Powerpuff Girls: Defenders of Townsville Review
PROS
- Nice visual options for the girls
- Great pace of unlocks
- Good range of easily controlled powers
CONS
- Backgrounds and robots are a little bland
- Map could do with more detail
VERDICT
Powerpuff Girls: Defenders of Townsville is a sharp and entertaining metroidvania with tight controls that is enjoyable for newcomers and cartoon fans alike.
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From the moment Powerpuff Girls: Defenders of Townsville starts it shows a clear love of its source material. The first choice the game has you make is between two different visual and audio treatments for the girls: one that matches the original series, and one for their new CGI interpretation. While this has no impact on gameplay, it shows a respect for the fans, letting them enjoy their favorite version of the heroes.
The action begins when the evil monkey Mojo Jojo lures the girls into a trap and shoots them with his Disremember Ray. This causes them to forget their abilities, leaving them powerless against his army of robotic minions.
You start out controlling Buttercup, who can’t even remember how to punch. It's up to you to rediscover her abilities, that have been scattered through the open-world. You move left and right using a virtual-stick. Initially this is all you can do but, by unlocking powers, the screen satisfyingly fills with a range of different virtual-buttons to enable you to fly and unleash a variety of powerful beam attacks.
The other girls are trapped inside massive robots that spray areas with bullets when you find them. By weaving through this shower of shrapnel you can smash these mechanised prisons to pieces and free your sisters.
Once freed you gain access to new powers by switchng between the girls. This is vital to moving forward with many doors requiring specific attacks to open. For example. Buttercup’s sonic-blast lets you activate switches through walls, and Blossom’s fireball can melt paths through ice.
This dynamic means that you won't be able to access all of a room's secrets on your first visit, forcing you to revisit it later. Thankfully, there's a map to show where you have been and which areas have yet to be explored. Unfortunately, the map doesn't comunicate which powers are needed to clear the obstacles that block your path, a fact that regularly saw us needlessly retracing our steps through bland environments.
We have become so accustomed to hastily designed licenced games that when a title like Powerpuff Girls: Defenders of Townsville stumbles into our laps, it takes us a moment to adapt. It is not perfect, but it is filled with sugar, spice, and a quite a lot of Metroid, creating a faithful and fun action adventure.
Screenshots
$3.99
