The good was, however, much outweighed by the bad, with an appalling glitch list marring an otherwise interesting title. In my original review, I found a lot to love about this twisted little oddity, with its great concept, twitchy characters, and dark sense of humour. To say that I’m not relieved would be a monstrous lie, but amongst the bitter, blurry eyed exhaustion, part of me is also a little sad. For me, the war is over and Fairytale Fights, is done. And that's it.Finally, the dust has settled, the spilled blood has congealed, and my faithful Wooden Chainsaw can slip from my fingers at last. Holding it in a direction charges up a more powerful blow. Tapping it out again moves into a combo, which can be extended a few times. Instead of using buttons to attack, Fairytale Fights maps all the offensive moves to the right analogue stick. For a game which is so arsenally fixated, the lack of variety in the actual execution of executions is a terrible blight.īut the real letdown is the control system. Despite the massive list of available weapons, everything boils down to ranged or melee, and the only discernible difference is that some are more powerful than others and one or two will freeze enemies or deal damage over time. Luckily, these half screen zooms pop up to obscure the action when you enter 'glory mode'. Specific weapon types can be made more effective against certain enemies, their effects can be interesting, amusing or even useful. They can add variety, forcing players to concoct new tactics and playstyles.

'We like weapons.' Well, yes, weapons sometimes add spice. Instead it relies on a huge list of weaponry and buckets of well-rendered and physically interesting gore. Fairytale Fights doesn't really try for any of these. Interesting enemies, environments and bosses play a huge part, as do story and a well-judged difficulty curve. Because they don't usually have the move catalogue available in one-on-one fighters, side-scrollers need to get their variety kicks in different ways.

The thing about beat-'em-ups, or at least the scrolling variety, is that they can be fairly unvaried. Two hours later my optimism had sublimed into a gassy rage. After a while, especially on a big screen, the incredibly bright colour scheme will really start to hurt. Controls are no longer as slippery, death is less tooth-grittingly regular. Some of the issues from last month's preview code have even been fixed. It's built on a quirky premise, has stylish, well-defined art direction, and for the first few levels even boasts gameplay that stumbles forward proudly, pregnant with potential. Initially I was cautiously optimistic about Playlogic's blood-soaked beat-'em-up. Meanwhile, in a completely unrelated place and time with totally different people, someone thought up Fairytale Fights. 'Why,' said a third little imaginary developer, 'don't we do both?' If we want to attract the kids why don't we just knock out something with loads of blood in it?' Nobody cares what pigs do with their houses these days. 'I'm not so sure,' replied another hypothetical member of staff.

'Why,' said the developer, 'don't we take the rich, well-established, hugely varied and copyright-free world of popular fairytales and retell them for a new generation? We could even use these traditional characters in a subversive way, making them all edgy and post-modern and stuff.' Once upon a time, in a studio not too far away, a developer had an idea.

Game review fairytale fights