacks which I didn’t really use much as they felt more like I was piloting a puppet on strings instead of my own giant robot.

Aside from melee attacks, there are also multiple specials per character which is what presented me with the most fun in the game and helped break the monotony of the melee based combat tools presented. 
The magical girl anime based mech quickly comes to mind as her specials the “Reverse Projectile Attack” and freeze beam made it really fun to trap and combo opponents, which is some complexity this game desperately needs. Each character’s special usage presented some form of creativity and really had me want to invest more time into the game. Funny enough, these opinions on the combat system found in the game seem to echo the very same thing that many critics had when it came to the old Godzilla arena fighters.

The game also presents you with standard movement options such as dashing and jumping. You also have access to lock on camera, a shield (which can be broken via charged attacks), and a super move to unleash once your health hits low enough.

Destruction But No Satisfaction

The brawls take place in real-world location-based cities and throughout your giant battles, the surrounding area can be used for mobility, cover, and more. Of course, this leads to tons of buildings being demolished amidst the chaos of you and your opponent’s bout. Sadly while I find it cool that there are more applications for the areas than just destruction, actually causing the destruction feels very unsatisfying. There is no fun in destroying the area and everything falls over from the smallest touch. Again going back to the Godzilla games this was the case with certain buildings in those but others were stronger and took multiple hits to topple and fell into the ground in a great destructive fashion giving you this rush of excitement. This also added the application of stronger cover in matches which was a cool touch.

Many Modes And One Surprise

The modes presented are your standard affair. Offline and online versus are self-explanatory and the story mode is an acceptable time waster told visual novel cutscene style pitting you against tons of giant alien invaders. Your mileage and enjoyment of these modes depend on how you feel about the combat system as if it’s barebones to you as it is to me these modes can get very dry and repetitive.

One mode stood out to me, however. Party CO-OP takes you and up to 3 others and puts you in control of different limbs of your mech. Think Power Rangers Mechazord or Voltron link style. Sounds fun right? That’s because it is, at least for a bit. The thing holding this mode back is once again the lackluster combat. Yeah, the teamwork is cool but what about the person that’s just stuck mashing the triggers or bumpers to operate the boring melee combat? It wears out the novelty fast and it’s disappointing because once I read about this mode I got crazy excited but the dull side of the game really killed that excitement.

Review Disclosure Statement: Copy of Override: Mech City Brawl was provided to us by publisher for review purposes. For more information on how we review video games and other media/technology, please go review our Review Guideline/Scoring Policy for more info.

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