With a title like this you are definitely ready for quite the scary film experience. That said, the monster itself takes forever and a day to show up. For the most part this plays out more like a classic drama of sorts. I don’t know, the genre would be hard to pick. I wouldn’t call it an action or adventure but slice of life doesn’t seem quite right either. Well, once the monster shows up then it’s fair to say that this goes into full creature feature territory I suppose.
The movie starts with a tribe getting ready to murder one guy. This guy had been accepting medical treatment from the Americans which is a big no no in the tribe. Before they execute him the guy says he will come back to life and curse them out. In particular there are 3 people he wants revenge on. His wife who lied to cement his death, The Chief who ordered his death, and the Witch Doctor who framed him. The tribe doesn’t believe he will come back but just in case they bury him deep underground. As long as nobody takes him out they should be safe…
We then cut to the scientists who haven’t been having a great time on the island. The natives don’t like them after all so they live in perpetual danger. Additionally, they don’t have a lot of good food here so they have to survive on rations and sub-par coffee. Still, they continue with their quest to heal all the natives from the plague. Two of the scientists decide to trample on the sacred burying grounds because “Who’s afraid of a few superstitions” as the girl says. This gives the dead guy some energy though so he emerges as a small tree stump that is glaring at everybody.
One of the doctors says she absolutely has to save this tree since as a professional she must save all lives. The tree has a heart beat after all. The other doctors are dubious but concede so she uses an experimental drug on it. This allows the monster known as the Tabonga to finally regain his strength. He turns into a tree monster and starts going about getting his revenge on those who wronged him. Can anyone hope to stop him?
Now, it may be easy to make fun of the Tabonga right away since he has a lot of weaknesses. He is exceptionally slow to the point where a small child could probably outrun him for a long while. Then you have the fact that his arms are rather small so he doesn’t have a long reach. The monster’s also not that big so the only thing he has going for him is a good amount of strength. Once he grabs onto you then it’s game over but it’s hard to get to that point.
So I guess part of the fun in the film is seeing how he will actually grab his victims. Naturally one of them trips but see even tripping wouldn’t be enough for this guy to catch you. So naturally the guy trips on a rock so he keeps rocking back and forth as he moans about his head. this allows the Tabonga to catch up to him and finish the job. For another character she got her knife stuck on a tree so she spends a while trying to pull it out without realizing that the Tabonga is there. She basically falls into his arm and then faints which allows him time to finish the embrace.
The Tabonga just isn’t impressive as a serious villain but he can be a fun one. The design is absolutely unique so you won’t be forgetting it anytime soon. I do think he should have appeared a lot sooner though as it takes so long for him to appear at all. I want to say over half the movie finishes without him and it’s a short movie as it is.
As for the human characters, well I won’t save any of the tribesman were that good. The Tabonga’s wife was a traitor from the get go and didn’t seem to have much of a plan. She is promptly betrayed as the cycle goes on and then isn’t even able to finish off her opponent before the Tabonga appears. The witch doctor is certainly on the annoying side as well. He does manage to take the Tabonga down for a bit but you’re just waiting for him to go down. At least there were two islanders who were willing to embrace the science that the Americans brought.
Then you have the main scientists. There are quite a few of them on the island. The main one would be William who doesn’t take the trees seriously. His cures have been working but a lot of people don’t believe them. He steps up when he needs to and works as a reasonable main character. There really isn’t too much to him beyond being a nice guy though. Then you have Dr. Terry who is the one that brings the Tabonga back to life. You can’t really blame her for wanting to save it but I do think the heroes should have kept someone on guard duty at least. We know nothing about living trees so you should take every precaution available.
Clark was another scientist and probably the most rational at times. So there’s a scene where the main characters wake up after their nap and see the lab in ruins. The other doctors immediately jump to the conclusion that the tree must have come to life and smashed the place up. Clark addresses the elephant in the room though and says instead of leaping to such crazy conclusions what if the natives just broke in and wrecked the place?
