Unbeatable Review: A Jumbled Rhythmic Adventure

Since its Kickstarter funding in 2021, there has been a level of anticipation associated with Unbeatable due to its animated flair and a unique brand of gameplay exemplified in its [White Label] demo. Four years later, the game has released, and it certainly delivers on what was promised from D-CELL Games’ original vision.

It features essentially two games in one: a full-fledged arcade mode that superbly showcases its beat ’em up-meets-rhythm gameplay, and a 10-hour narrative adventure that places a bigger focus on exploration and character interactions. Ultimately though, this blending of such a variety of genres proves to be both a strength and weakness of Unbeatable, providing plenty of exciting and emotional moments throughout but faltering in how it goes about implementing them.

Game Name: Unbeatable
Platform(s): PlayStation 5, Xbox Series X|S, PC (reviewed)
Publisher(s): Playstack
Developer(s): D-CELL Games
Release Date: December 9, 2025

A World Where Music Is a Crime

During a rocking opening number, in the crowd stands a young blue-haired girl named Quaver who’s amazed at the band playing in front of her. Later, we find out that the vocalist in said band just so happens to be her mother and having grown up watching her perform inspires Quaver to want to be in a band of her own.

Years later, we see the point of view change to a pink-haired girl lying in an open field, watching flower petals fly past her. You then gain control of the game’s main protagonist, Beat, as she runs across the field with a guitar on her back.

Once she arrives at a fence, she meets Quaver outside as they wonder how to get into Quaver’s home without a key. Immediately, the first interaction between both characters gives the player a snippet of what’s to come. Beat hops over the fence, while Quaver, the much shorter and younger of the two, is unable to do the same. Beat teases Quaver about her height, and Quaver reminds Beat she still has plenty of growing left to do.

Unbeatable is set in a world where any type of music is illegal, and an entire police force named HARM (Harmony and Resonance Management) exists to enforce the law. According to them, this law is in place to prevent the spread of Silence, monstrous representatives of sonic antagonism. HARM’s oppressiveness against sound stands in direct conflict to what Beat and Quaver hope to accomplish in living out their dreams of playing their music in front of others.

Quaver’s idolization of her mother winds up getting them into trouble as they break into an abandoned arena so that she can practice in the same place her mother performed. They are quickly discovered by HARM agents and get into a standoff. Although they ultimately succeed in thwarting them, it doesn’t take long for Quaver’s quest for bandmates to lead them on a heck of a journey.

Exploration at the Core of the Story

Unfortunately, Beat’s expedition isn’t without its tribulations, not only for the characters within the story, but also for you as the player as well. It’s quite a contrast to have started my gaming year reviewing a more traditional rhythm game title in Rift of the Necrodancer, which uses its brand of comedy to keep things light, but everything pertaining to the gameplay sticks close to what you’d expect from a title in the genre.

Unbeatable, on the other hand, defies conventions, unafraid to dive into serious subject matter at a moment’s notice, including themes of rebellion, grief, and self-discovery across its six episodes. The issue is in the way it goes about having you reach these impactful moments throughout its narrative.

There’s a large bulk of the story mode that encourages exploration on foot to find the next clue, solve a puzzle, or talk to an NPC. Outside of distinct areas, such as an underwater tunnel where Beat is tasked with finding a way to get to the other side and thus has to solve code puzzles to push sewer water in another direction, a lot of the exploration felt empty and unnecessarily cumbersome. Going from one end of a large area to the other and finding nothing of note is a frequent occurrence, only to find out that I have to go all the way back to the other side to locate the NPC or object I needed to interact with to continue.

Where Experimentation Starts to Falter

Then there are the instances of platforming, which are perhaps the most egregious examples of the game trying to do too much. The camera is pushed further back, and it becomes difficult to see where Beat is supposed to go. I had an annoying situation rather early on where you are supposed to find another entrance into the concert arena, and it wasn’t until I accidentally fell off the makeshift bridge that I found the hidden door. Until then, I had gone around the entire arena and found nothing, which just felt needlessly frustrating.

To be fair, that was probably the worst of it, and exploration does improve the further you progress in the story. Later episodes take place in an entire town that encompasses quite a number of screens and features several stores, a bar, an arcade, and other areas for Beat to venture through. It almost felt like a point-and-click game at times, where the entire point is to find one thing that will then cause a conversation to occur, which pushes things forward.

