A nice romp for a lower price
Shantae and the Pirate’s Curse recently launched on the Wii U eShop, and while I haven’t played through the whole thing yet, I can attest to the consistently charming comedy in its first few hours or so. It’s clear that the team at WayForward looked to friends and former colleagues like Pendleton Ward and Yacht Club Games as peers and inspirations here. The overtly silly self-parody and sometimes shocking levels of irreverence lead to a pervasively jubilant and ribald narrative.
It’s been a while since I was surprised by something that happened in the story of a 2D platformer. The [SPOILERS] dragon spittle bathing spring break women seen in the video abovemanaged to do just that [END SPOILERS]. I wonder if Francis from Super Paper Mario was an influence on the game at all? I should have asked Matt Bozon while I had the chance.
The game is 25 percent off on the 3DS eShop until Jan 22. If you like this kind of game, but held back because you didn’t want to take the risk with your cash, I recommend you pick it up at that price while you can. That said, I prefer the Wii U version overall, for the flexibility to move between handheld and big-screen, plus the effects look a little bit better to me on home console. Either way, I’d strongly recommend this one to fans of Cartoon Network’s current 6-8pm weekday line up, or anyone who likes 2D platformers that know how to poke fun at themselves.