The crazy thing is that it was the tree that did it of course, but why would that be anyone’s first guess? Clark’s made the most sense by far but everyone pretty much dismisses it. So much for that I guess. Finally you have Mae who nearly dies early on but managed to just make it to safety in time. She talks a whole lot and has a certain sense of bravado that the others can’t match. She apparently had a pretty good business on the island trading jewels and materials for a lot of money. So things have gone well for her but you’re almost surprised she has lasted so long on this island. Her two husbands were evidently not quite as fortunate so the next one better beware.
Overall, From Hell It Came is a fun enough film. You can’t take the living tree all that seriously but that doesn’t bring down the overall movie experience. The writing is pretty solid here and it’s over in the blink of an eye. The execution in the opening scene is a little intense but after that the film is rather tame. The cast of characters hold up well and this is a film that really captures the essence of the creature feature genre. The characters must all gang up to take this guy down or they are finished. We have supernatural elements and even a bit of a mystery as the heroes figure out how to stop him. If you like this genre then this is a good movie to check out. It’s not all that well known but perhaps that will change if it ever gets a sequel.
Overall 7/10
You can definitely chalk this up as another film I had never heard of before watching it. 9 to 5’s got a fun setting since it takes place in a classic corporate job where the boss is rather corrupt. It’s a comedy that goes all out and embraces how crazy the story is. Ultimately this works out quite well. While I wouldn’t say it quite stacks up there with the best comedies, it has a lot of fun moments.
The movie starts by introducing us to Judy who is starting her first day at work. She is quite excited although her colleagues are not exactly thrilled at getting a new hire in. After all that is a spot that someone from inside the branch could have taken as a promotion. The person training her will be Violet. Violet’s been at the job for a very long time and is hoping to get the next promotion. She’s not exactly a happy camper but at this job there is little reason to be. Violet is playing nice since she wants the promotion but if she is not picked then there are going to be problems.
Finally you have the third main character Doralee. She is the boss’s secretary and has to put up with a lot of Franklin’s antics. She needs the job so she usually looks the other way and just makes sure Franklin never goes too far. Unfortunately nobody at the workplace likes her since it turns out that Franklin’s been spreading rumors around that they’re in an affair. Finally, the three ladies have had enough. They need to take Franklin down but how should they go about it?
The movie makes sure to paint quite the picture about what a bad boss Franklin is. Think about the worst boss you’ve had and then keep increasing the extremes. He constantly harasses Doralee and always takes credit for other people’s work. He is extremely quick to fire his workers even over something like gossip. The guy is massively obsessed with having power and of course he also steals from the company. Like I said, they go all in with how this guy’s a total villain.
So you’re not exactly going to sympathize with him once the main characters decide to start taking him down. He does make for an entertaining villain minus the Doralee scenes though. The guy is quite determined and does come up with a lot of plans. You certainly can’t say that he’s the type to give up at least. He also does put up a fairly good poker face when dealing with people who don’t know the truth about how he controls the place.
From the 3 main characters my favorite one was definitely Doralee. It’s fair to say that she was the most sympathetic character here. It’s no fun to have everyone exclude you, especially when you have done your best to be quite pleasant. This even includes the other main characters who believe the rumors and don’t make any attempt to get to know her. At least the others always had company so that’s why you feel the most bad for Doralee.
Especially considering that she was still keeping her integrity despite all of the external pressure. Doralee also had a gun which is very handy to have in these things. It certainly came in handy for keeping Franklin at bay. Then we have Judy who in some ways you could say has the largest focus although it’s close between her and Violet. Considering that she has just started at the job and is quite nervous I would say she does really well here. It’s natural that she makes some mistakes but she makes friends quickly and then is able to help out in the adventures.
Finally you have Violet who gives the film a lot of energy. The whole situation really starts to heat up because of her intervention. Grabbing poison from the store is quite the way to go about it even if it was an accident. The labels on both boxes were incredibly similar so you could see how the mistake could happen. Violet does tend to panic a bit more than the other two. She may be the most in control at the office space but outside of that the other two seem to adapt quicker.
