Rush Bros. review: no need to rush out to play this game

Rush Bros. is a platformer all about speed runs, where each level claims to be affected by the music playing, whether it's the game's soundtrack or your own music; the problem is, despite the quality of the game's soundtrack, the music doesn't seem to provide anything other than something good to listen to while racing through levels; I played multiple levels with different songs and never noticed any differences. There are a few moments when the music plays a part--such as when woofers are in the background and blast sound waves that push back the character--but they are rare and even they don't feel immediately influenced by the music as much as they should be.

You may be asking, "Why is the music integration so important in Rush Bros.?" The answer is simple: it's because the platforming is good but not great, and the music is the number one aspect of Rush Bros. that tries to set it apart from other similar platformers.

Platforming in Rush Bros. feels a lot like Super Meat Boy and N+--you control a character that is relatively small on screen, running and jumping from left to right, down to up, and vice versa, in order to reach the finish line as fast as possible, while dying as little as possible at the same time. The controls--I played the game entirely with an Xbox 360 controller--are solid and responsive--though I did find the character moved a tad slower than I would like--but the level design is inconsistent and the checkpoint system makes no sense--a new checkpoint may come seconds after the previous checkpoint, or it may not come until almost a minute since the previous checkpoint; unless you're master platformer, death will happen and the nonsensical checkpoint system can be frustrating at times.

I know I've been fairly down on the game so far, but there are things to like in Rush Bros., things that make the game worth trying if you enjoy platformers. First, the game's soundtrack, as alluded to earlier, is really good and makes the average gameplay more tolerable. Second, the multiplayer is fun and implemented in a way that makes it easy to jump in and out of single-player and multiplayer with little effort--while playing single-player, a prompt will appear on-screen asking if you'd like to face-off against another person; though, you can turn off this feature if you find it intrusive. Rush Bros. is a fun game, but it doesn't do anything special, is relatively short, and fails to reach the greatness of comparable games--like the previously mentioned Super Meat Boy and N+. Does that mean Rush Bros. isn't worth playing? No, it just means it shouldn't be at the top of your list of must-play platformers.

Rush Bros. (Win/Mac)