Happy November. Or, at least, it will be. Wishes Unlimited (Wandersong, Chicory) has announced that turn-based volleyball monster game Beastieball will be launched into Early Access for PC on November 12, 2024.
I almost overlooked Beastieball entirely. I had my head down with other things when the developer emailed me. I didn’t look too closely at the email until they followed up later. I was skimming through it when I realized it’s being developed by the folks behind Chicory. If I’m not mistaken, out of all the games I’ve reviewed for Destructoid, Chicory has the highest score of 9.5. The only game to have breached the 9 threshold for me. Chicory profoundly impacted me, so much so that I haven’t played it a second time because I’m not sure I could take another blow, even if I see it coming.
So, I’m hoping Beastieball doesn’t have quite the same impact, which might be a strange thing to wish for. I’ve played as much of the demo as my currently overburdened schedule will allow (it isn’t much), and while the writing is still sharp and detailed, I think Beastieball is aiming more to be an entertaining rather than profound experience. Although, truthfully, there’s enough setup here for an emotional journey of the burdens of fame and the cost of turning your hobbies into a job, but… ah… uh oh.
Beastieball is a bit like if you replaced the RPG-style battles in Pokémon with turn-based volleyball. It’s two-on-two beach-style, and you can win by either scoring points or exhausting the other team’s beasties. One of the opening tutorial fights demonstrates how you can beat a team that vastly outlevels you with careful ball placement. Pretty neat, but I’ve only scratched the surface.
And it isn’t entirely just swapping out cartoon cockfighting with volleyball. The actual flow of gameplay and how you recruit new beasties onto your team is changed as well. I think that part of the design approach is to approach the formula in a way that removes the questionable cockfighting subtext. The Pokémon Company tends to just skirt around the fact that you’re enslaving creatures and forcing them into battle by making it seem as harmless as possible. And to be fair, I think this is just a case of a concept not being thought completely through in its inception, and now that it’s popular, all they can do is try and throw friendship in there to try and temper things. I don’t think there was really any malice intended.
What were we talking about? I got off track there. Right, in Beastieball, it’s the choice of the creatures to join your volleyball team. You give them jerseys rather than cages. They have to respect you, which means I’m screwed because I don’t even respect myself. There’s also multiplayer.
Anyway, Beastieball hits PC Early Access on November 12, 2024.
Published: Nov 1, 2024 12:00 pm