Franchise game...? We know. You're thinking, "Uh oh." But don't worry! It turns out Shrek SuperSlam is a nicely polished combination of PowerStone's intense fluidity and a few of Super Smash Bros. fine quirks. It's an arena fighter focused on weapon use, intuitive attack combinations, environmental hazards, and one really cool scoring system.
This four-player brawler features 20 characters from the Shrek universe and even some new ones created by the developers at Shaba Games (DreamWorks was very accommodating, apparently). All combatants have signature moves like Shrek's room clearing Green Storm, Puss-in-Boots' sweeping Love Stun and Pinocchio's Hummingbird that spears enemies.
These signature moves -- and even the standard assortment of weak and strong attacks that vary between characters -- can be used to inflict damage on fighters and levels. Feel free to tear up 16 Havok-powered destructible environments (from Dragon's Gate to Candyland). Industry standard physics ensures everything breaks and tumbles realistically. Specific pieces of levels can even be picked up and smashed or thrown at enemies. Not including these venue chunks, there are 20 different weapons and items to help players fight one another more effectively. Environments, weapons... PoweStone much? Hell yes!
Shaba managed to hit a solid 60fps on the Xbox, PS2 and GCN with Shrek SuperSlam, so the game runs real fast, which lends it even more PowerStone-like qualities. The similarities are especially apparent when players quickly leap around square-ish arenas, bouncing off walls and hurling large objects at one another. But what separates it is a rather cool scoring system.
There are no life bars in Shrek SuperSlam. There's just a Slam power meter. By beating opponents with objects, attacks and throws a player can build his or her Slam meter. Once that reaches a charged state, it's possible to perform a specific Slam (a totally distinct super attack) and thus score one point, assuming you hit another player and aren't countered. Only you won't ever know how many points you have.
At the end of a match the game declares a winner, but since there are no lives to worry about and no real health bars to manage, there was no need for Shaba to impose a scoreboard on players if it would only make them give up to hopelessness halfway through a losing fight. This way Shrek SuperSlam's matches are always intense.
We got to play a few good rounds of Shrek and were quite pleased with the whole lot of it. The developers at Shaba are putting a good bit of effort into balancing and polishing the product and it really shows. More than a good coat of paint, however, Shrek features some real content beyond the films. Even new characters are being put in. We specifically got to play around with the Black Knight, a slower maniac with more powerful moves that charge up the slam meter much quicker, but there were plenty yet to be unlocked.
When you play, you'll be able to toy around with the basic melee mode that provides the option to fight against any combination of three other players or computer controlled opponents. Then there's a story mode that weaves the matches into fairytales being told to young Dronkeys. The tales included K.N.I.G.H.T.S. Coolde Style, Iron Donkey, Bell Brawl, Fatboy Fury, Medieval Chef and Puppet Panic. But there's also a cool Mega Challenge that features around 50 challenges spread across 28 tournaments. These challenges all use the game's fundamental mechanics, but require gamers to do special things like toss X number of unruly gingerbread men into a furnace or destroy enemies only using one kind of attack.
Shrek SuperSlam should retail for about $20 on PC and $40 on Xbox, PS2 and Cube. Look for it early this November. We sure will be.