LogFAQs > #950735049

11. Playstation All-Stars Battle Royale (2012)
System: PS3
Played with: random strangers, friends, girlfriend, one guy at my college

Every year, when E3 rolls around, or when there's a Playstation State of Play, or at the Game Awards, there's always one game I'm wishing for more than any other to be announced: Playstation All-Stars 2. PSASBR may have been my most anticipated game of all time in the year leading up to its release (I'll give an HM to Kingdom Hearts III and God of War '18). While I love Smash Bros., I've always been more of a fan of Sony's first party titles than Nintendo's (Kirby aside). God of War, Jak and Daxter, Infamous, LittleBigPlanet, Uncharted... THESE are the games I gravitate toward more than Zelda and Metroid and Fire Emblem. The addition of characters like Heihachi and Big Daddy, 2 other series I considered among my favorites, only elevated my hype that much further.

The game didn't succeed as much as I'd hoped, for multiple reasons. Sony never really gave it the publicity and backing it needed. Many gamers and game "influencers" (lets players and the like) wrote it off as being a Smash Bros. ripoff, while curiously also shunning it for not being enough like Smash Bros. (I distinctly remember disappointment watching GameGrumps play it, hearing Arin insult the game for being a cheap knockoff, and then getting angry at the game when he couldn't win by playing it like Smash). There were some improvements the game needed (primarily it could've used some better balancing and a more modern menu layout.

Still, despite its issues there was SO much to love here. Great crossover levels complete with crossover music tracks, exciting special attacks, detailed alternate costumes for the characters that showed the people working on the game really cared about it (for instance, Jak has 3 costumes, based on his Jak and Daxter, Jak 3, and Jak X: Combat Racing appearances). DLC characters released for free, DLC stages released for free, and so on. There is so, so much potential for this to be the new big crossover series, if people (Sony included) will just give it the chance.

There's not much special to say about its multiplayer experience vs any other fighting game. I played with several different people, and all enjoyed it (though maybe none as much as myself). Online matchmaking was fun for a while, thoguh eventually it got frustrating as the most unbalanced characters (Raiden and Kratos) were the ones always selected, and the online featured a few too many spammers. Perhaps the most memorable experience playing multiplayer happened in college. I had a small friend group there, and happened to find out that a friend of a friend in that group was ALSO a huge PSASBR fan, and so we met up, and despite not knowing this guy well, I went to his dorm (he lived alone in a dorm, which was curious as most dorms were for two people at least) to play with him. I got into the dorm, and it was covered, I mean covered, wall to wall, ceiling to floor, bed, shelves, every square inch covered in My Little Pony merchandise. Anyway, we played and he beat me as Sly Cooper.

---

Khal Kirby, warlord of the Super Star Khalasar
PSN/Steam: CheddarBBQ https://goo.gl/Diw2hs