There are a flurry of side characters as well even though I wouldn’t say any of them are particularly big. For example you have Franklin’s spy who spends a lot of time in the rest room just to try and gather gossip to give to him. She is absolutely desperate for his approval to a rather crazy degree. You also have Franklin’s wife who appears to be quite dense in this film. She doesn’t notice his incriminating behavior and buys whatever he is selling. Perhaps she will start to pick up on things if we ever got a sequel to this film.
As to the writing in general, I would say it was pretty good. As with all comedies you will have the jokes that land and then the ones that don’t. I would say more land than the ones that don’t so in general you’ve got a pretty good range there. I liked the dream sequence when everyone decides to chase after Franklin with their guns as he runs all over the place.
Then on the flip side I would say the Alice in Wonderland/Snow White one wasn’t quite as entertaining. Finally the Doralee dream was the least amusing in part due to it seeming to drag on a lot. Not to mention I wouldn’t say Franklin was quite as badly off in that one. That said, I think the true intent of that dream was also to show us more of what Doralee has had to put up with the entire time without having to actually put her in those scenes. Her revenge in a way is just flipping the way he had been acting the whole time.
Then you have some of the hospital hysterics which can be amusing but go on a bit long. In general I would say that’s the film’s weakness which is that some of the jokes do tend to overstay their welcome. It’s the difference from being a good comedy to being a great one. There are no negatives nearly serious enough to bring this film down from being a good one though. At the end of the day it properly hits on all of the essentials such as being entertaining, having likable characters, and containing a good ending.
The credits have a bit of an epilogue for each of the characters which is nice. One character very nearly got off a bit too easy but this fixed that right up. In general the ending is quite busy with a lot going on in the right ways. It’s really a satisfying ending for all parties involved.
Overall, 9 to 5 is a solid film. It’s definitely a comedy title that I can really recommend to any fan of the genre. It does a good job introducing all of the main 3 characters and they each even have a tiny supporting cast that appears for their origin of sorts. (In Judy’s case her character appears near the end) Not every scene may land such as the group deciding to smoke some marihuana but then you have the more epic scenes such as the shootout and general office moments like Franklin’s chair not working very well. It ends up being a solid all around mix of fun.
Overall 6/10
The Slender Man was definitely a character who got pretty big for a while. Perhaps not as big as Freddy Fazbear but since Slender Man was involved in court proceedings and such he may have gotten more screen time for a while. Naturally the movie came out very late once most of this was already done. It’s not a very impressive horror film though. Slender Man himself doesn’t even get to do anything for the longest time and the film is more about setting up the atmosphere than doing anything with it. Slender Man just doesn’t stick out.
The movie starts with the 4 main girls Katie, Wren, Hallie, and Chloe deciding to have a girls night out to summon Slender Man after hearing that the guys were going to do it. Little did they know the guys decided not to summon him in the end. So the girls watch the tape that summons him and immediately they all feel the fear. Usually after something like that you would expect the characters to just laugh it off or something but they take it deadly serious. You can already tell that the film is going to be rather dramatic the whole time. They figure they will go about their lives as normal except then Katie goes missing a few days later. Can they possibly rescue her from Slender Man or is it already too late?
You feel like it probably is too late at this point since usually you aren’t able to do much against these supernatural creatures but at the same time since a lot of focus is put on trying to bring her back then maybe there is a slight shot. Mainly Wren is the one trying her hardest as she does a lot of research to the point where she basically goes insane and manic over a lack of sleep. She does well in learning about him but also takes far more chances then you would want.
For example, she goes to the message boards that Katie was posting in about Slender Man. The main user there quickly lets her know that Katie is gone and the only way to try and bring her back is to make a deal with Slender Man. As part of this deal she needs to go into the wilderness and blindfold herself in the dead of night along with her friends. Here’s the problem, based on the videos that Katie sent in the chat, this user knows roughly where she lives.
The user would also then know where the forest is so saying that you will go there at night blindfolded is not a great plan. Even if Slender Man isn’t real, the alternative is that this user may have had something to do with her disappearance. If that is the case then you’re pretty much throwing your life away by following his advice. It’s also a shame to see the characters throwing away their prized possessions. Of course if you actually think this could be real then it’s admirable to take these risks to try and save your friend.
