Bomb Rush Cyberfunk is Kind of a Letdown: mid game review

Bomb Rush Cyberfunk, a game filled with  nostalgic images of cel-shaded characters and street style gameplay reminiscent of Jet Set Radio Future (Not Jet Set [grind] Radio). The game definitely has the look and somewhat feel of JSRF, but the music, the story, and the characters and character designs are all lackluster to say the least.

The story is about ” 3 big writers inspiring the streets” which in itself makes almost no sense and has no substance to a proper introduction to a story. Keep in mind I’m about 1/3rd in the game already and it already seems like the story is going to be a let down as it continues with your character getting decapitated and you have a robot head to replace yours while trying to find your “identity” which is heavily implied by the first rival gang you end up fighting who are a bunch of Frankenstein creatures stapled together talking about where their “parts” came from by priding racial origins of the part, almost blatantly dehumanizing himself and the people his parts came from.

This gets your robot head character (named red) questioning his own identity… Already feels like they pushed identity politics in this game. Maybe it’s because I’m on guard from all the Woke BS indie devs have been trying to influence gamers with, but this feels like a forced story piece and feels absolutely pointless.

It goes on from here where you have to get street cred by tagging different areas to challenge the street holder and antagonist “writer” who has your head. You meet the big bad briefly only to have him retrieve a memory that you have no idea where it came from to see your old self (makes no sense) as you play through a dream level that tells me the game focuses more on a personal story, than an actual story.

From there you go on to challenge the next gang who is literally a group of angry black women in spandex 80s looking suits with giant shoulders and braids that stick out complaining how your character is a man🤦 so progressive….

The placement of these characters are boring and predictable which is sad to say the least. That’s about where I stopped story wise. I honestly couldn’t think this was woke until I saw character designs predominantly leaning in with race/gender and boring designs. The first gang was literally just Frankenstein creatures in basketball outfits riding BMX bikes, boring.

Now let’s compare that to a JSRF character: Combo, a boom box holding beast with a free dangling gold chain with a logo and baggy pants and the most chill shades you ever saw, way better. Compare that to the Frankenstein characters, boring.

But not as boring as the music. Sure it sounds like techno, but it has zero of the same energy and memorability as JSRF. It has no up eat tempos, the soundtracks don’t stick out and really sounds like they want stick to more boring tempos and mixes of music. When I hear the music, all I can think of is “when is ‘concept of Love’s track coming up?” That’s how bad the music has been so far. I wouldn’t be surprised if we do get some more memorable mixes in the playlist, but really it’s not exciting or pushing me to keep playing.

Which brings me to the gameplay itself. I was shocked to see the gameplay was strikingly similar to JSRF, even when you’re using other modes of transportation like a skateboard and bicycle. But it’s also harder to control with the camera angles always shifting in awkward positions making you incapable of seeing where you’re going compared to JSRF and even then it’s still either too slippery to control your movements and the combination trick system doesn’t work in tempo like JSRF did. I know I bring this up a lot, but JSRF is the direct inspiration and it doesn’t remain faithful to its roots as ironic of a statement that is, it deviates and forgets what made JSRF good like the graffiti.

The graffiti system works with specific patterns of each design which gives you a option for every movement you make with your spray  button commands, but good luck remembering each and every spray option. It would’ve been easier just to preset which ones you want to use, but the game Creators rather make it harder for you to use the designs you want to use. It’s just overcomplicated for a 10 hour game…

Ultimately, this game tries too hard to emulate the visual success of JSRF but falling short in every other part.

The game feels like the story was trying to push a story more than the fun of the game. You see the story unfold and simply don’t care because it doesn’t make sense and the characters are paper thin boring.

When I played JSRF, the characters weren’t trying to be deep, they were trying to be fun which they did successfully. In the same time I spent playing JSRF, I unlocked two characters and and passed a quick tutorial with Beat. In that same time, I played a character that had his head removed and played through TWO SEPARATE TUTORIALS and a really bland storyline… I really can’t say this was all that fun, but it wasn’t the worst thing I ever played either. It has the elements of JSRF, but lacks all the charisma of the game they are emulating.

With JSRF you got characters who seemed almost out of this world, you had a easy fluid gameplay, and while the camera angles were a problem too, they were more manageable in JSRF. BRC simply trying too hard to be bigger than it actually was. The game is mid at best. I’d say worth at most $20 dollars and the game itself is only recorded at 10 hours long. Not really a game I would pay $40 again.

Let me be blunt and state this isn’t my best writing and I just wanted to give you all of my opinion of the game overall. I didn’t take time to proof read, or edit or anything that would possibly  be considered to a well written review.

Let me know what you all thought of the game or if you think I’m being too critical.