Astro Bears Party (Switch) Review

When I first saw the Switch, a lot of ideas formed in my head for what it could be. Detaching the Joy Cons, handing one to a friend and playing anywhere, portable couch co-op, or competition. And a lot of games have capitalised on that idea, of being fun for more than just yourself wherever you go. Mario Kart, ARMS, there’s a long list. But Astro Bears Party isn’t as expansive as a lot of these games, but the one thing it does, it does well.

I try to avoid describing games as “like this game crossed with that game”, but there are no denying Astro Bears Party’s influences- it is very much Snake, or Tron, played around a sphere. You control your bear, running around a translucent planetoid, leaving a coloured trail behind you. This trail doesn’t fade away, making longer matches more and more frantic.

Running into a trail, whether it’s your own or another player’s, will disqualify you from the match. You can jetpack over trails, which also leaves your trail hanging in the air. You keep on playing until a predetermined score-limit is reached.

There are 4 different bears to choose from, each having different specs relating to speed, how fast you turn, and how long your jetpack works/recharges. Beyond this, there’s not an awful lot of depth to be found in Astro Bears Party. I’d love to see different shaped arenas, like a peanut-shaped one, instead of just different size spheres.

There’s a single player mode that works a lot more like the classic snake, where you collect Jetfish, which makes your trail longer and longer. After a certain number of fish collected, you level up, leading to faster levels, and even longer trails.

The art direction and quality is fantastic, however, with very crisp and clean character models. The music in the game is mostly the one track, but it fits the theme well. A lot of the audio is lost to playing with people, with plenty of shouting and yelling going on.

On its own, Astro Bears Party doesn’t have a huge amount to offer, but everything above is still extremely solid. Ideally, I’d see this game being pulled out alongside a bunch of other smaller multiplayer games, like Astro Duel Deluxe, or the bigger hits like Mario Kart. For the price, it does the job, but I honestly just wish there was more on offer.

Rating: 3/5