Wren is definitely the best character in the movie. She easily takes the most chances and puts in a lot of work to save Katie. Without her the other characters probably wouldn’t have done much of anything. After all, they were doing their best to avoid even thinking about the video. Even when Wren was being up front with them about the nightmares and such they kept trying to act as if it wasn’t happening. They weren’t too convincing about it either.
Slender Man throws in a bunch of jump scares of course but nothing too noteworthy. You have people looking distorted or Katie’s drunk father breaking into the house but for the most part it’s all rather standard like that. You figure Slender Man himself won’t try anything for a while. One scene that was at least visually interesting was when Slender Man started rewriting reality so the library started looking off. He would extend the distance to go anywhere which sort of locks you in a bad spot.
This helps to offset that his design doesn’t look very intimidating. Not only has he skipped leg day for decades but he doesn’t have any real muscle either. He does have one moment where he causes someone’s face to be empty like his which certainly seems like a tough trick to get around since you can’t talk at that point. His actual screen time is so small though. For a film called Slender Man you would expect to see him a little more right? It’s not like we’re ever meant to think he’s not real. It’s clear from the start that he is actually around.
By the end of the film there really isn’t much of a happy ending considering the body count. At the same time, there was never any way the heroes could have defeated him which makes this an exercise in futility. It’s something that particularly happens in horror films a lot that can be annoying. If you write a villain out to be absolutely untouchable then what is even the point? Slender Man has no weaknesses. You can barter with him but that’s about it.
When you remove any chance of even damaging the guy then it’s like the heroes are fighting against an abstract force. At least with films like Friday the 13th and Scream you can see the heroes putting up a fight. You figure they’ll lose in the end anyway but at least it’s close. Although supernatural forces are more interesting to battle with, it’s nullified if the whole journey is pointless.
I’ll give Slender Man the slimmest of credits for at least being fairly tame though. It’s not throwing out gratuitous violence or super gritty deaths at you. There isn’t a lot of crazy language which is usually the norm for these films. All in all it’s a lot tamer than you may think although it’s still quite dark. Slender Man seems to always be going after kids and teens after all which may also mean that he’s nervous about getting adults. That’s pure head canon though since his abilities would suggest that this would be easy as well.
Overall, Slender Man set the tone early when the characters got super disturbed after watching a low quality video about Slender Man. It was just a few images looping at high speeds so it’s hard to see why they were so affected. Apparently they all felt something as Wren would later state but that’s when you knew that the characters were doomed. They were terrified long before they met Slender Man. Katie also seemed to have made a rather iffy choice once we learn more details about what happened with her. She could have at least left the other characters a note or something right? It’s certainly nice that Slender Man got a film I suppose but it’s really just a standard horror film about a group of teens trying to survive for as long as they can against an utterly invincible foe. The characters aren’t particularly likable and there’s just nothing to hook you on the film.
Overall 3/10
Saint Seiya returns once again to fight their most powerful opponents yet. If you’ve seen the first three films then you know you’re about to see another epic installment in the franchise. Athena may not look great here but she has improved quite a bit since the last film. This one’s back to being a bit on the shorter side but it cuts right to the action so you’re still going to get a lot of epic battles.
The movie starts with a bang as Lucifer has been resurrected. He sends his minions to go and take down the Gold Saints first. They quickly murder each one in an instant and then after that they go with Lucifer to take Athena down. Athena is unable to stop these guys and even Seiya and friends are defeated. It all just happened so fast and now the world is in ruins as towns are being flooded and cities are being destroyed. Lucifer gives Athena once chance to save the world. She will have to walk over to his throne across a valley of thorns and sacrifice herself so that the world will live. Athena has decided to do this but her Saints aren’t thrilled at the prospect. They’ve decided to rise and fight against this guy.
