Bloo Kid 2 from winterworks GmBh and Headup Games doesn’t look like anything special at first glance. Just another piece of colorful budget priced digital content to suck a few bucks out of people’s accounts. In fact, it’s one of my least favorite types of games, one converted to console from a smartphone format. Smartphone games tend to be the most lackluster and underwhelming games out there, often being straight ports with no optimization at all and little thought put into anything more than bite-sized gameplay. And I’ll be honest, Bloo Kid 2 is not the best game. It feels like a smartphone game. Levels are short and sometimes uninspired. It’s impossible to accomplish all the goals of a level in one playthrough. The hit box is painfully inaccurate, often leading to unfair hits. But surprisingly, there were some positives too!
What Bloo Kid 2 doesn’t have in terms of gameplay design, it at least partially makes up for in sheer creativity. Enemies are varied and constantly changing. Level designs are clever and well-thought out (not all of them but a surprising number). Each world is radically different from the last, with interesting backgrounds and new design elements. And the bosses are simply excellent. Each one is radically different, entertaining, and fun. Honestly, I’d love to see these guys do a light fluffy version of Alien Soldier where the whole game is simply a boss rush mode. Sure, the bosses aren’t difficult, but they were definitely entertaining. World 3 in particular really surprised me with its creativity and homage to Genesis gaming!
Now, don’t expect too much here. I’m definitely not lauding Bloo Kid 2. While the enemies vary wildly, a fair number of them are directly derived from other games, almost to the point where you’re wondering where you’re wondering when the cease and desist letters are coming from Nintendo and Sega. Bloo Kid 2 uses a fair amount of content that’s almost criminally similar to Super Mario content, for one. It also takes design nods from other classics like the Wonder Boy series, Sonic the Hedgehog, and Alex Kidd. While those are all excellent franchises that can definitely be inspiring, this was a little too blatant for comfort.
On top of the borderline copyright infringement, the issues with level design and hit boxes make for some frustrating gameplay as often as not. For example, level goals include having all health, killing all enemies, beating the level inside the timeframe of the ridiculously short time clock, and a few more. They’re arbitrary, meaningless, and can’t all be accomplished in a single playthrough. You also can’t run out of lives and get a game over, as you just start back at that stage. There’s no real depth of difficulty or fear of losing the game here. In fact, most levels have a halfway marker that allows you to restart in the middle of the level with the things you’ve gathered so far intact.
Bloo Kid 2 is a decent game that’s fairly fun most of the time. A lot of that fun factor results directly from how derivative the gameplay is from other franchises, but some of it has to do with a few clever levels, solid unique characters, and excellent boss designs. There are random difficulty spikes in a few levels and enemies take some cheap shots with targeted fire patterns, but overall, it’s not a hard game. It’s definitely better than anticipated for a phone game port, but this won’t be a title you keep coming back to. For $5, you’ll at least have a few hours of fun.
This review was based on a digital copy of Bloo Kid 2 provided by the publisher. It was played on a Nintendo Switch in both docked and undocked modes. All screenshots are from actual gameplay. Bloo Kid 2 is also available for Android, iOS, Steam, Windows Phones, Ouya (probably not anymore though), and Amazon Apps of all things. Seriously people, stop playing phone games. They generally suck, and they’re directly responsible for the vast amount of shovelware coming to PCs and consoles. Winners Don’t Play Smartphone Games!
