Best Buds vs Bad Guys Review

Created by a dad and his 11-year-old son, Best Buds vs Bad Guys is a 2D run’n’gun arcade platformer that takes you back to the good ol’ arcade days. Not that i was around at that time, but I’ve still played old classics like Contra and Ninja Gaiden on the NES and there are plenty of references to classic games, such as Black Tiger, Bionic Commando, Green Beret, Ghosts ’n Goblins and loads more! Best Buds vs Bad Guys very much reminds us of such games where your only gaol is to shoot some bad guys. And Best Buds does that very well.

Right of the bat you’ll notice the awesome soundtrack which is fast and hardcore, just how you’d except this sort of game to have. Sound is not the only things Best Buds vs Bad Guys does well with it’s presentation. The graphics are also very nice looking. Very retro but yet modern. It’s 16-bit but the explosions and other effects look very cool and grand, almost modern. Not to say that 16-bit is a bad choice, it’s very nice art and animations.

If I were to judge this game purely based on presentation it would probably be a 10/10. But I don’t. Gameplay also very much matters, and in this case it’s only partly good. The controls are clunky and hard to get used to. You would think that there would be tutorials, and there is. It’s just that they teach the wrong thing. Very rarely do they teach you something you really need to know, but more often than not it’s just information you probably would’ve figured out yourself. The levels are also not very self-explanatory and it can be hard to know what to do and where to go.

There are 11 different worlds, pixelated in 16-bit Arcade machine style, with plenty of modern touches including detailed background animation, multi-layered parallax, weather and special effects and each of the 11 world are very different from each other and fun to play through. You fight many different types of enemies (over 100), each with different attacks and ways to defeat them plus there are plenty of special power-ups such as giant-buds, mini-buds, tanks, mine carts, TNT, banana napalm, donuts of death, skateboards and more.

There are three different difficulties. I played on normal and the game was really challenging and forced me to bring out my old hardcore gaming skills. It was really quite fun to go back to and those who enjoy a whole new level of challenge should try the REPLAY+ mode.

In conclusion, Best Buds vs Bad Guys is really fun once you get over the weird controllers. It has really nice graphics and sound, and the gameplay is really fun and challenging. The levels are well designed although a bit hard to figure out what to do at times.

REVIEW CODE: A complimentary PC code was provided to Brash Games for this review. Please send all review code enquiries to editor@brashgames.co.uk.