Shiryu missed out on the initial battle involving the main saints so he is the only one still at full power while Seiya, Hyoga, and Shun are already at death’s door. Of course Ikki also wasn’t there but he never is. Due to this, Shiryu actually gets some of the best scenes in the film such as taking on two of Lucifer’s minions at the same time. Considering how these guys handled the other Saints so easily, it was a pretty intense moment. We also got to hear him say the catchphrase “The same technique never works on a Saint twice” which was hype.
Shiryu fans will definitely enjoy his appearance here as I would say it is his best appearance across all of the films. Then you have Shun who gets beat as usual but I suppose he did hold his own for a bit. The issue is that his opponent could literally slice through his chains without any effort which is an issue. Not much you can do if your chains aren’t strong enough to defend with right?
Ikki naturally gets to step in and look good though. Again I would say his role here is rather small but he takes his opponent out pretty quick with his illusions which is always fun. It’s clear that his abilities are near the top when it comes to all Saints around the board. There’s not much to complain about when that’s the case since I suppose he would end up stealing the show if he was there the whole time. He has a pretty hype scene where he tells Shun that he needs to get up on his own though.
Hyoga also looks good here. He may not stand out as much as in the last film since he got such a big focus there at times but he takes on his opponent and looks quite good. Then you have Seiya who definitely looks great here. He doesn’t back down and isn’t afraid to give his opponents some attitude as well. It doesn’t matter if it’s Lucifer or Hades going up against him, Seiya always fights hard for Athena. He gets to unleash his Meteor Fist and of course takes out his trump card near the end.
Compared to the last film which was going for more of an ambitious setup, I would say this film is really going back down to basics. Athena is defeated/put in a position where she will die soon so the heroes have to save her as soon as possible. We get the big fights as the heroes near the end and then the climax has arrived. There are really no side quests or anything to distract you.
That said, if you think about it some more then the Gold Saints look pitiful once more. When even Virgo Shaka was taken out in an instant I had to shake my head at that. I mean…I guess you could say since it was 4 on 1 that if they go all out from the start even Virgo would lose but it’s hard to see it being that quick. Lets say we take it to be fact that all of the Saints are massively faster than light so that one instant was actually a few minutes of their time in battling. Couldn’t Virgo have landed any real hits or something? I don’t see him calling for backup but the guy was always shown to be one of the most powerful Saints so losing just like that was hard to buy.
It is an effective way of building up hype for the new villains though. Since the heroes surpassed the Gold Saints in Arc 1 I am fully comfortable with them defeating the guys who beat the Gold Saints as well. That tracks for sure, but why didn’t some of the other Gold Saints arrive to help like Roshi? At least he could have offered some kind of assistance. Athena really needs to fire all of her Gold Saints since they never help her anyway.
The animation is very solid as always. It doesn’t really use any super cool effects like the fire blasts in the last film but it’s all very consistent. Ikki’s illusion was certainly fun and all of the battles have a lot going on. Keeping up with the close range blows and projectiles is fun. The choreography here is definitely on point. As expected the soundtrack also delivers the whole time as well as it amps up the battles.
Overall, Saint Seiya continues its run of solid films. You do feel like there’s not much of the Earth left to save by the time Lucifer is done with it but I suppose that’s at least something Athena and her magic can work out. At least it gives her something to do when all is said and done. Since the series uses all kinds of inspirations from around the globe for each set of villains it was fun to see a Biblical interpretation here. Lucifer certainly makes for an intimidating villain in that sense and existing in the same series as Hades will naturally have you wonder which fighter is stronger. If you like action films then you’ve definitely got to check this one out. It’ll give you all the fighting you could ever want with the characters inspiring you as they get up after each hit.
Overall 8/10
The Saint Seiya crew returns once more for another great film. The movies have been quite consistent in quality and this one is no different. With the extended run time we also get to see quite a lot of extra action scenes here. Some characters look a little suspect of course but ultimately you are bound to have a good time.
One day Abel returns to the world. He is the god of the Sun and Athena’s long lost brother. His abilities are pretty much invincible and he also has 4 Corona Saints working for him. As a result, he says that Athena no longer needs her bronze saints to defend her. Seiya and the others are outraged at this but Athena confirms it must be this way. She doesn’t even bat an eye when the main Corona Saint beats Seiya to a pulp and even the Golden Saints who had been slain have returned to offer their allegiance.
