Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD Review

If you told me I'd be playing originally a Nintendo Wii exclusive on my Xbox One then I probably wouldn't believe you.

This really was an interesting game to play, it reminds me of an old Xbox Live Arcade game (back when times were simpler than today's times) called Marble Blast Ultra, I think. You'd be on a level as a ball on all different kinds of levels and you have to get from point A to point B. It was such a fun game and would love for it to come to backwards compatibility but yet I must be patient for Xbox Scarlett for the program to continue.

Let's get to the point, Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz HD. So, let's do a quick recap of Super Monkey Ball. It originally started out as an arcade game years ago. A lot of people will probably recognise the game more as a Nintendo Gamecube title, where you play as an adorable monkey inside of a ball.

Now this game relies on moving around via momentum and the thing that made this so fun on the Wii was the motion controls with the controllers that back in the day were seriously revolutionary as you spin it back and forth while playing Mario Kart or holding the controller and the nun chucks as if you were holding an actual gun in Call of Duty (I played the third one but it was all in French for some reason). I think the main thing about me reviewing this game is that I never played this game back then so I'm going into this with fresh eyes so I'm going to base this on today rather than comparing it to the classic, even though it's a HD remaster but that isn't the point. Now one of the main things that needs to be spot on with games like these are the controls, when you are going slow to going insanely fast, they really got the controls with the momentum spot on so fair play to them.

Now loading up the game, I immediately can tell that Sega designed this game. How to tell you ask? Just listen to the sound effects of the game when you collect an item, how you have an announcer in the background shouting "Ready? GO!" and the same kind of atmosphere as an arcade game. You could play Sega Rally and use the same sound effects and music and it would still suit the game. It is a really fun arcade feeling game though, its nice to play a game that is a family friendly game as they seem to be rarer as the gaming industry advances.

The levels themselves are really well designed, when you are going down a spiral hill at a ridiculous speed you need to take care that you don't go shooting off the side while collecting bananas as you go along. Its like most games, you pick up over a certain number of collectibles and you earn a life. When you start the game you just assume that the levels are quite easy and you'd be right at the start but then as you progress, not only does it test your skills, it also tests your patience. I actually found myself raging when I failed numerously, which I actually do very little of, not as much as the Modern Warfare 2 days anyway (stupid noobtubers everywhere) but I digress.... again. I seem to do that in all my reviews.

Not only does the game test you with complicated and awesome looking levels, there are also boss levels. Now for a game originally on the Wii I bet it would have been much easier as I assume, you'd make use of the motion controls to roll around, going from that to an analogue stick for those players must be strange. I did like the variety of the bosses you face, you go up against some really interesting and sometimes infuriating characters, going from a really fat spinning boss to another one who is using a jetpack with 2 missile launchers and the only way to defeat him is to jump on the missiles to make them bounce back. When he launches one at a time it's actually really easy but like most bosses, when their health is below half, they tend to change their tactic so he only goes ahead and launches about 10 missiles at me completely launching me from the level straight down to my demise.

Now in all honesty when I was asked to review this, I really didn't have the best of expectations because I had never played a Super Monkey Ball game at all and always thought of it as a game for children but when you review games you need to be open to new experiences, otherwise there is no point in you being a reviewer. I actually really enjoy this game, just the feeling of collecting everything on the level and beating them gives me a massive sense of glee, I think that's the term, like real proudness of what I achieved. It can go from "Yes, that was a fun level" to a more constructive rage like "HOW WAS THAT POSSIBLE, I HAD THAT JUMP LINED UP PERFECTLY AND IT WENT TO THE COMPLETE OPPOSITE SIDE OF THE LEVEL!". You know, that sort of thing. I'm sure people understand, everyone has a bit of game rage even if it's only a slight amount.

I do recommend grabbing this game but in my honest opinion, while I think it's a really fun game, I don't necessarily agree with its current price tag. I'd recommend grabbing this when its on offer. If this came out on the Xbox 360 back in the day this probably would have been under the Xbox Live Arcade program (when times were easier and the only thing that I worried about was homework, which I never did). Like I said earlier, it's really a nice refreshing feeling to go from shooters and racing games to a nice arcade family friendly game, especially a SEGA game, I mean SEGA have made a lot of great titles in their time (other than the disaster that was the original design of Sonic in the upcoming Sonic movie, but they fixed their mistake). 

So just a quick recap, got that familiar SEGA feeling, controls are spot on, the graphics are really nice, levels are different and unique and challenging as well. So I recommend this game but not at the price its at right now, get it on sale.