Art Direction That Speaks Volumes

Thankfully, these conversations, for the most part, are worth wading through. Aside from the occasional abstract turn or moments where characters talk over each other, the writing and interactions between the main cast are thoughtful, endearing, and often confrontational in a slightly jokey way. Quaver and Beat in particular have writing between them that can go in all sorts of directions, but what always stuck with me is how earnest it is. Although they don’t have a long history with each other, you feel the kinship between them that carries through the narrative. Even when the story gets absolutely bonkers, it’s still grounded.

This also plays extremely well with the art of Unbeatable. The characters are in 2D, while the backgrounds are in 3D, with an aesthetic modeled after anime from the 1990s, especially FLCL. It always just oozes cool, and that vibrancy makes you want to see what’s in the next cutscene or set-piece moment.

Sadly, there are times where it’s a bit jagged. You’ll have a big scene that inexplicably takes almost a minute to transition to the next moment, where I almost thought the game had frozen. Characters may be mid-conversation, and it just abruptly cuts off.

In a way, it’s almost appropriate. Considering the narrative’s ups and downs, the jarring parts almost make sense, but it’s a bit too messy in a way that feels unintentional. And perhaps nowhere is this felt more than in the rhythm gameplay itself.

How Unbeatable Reinvents Rhythm Combat

The rhythm gameplay of Unbeatable is equal parts fun, flashy, and frustrating. There are essentially two lanes on both the left and right sides of the screen, and you use only two buttons to hit high or low depending on where the Silence are coming from during that part of the song.

On what the developers determine is the intended difficulty, “Hard,” the action is pretty much constant between single notes, hold notes, and red punching notes. And since there’s a forward and backward element to the whole thing, it’s intended as a beat ’em up. When Beat hits an enemy, if done correctly, a thud sound resonates instead of sounding like a guitar or drum note like in other rhythm games. The closer you hit a note to the beat, the better grade you receive, and of course, at the end you’ll receive an overall letter grade as well.

The arcade mode operates using what I outlined above, with harder difficulties introducing more enemies, and with that comes more chaos. However, the story mode takes this a step further by introducing fights with HARM agents or bosses where the song can suddenly take a different perspective entirely. Notes shift from moving horizontally to vertically and appear either above or below the enemy. In practice, this is a neat take on genre concepts, and it really can feel like you’re fighting the enemy on screen.

But the transitions between horizontal and vertical gameplay are also jarring. It can happen so suddenly that you’ll miss notes because of it. Not to mention, the game has many battles that will keep progressing the story whether you win or lose. That’s nice since you don’t have to win every encounter, but there are times where what happens directly after doesn’t make sense with what happened during the song.

When Music and Story Collide

Add to this that during the huge cutscenes where you play a song while a cutscene runs through it, with transitions between both gameplay types at any moment, it becomes even more challenging to prepare yourself to hit everything. These grand scenes are absolutely awesome, as they showcase how the band all play their part.

But there’s also no checkpointing or way to skip these scenes. So, if you lose at any point during one, you have to repeat the entire sequence again. Part of this is understandable because you are essentially playing the song. But with all of the extra aspects, it feels even longer. Not having the ability to skip at least the cutscene portions ultimately forced me to lower the difficulty just to get through that part.

I didn’t mind repeating sections too much because the soundtrack for Unbeatable is fantastic. It includes everything from indie rock to techno, and even jazz elements. The rock tracks are catchy and a blast to hear over and over. Even the more mellow songs are done so well that I enjoyed listening to the soundtrack outside of the game as well.

A Confident Debut with Rough Edges

Overall, much like the game itself, I went through a gamut of emotions during my time with Unbeatable. I loved the music, and it became my go-to for listening while doing other things throughout the day. The rhythm beat ’em up gameplay is a fun addition to the genre, providing its own unique take on how to play a song. I definitely had my frustrations with exploration and some of the gameplay.

But at its core, it’s all about the narrative. If it hits you, as it did for me, you’ll be much more willing to put up with the game’s faults and inconsistencies. By the end, I adored Beat and Quaver, their friendship, and seeing them grow throughout the adventure. I shed a few tears at the ending, watching them find themselves in all of the chaos around them.

Unbeatable is a tremendous first effort from D-CELL Games. It’s certainly going to be exciting to see what the team does next.

Review Disclosure Statement: A digital code for Unbeatable was provided to us by D-CELL Games for review purposes. For more information on how we review video games and other media/technology, please review our Review Guideline/Scoring Policy for more details.