After the Bronze Saints are gone and Athena is sure that nobody can protect her, she offers one of the worst attacks I’ve ever seen as she tries to defeat Abel. He quickly murders her and then his Corona Saints murder the only 2 Golden Saints who were brave enough to try and defend her. With Athena on her way to hell, Seiya and pals must once again don their armors in order to save her. Still, they are going up against foes who have even defeated the golden saints with ease. Do they have a chance?
I’ll go into the positives in a minute but I just have one negative with the film which is that the plot makes Athena and the Gold Saints look absolutely horrible. Athena is the main culprit here though. So her long lost brother shows up and after hanging out with him for a few hours she is ready to discard her saints entirely and just follow his rule? She doesn’t object when he beats up her friends via proxy? The guy is so corrupt it’s obvious and she seems to know it but decides not to make a move.
It’s almost worse that she decides to attack him later since we find out that she knew he was evil all along. The reason she waited is she thought Seiya and friends would get murdered by him. She should know they would try to avenge her anyway so that would be even worse. Even more so when you realize that there were 5 Gold Saints with her at the time so Seiya would have had some backup. Her plan was just nuts and she dies without even putting up a fight. Athena has to be the weakest cosmic being in the series.
Then you also have the Gold Saints bowing to these Corona guys and refusing to do anything. At least 2 of them rose up to try and defend Athena but naturally they were absolutely crushed since it was 4 against 2. It’s nice that they acted but it was too little too late. They should have been helping Seiya when he was getting pounded, particularly as it seemed like Seiya would have beaten his opponent if not for Athena stopping him.
There’s no defense for Gemini Saga and the others though. Just standing by as their allies are being beaten is the height of disgrace. Their armors should have shattered in disgust as they went to find a new owner. So the story itself feels very forced and there were many better ways to set this up. At least once we do get to Seiya and friends storming the temple then we get back on track.
Once the introductions are over then the heroes quickly march on to take these guys down. Seiya in particular looks great here since he didn’t wait for any kind of explanation and just went right to the action. Now, he was filled with self doubt so he tended to lose a whole lot here but at least he always got right back up. He’s not the kind of character to back down from a fight and he got the job done in the end.
I think fans of all the bronze saints should be satisfied here. Shiryu was the one who found out the method to save Athena and did well in taking his guy out. He even let the opponent get a false sense of security so he could confirm his theory about Athena. Hyoga flat out defeated one of the Corona Saints in a fair fight which was very impressive and was also one of the first ones to reach Abel. Of course that was partially because they let him.
Shun got beat real quick in his fight but that is to be expected. After getting saved he was at least able to assist Seiya near the end by stopping one of the opponent’s blows. It may not be perfect, but you can see some improvement with Shun. Ikki looks great here as he naturally takes his guy down. If not for a cheap shot he may have been able to do a whole lot more as well. I admit that I would have liked to have seen him take on the main villains more though.
As for the Corona Knights, they make for fun adversaries. The main one, Carina had a really good fire attack that the animators clearly had fun with. Effectively his flames burn you from the inside out so it looks like the character is expanding from the hot air. You can feel how painful that attack has to be. Others had electric wires which were also deadly and a nice variety of attacks. As with most of these films since it is a whole group introduced here it is hard to really remember any of their names in particular. Additionally their introductions are long since they also say where they are from.
That said, each villain is good. I wouldn’t say any were underwhelming. The evil Gold Saints were also good opponents even if they didn’t learn anything from their last defeats at the hands of the saints. I would have liked Gemini Saga to have done a little ore but I suppose taking on one of the Corona Knights would have to suffice. Perhaps he should have let his evil side out a bit more and then he could have really taken the fight to these guys.
The animation here was really good as you would expect. The fight scenes really shine and the armors look very sleek on the characters. Saint Seiya is one of those titles you really watch for the fun fight scenes and they always deliver. You can probably tell how most of the fights will play out since Saint Seiya is a very formulaic series but it doesn’t undercut the raw determination that each character brings to the table. The music tracks also fit right in with what’s going on.
