Wondershot Review

When I first heard of Wondershot I thought it was nothing more than another one of those top-down local party titles that are seemingly flooding the Xbox One library. With cutesy graphics, a basic sound structure and that all important local multiplayer setting, I could have been forgiven for plumping Wondershot right into that category of ‘Christ, I’ve got people round, what can I do to entertain them? Oh, this’ll do!’.

Thankfully though, I was wrong.

Yes, Wondershot is a local multiplayer arena title in which you can go up against three sofa friends in a battle to the death. Yes it has a few different game modes to keep the party action rolling and yes it’ll be great to play with a beer or two. But this is where things get interesting, for Wondershot is actually a better single player game than you’ll realise. It may not last you weeks on end, but for a fun couple of hours it delivers some decent goods.

The main premise of the game and indeed its USP, is that you have only one ammo and only one life. Miss your shot, and you’ll find yourself dodging, dashing and rolling as fast as you can in order to grab that precious arrow, slingshot, boomerang or hammer back, puckering up to get another go. Get hit by one of your opponents and it’s game over, round lost and time to regroup, ready to go again with the next round, with a new weapon in hand and the chance to dish out some justice. If you skills allow.

The multiplayer side of things comes with three distinct modes. ‘Last Nippa’ is your standard deathmatch, whilst ‘Nippenator’ dishes out medals to the person with the most kills at the end of the set rounds. ‘Diabolik Duel’ brings a bit of small arena sudden death madness into the equation and can be a little bit nuts, over in mere seconds. If none of those three excite you and your friends, then the option to create your open custom match ups with numerous crazy rules should see you keeping the party juices flowing. The variety in weapons alone allows for some decent customisation but if I’m being honest, the entire multiplayer format ends up as a decent half hour blast before everyone wants to move on to something different. And that’s even when taking in to account some cleverly designed maps that allow for multiple tactical approaches.

Because like I previously hinted, it is the single player sections that strangely bring the most Wondershot joy.

Split into two sections this is where the real skills come in to play. The Challenges are by far the most interesting and throw you into 45 different scenarios in which you’ll need to brawl, survive or deal out a set number of kills within a time limit. The weapons, the characters and the maps are all predetermined but have been cleverly worked out by the developers to offer very little room for error. The timed modes themselves really do push you up against the gun as you attempt to clear out the arenas in as quick a time as possible. One wrong move and you’ll not only find yourself placing far down on the worldwide leaderboards, but will also find yourself pushed to just complete the event. With much variety in the challenges in place, you’ll find a good couple of hours of gameplay in here alone, although admittedly once you’ve completed a challenge, unless you find a friend on the leaderboards who you really want to try and test yourself against, you will struggle to find any reason to go back in again.

The Endless game mode is the secondary solo mode, but is also one that can be taken in with a co-op friend or three. Throwing you deep into the Woods, spending time lost in the Kingdom or fighting off enemies in the Nightmare setting, it is you and your friends up against the strange enemies that frequent the Wondershot worlds, seeing you try and battle through as many waves as you can. With experience points on offer for each kill, each wave completion and more, the more you play and get involved, the more you’ll get to level your characters up. Why do you need to level them up though? Well, I’m not too sure!

With four different characters to get to grips with, the limits are quickly hit, but thankfully the weapons that they come equipped with allow for a little more fun to be had. The Bow and Arrow is an extremely fast weapon that requires little skill, allowing you to hit the Chargers, Support, Melee and Ranged enemies from afar. It’s probably the weapon that you’ll decide to use when you first kick things off in Wondershot but it won’t be long before you realise that there is better out there. Namely, the Slingshot. A face paced, bouncing time bomb of a weapon, the Slingshot is ideal for clearing out enemies in no time at all and it’s lovely to fire it off certain angles and watch the enemies attempt to scarper. It requires less skill (perhaps that’s why I like it so much) but get a fluked good shot and you’ll be laughing.

The Boomerang is probably the one weapon that requires a huge deal of thought as, like boomerangs do, it’ll come back to you, slicing its way through enemies in the process. What can initially look like a poor shot will turn out to be a match winner and whether you’re fighting against the AI opponents or your drunk mate on the sofa, will thoroughly enjoy a lucky strike. Lastly we have the Hammer. Now, this allows for your character to dash through walls, striking when the opponent least expects it but as is the nature of a piece of wood with a metal head, will require you to get up close and personal with your victim. When you’re sitting there on one solitary life, you’ll be hoping that your swing of the club is quicker than your foes. If not, disaster.

Overall, and Wondershot is a wonderfully simple, highly frantic game that nearly succeeds on multiple levels. What promises to be just another local multiplayer game does however ultimately fall short due to repetition and the lack of enough options to really keep a group of mates hooked for too long. The single player Challenges and Endless game mode however more than make up for it and are definitely the way forward for Wondershot. Something which I never thought I’d be saying prior to firing the game up.

But how long will you wish to battle the demons alone? Probably not long enough is the truth.