Developer: Jollypunch Games
Publisher: Jollypunch Games
Platforms: PC, Switch
Tested on: PC
Fly Punch Boom! – Review
Many anime franchises are known for their expansive battle scenes with overpowered fighters that’ll let each other fly miles away with their powerful strikes. Fly Punch Boom! tries to recreate these amazing anime fights and combines them with a simplistic comic style. Watching the trailer will get you hyped a lot while the actual gameplay is completely different than what you’d expect. We’ve gotten the chance to take a look at this game and find out how it actually plays.
Story
Aside from its lore that can be accessed from the main menu, Fly Punch Boom! doesn’t really have a storyline or any story content that you can enjoy while playing this game. This game is purely focused on 1v1 and 2v2 battles between funny-looking characters called Punchies which are immortal sexless beings that reproduce through combat. When two Punchies fight together, the clashes of their fists can generate enough energy to create stars and galaxies. Sometimes, the clashes will be so powerful that a new Punchy will be born as a union of the two fighter’s best qualities.
Graphics
Fly Punch Boom combines the epic anime fights where combatants are punched through the air at amazing speeds with a cartoonish style that looks quite good if you ask us. Each character has its own unique appearance and the moves they have are perfectly in sync with their designs. You can see that the creators did put some work into making the backgrounds as every structure can be interacted with and can also lead to certain death when flying straight into them. Each area has its own theme and there are quite a few to play in. The buildings and items on the map won’t only be causes of death, but can also be launched to send them right into your enemy’s face.
Sound
The music in Fly Punch Boom! is quite well-designed. The music is very rhythmic and really gets you hyped for an intense battle. They’ve used some rock music to really liven up the game and it fits the game perfectly. The music will constantly keep playing and will keep you heated for battle the whole time. When a battle takes a long while, the music will even get better and mix it up with a little bit of voice that will shout “Fly Punch Boom!”. The sound effects are all spot-on and there isn’t really anything bad you can say about the game in this department.
Gameplay
Fly Punch Boom! is a fighting game that specializes in 1v1 and 2v2 battles. These battles are fought by strange but funny looking creatures which have overpowered strength and can send their enemy flying with one strong punch, throw or counter. Watching the game’s trailer could get you hyped a lot because the game looks amazing there and it also looks like it’ll be very fun to play, but it won’t show the essence of its gameplay well, as the combat system isn’t really perfect for this type of game.
The movements in Fly Punch Boom! are pretty basic with some basic movements in the air and the ability to dash subsequently. The combat in Fly Punch Boom is anything but basic while it is based on a Rock-Paper-Scissors-system where hits beat throws, throws beat counters and counters beat hits. When you are flying at high speeds towards your enemy and press the X button, you will have a short moment where you need to act very fast to choose which of these three you want to use, and time it well in the bar as it appears after you’ve chosen. A slider will move on this bar and when you stop it at the end of this bar, your attack will be at its highest power, if it connects. This combat system may look quite fun, but it can be really frustrating when multiple attacks in a row keep failing because your opponent uses the correct counter move.
Playing against a CPU can be very complicated as you can make many mistakes when pressing your buttons and the timing inside the bar, while the CPU will rarely fail these commands, only when it’s at the minimum of its life. Losing focus one moment can result in a quick game over, so you need to be alert at all times. The bar with the slider also appears when you are sent flying towards the end of the map or one of the objects on the screen. One part will be yellow and one part will be red. If you stop the slider in the red part, you’ll be instantly killed and a new battle will start after a few seconds.
The characters in this game are quite diverse in looks, from a skeleton, to a bird or a gorilla. As diverse these characters are, they all have their own attacking moves, which makes each character unique. Aside from the normal attacking moves, each character also has a special move, which varies in effect for each character. Executing these special moves can sometimes be quite difficult as each one is used differently and it could take you quite a while to master them all. Sadly, your CPU opponent won’t have this problem, so he will beat you up with everything he’s got right from the start.
Conclusion
While Fly Punch Boom! Looks very interesting when you look at its trailer, the game seems to disappoint when it comes to terms of combat. You would really have to like this Rock-Paper-Scissors-system to enjoy this game at its fullest. Surely, this game can be quite amusing after mastering its controls, but because the game only offers simple 1v1 or 2v2 battles with a standard best of three ruleset, the game really lacks content in our eyes. This definitely isn’t a bad game, and it looks good with a unique style of graphics and gameplay, but If you want to have more influence in a battle with skill, or anything else than just sheer luck of the draw, you’ll need to look for a different game.
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