QCF: Balan WonderWorld
here are developers out there who hold some of the highest prestige in the industry from their work on a few, or even just iconic game—some of these developers have gone on to do great things in the current day scene, and then there are some who are just stuck in the past.
Yuji Naka’s Balan WonderWorld is an indictment of the latter because the new release from Arzest and the Balan Company is seemingly engineered to compete with platformer games released back in 2003 more than anything else. At its core, Balan Wonderworld plays like a pale imitation of the Super Mario Odyssey formula dressed up in a bad NiGHTs into Dreams aesthetic…
I know I started marching my steps strong and heavy with the Poo Poo Parade real early into this review but I honestly can’t help it; for every neat idea the game seems to have, it comes back with three more flaws or design choices that put a big sour on any fun to be found.