Skullgirls: Game Review for Playstation 3 and Xbox 360
Combining an eye-pleasing two-dimensional (2-d) art style with tournament-style gameplay brings nothing but an extremely satisfying fighting game experience in existence. That is exactly what is offered by Skullgirls, a downloadable fighting game featuring
decapitated cat-girls and ninja nurses.
The 2-d art style is so beautiful that it almost makes a person cry with joy and that is not half of what the game has to offer. The game is arguably one of the prettiest 2-d fighters around, with much of the credit going to the lead designer Mike Z, an
experienced tournament fighter and hardcore fan of all things combo related. With Mike “Mike Z” Zaimont’s insight on fighting and Alex Ahad’s overwhelming eye candy, the game turned out to be pretty special even if it comes a bit short in modes and a few other
things.
Presentation
Allow me to run it by you once again that Skullgirls is a beautiful game. With super high-resolution character art and snazzy backgrounds, almost everything in the game looks amazing. It would not be an overstatement to call it the prettiest fighting games
to be released in recent years.
The game barely stutters both online and offline. The only time the frame-rate drops a little is during the fight with the final boss. The voice work and soundtrack is nothing short of epic either. The amazing one-liners that come with every fight make a
huge contribution to the experience.
Gameplay
When you start Skullgirls, you are looking at a cast of eight corky ladies with ample ways at their disposal to play rough. You can build a team that is one, two or three-fighter strong and you can even pick up custom assist attacks for each member of your
group.
Fighting in Skullgirls puts all the basics of the genre on to a solid foundation. You have the classic light, medium and heavy set up of both punches and kicks, along with special moves and metre-reading special moves that will leave your opponent in shambles.
It all works well in the possibilities for different combinations and strategies that will leave the mind boggled. Each fighter has possesses a unique edge that makes experimentation rich and rewarding. Cerebella gets up-close with grapples, Ms. Fortunate
literally throws her head at people and Valentine uses poison syringes to take out the wind from the other girl’s sass. The techniques here are so unique that they are more fun to watch than they are to use.
The real fun in Skullgirls and fighting games in general come from squaring off with a fellow human being. This is when the mind-games come out, trying to outsmart the other person and thinking two-to-three moves ahead of him at all times, learning and countering
patterns during the pursuit for victory. Fortunately, both local and online play runs beautifully in Skullgirls, including the GGPO net-code that works to keep the game lag-free.
Besides the solid basics, the game does not have much else to do. The short story-mode mode only takes a short time to get over and the arcade ladder is pretty hard. Even on the sleep-walk difficulty, the AI is way too hard to beat for the new-comer. The
imbalance is a turn-off for casual gamers.
Another negative point in the game is the absence of a detailed move-list. While there is an option to get one’s hand on the moves by visiting Skullgirls website, it is not something that players will be too enthusiastic about.
The Verdict
Even with the lack of modes and insanely hard AI, Skullgirls is a masterpiece. Anyone who loves a 2-D fighter will love this stuff.
I give the game an 8.5 for its superb graphics and beautiful animation, not to mention the gripping gameplay and strongly recommended it to the fans of the popular SNK game King of Fighters.
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