Overall, Saint Seiya delivers with another great film. The climax even tries to go a bit more high scale than the last 2 films which is good if you like the other Saints as well as Seiya. Ikki’s role may be a bit smaller than the first two films but it’s satisfying. I had my issues with the plot and Athena as she continually disappoints but the main Bronze Saints all look good. It’s nice to see how far they’ve come from the old days as they now take on opponents who were easily crushing the Golden Saints. While the gold fighters may not have looked great here, I do like the idea of getting them in on the action a bit. It really helps to solidify these new guys as true threats.
Overall 8/10
It’s time for another platforming adventure. Joe & Mac is essentially the bargain bin version of Mario and Luigi but it actually holds up a little better than expected. I’ve played my share of caveman type adventures over the years and this one is a lot smoother than the competition. It’s fairly short and never really threatened the bigger players but it makes for a fun little playthrough.
The general plot is that a bunch of giant animals and a wizard have kidnapped all the cavewomen in the tribe. Joe and Mac must now head out to save them. Each level has you defeat a giant dinosaur/creature at the end and you save one person at a time. There are 10-13 levels in the game so it’s fairly quick since each level is around the length of your average platformer. Watch out also as you don’t get unlimited game overs. Lose all your lives too many times and there is no way back. Instead you will just have to endure your defeat.
Of course as this is on the Switch Online you are able to rewind as needed so you should never be in any true danger. Just be ready to back out at any given moment. Some of the bosses can be rather intense although at the same time I would also call them easy to exploit. Just hide under the head a lot of times and they just can’t reach you. Pretty good deal right? Occasionally they will mix things up a bit so you just need to be able to react and get out of there as soon as possible.
When it comes to the graphics the game certainly looks good as you would expect. The stages look solid and there’s a lot of variety throughout the game. The enemy bosses look good but they do tend to reuse the same bosses a few times. Since the game is so short this is very noticeable. The game probably won’t last you much longer than an hour so when you see the same boss it’s impossible to miss.
Now when it comes to the main characters I wouldn’t say they are very likable but this is the kind of game that’s not really character driven anyway. You should be able to just completely ignore them as it is. The gameplay is what you’re here for. Come to think of it, I haven’t really gone into the gameplay yet so I should do that now.
It’s a classic platformer where you have to jump and smash your way to the end. You have a club by default but you can unlock various power ups based on the items you pick up from a box. This includes boomerangs, stone discs, and even fire balls. The best item here is definitely the throwing stones. You can spam these and they deal a lot of damage. I highly recommend holding onto these as long as possible. That makes things tricky if anything because you will want to actively try to avoid the other power ups which is a little different compared to the other games.
It’s an odd feeling when you are trying to not allow yourself to get power ups. It’s not too hard to avoid them though so you should be good. As for the minions, it can be difficult to hit them without taking any damage so keep that in mind. Try to stay from afar or even skip them if needed. They don’t drop food all that often after all so a lot of times hitting them is really just putting unnecessary risk on yourself the whole time.
This is really why the game stands out. The gameplay actually feels like a big Nintendo game. The controls are very responsive. The only thing that takes some getting used to is how the characters keep their momentum when jumping. It can be a little difficult to stop on a dime or change direction. It’s not a bad thing per say, it’s just not quite what you’re used to in a platforming title. Once you get the hang of this then you are definitely set for the rest of the way.
Due to the straight forward nature of the game there isn’t a whole lot more to talk about with it. It would be nice to see this game get a sequel I suppose but at the same time since Nintendo can easily make a high quality game they may as well make a whole new franchise with this style of gameplay. The caveman era never really made for the most interesting saga if you ask me so changing things up would definitely be for the best.
Overall, Joe & Mac is definitely a game you don’t want to miss out on if you have the Switch Online. It’s a well balanced platformer that should keep you on the edge of your seat the whole time. It’s definitely a short title so it won’t take you very long to beat it but you’ll have a good time. Considering that it’s free if you have the Switch Online, it’s a pretty good deal.
Overall 7/10
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