While the various entries in the Super Smash Bros. franchise helped pioneer platform fighters as a subgenre, several indie efforts in the same vein have seen similar popularity. Rivals of Aether, Brawlhalla, and other projects have grabbed the attention of Smash fans on Nintendo Switch, as well as other platforms like PC. One more recent addition to the platform fighter subgenre was an original title, developed by Ludosity, called Slap City. The game saw some decent success on Steam, but it seems the game's wacky characters and gameplay caught the eye of Nickelodeon. Now, Ludosity has moved on to another platform fighter: Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl.
Building off the studio's experience with Slap City, Ludosity's latest project brings the same enjoyable chaos of the studio's inaugural fighter to some of Nickelodeon's biggest stars. Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl got a lot of positive attention with the game's surprise announcement, with many drawing immediate comparisons to the Super Smash Bros. series, as well as Cartoon Network: Punch Time Explosion. However, the connection to Slap City and Ludosity developing the game should excite fans of the studio's previous title, as well as fans of Super Smash Bros. Melee specifically. Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl brings that inspiration, and more, to platform fighting fans.
What Makes Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl Exciting
Many praised Slap City due to its connection to Super Smash Bros. Melee, specifically the slightly competitive-oriented lean that many hardcore fans came to love. Even though Slap City presents itself in a similarly campy manner and atmosphere as Super Smash Bros., many of the game's mechanics catered to the advanced techniques of hardcore Super Smash Bros. Melee players. That means wavedashing, L-cancelling, as well as other Slap City specific movement tech that is particularly useful in-game, is available to any players who are familiar with Melee-esque competitive movement. Ludosity has confirmed all that and more is coming to Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl.
While Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl was built with similar design intentions and style, this new Nickelodeon brawler was rebuilt from the ground up, instead of being strictly based on Slap City's code or foundational design. Instead, All-Star Brawl plays quite differently compared to Slap City; the game is fundamentally faster, but doesn't have as much advanced tech as Slap City. Additionally, each of the characters in All-Star Brawl has a vastly different moveset compared to Slap City characters. Among other fundamental changes, All-Star Brawl has a ton of additional perks: rollback netcode for online, additional Nickelodeon characters, and competitive lobbies.
Why Melee and Slap City Fans Will Love Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl
This is obviously huge for Super Smash Bros. Melee fans, especially in the last year. Competitive Melee players have always preferred playing the game as it was originally intended: on an original GameCube, displaying on a CRT television only. However, during the pandemic, a version of the Dolphin GameCube emulator had released called "Slippi." Representing the closest thing to offline Melee on an online platform, Slippi improved and streamlined the Melee experience to a comparable gameplay experience with rollback netcode. Rollback being baked into Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl is only going to improve the game's multiplayer experience.
Pair that with Slap City fans, who enjoyed the game when it first released back in 2018 in early access, Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl is the next logical step for Ludosity. The variety and silliness of characters like Patrick Star from Spongebob and Reptar from Rugrats fighting each other is perfect for a similar platform fighter. Many fans were surprised to see the Slap City developer move on to a licensed platform fighter for Nickelodeon, but the network's numerous iconic characters make perfect sense for a new brawler. A Slap City-esque platform fighter, in a similar vein to Cartoon Network: Punch Time Explosion, will likely build upon Slap City's foundation in a big way.
From the gameplay shown of Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl thus far, the game is shaping up to be a solid iteration on what Ludosity started with Slap City. Super Smash Bros. fans, or fans of platform fighters in general, will likely find a lot to love in All-Star Brawl: Iconic characters, fast-paced gameplay reminiscent of popular advanced mechanics as well, plus all the benefits of a multi-platform release and rollback netcode. For those who are able, any Super Smash Bros. Melee and Slap City fans should check out Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl at release, regardless of whether they're a big Nickelodeon fan or not.
Nickelodeon All-Star Brawl releases in fall 2021 for PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.