Game Review: Kung Fu Rabbit (PS Vita)

Kung Fu Rabbit is a side scrolling action platform game available for download from the PlayStation Store for the PS Vita. Having previously released for iOS and Android devices; Kung Fu Rabbit has came to the Vita to eat carrots and defeat Universal Evil.

The story of Kung Fu Rabbit sees you having to rescue your disciples after Universal Evil has struck again and kidnapped all of your disciples. They made the mistake of allowing you to escape and now you must make them regret that by using all of your skills to fight your way through the Universal Evil across eighty levels spanning four worlds to rescue your kidnapped disciples and return the life of the temple of rabbits back to normality in the process.

You need to collect as many carrots as possible during each of the levels as carrots represent points, which are used to purchase power-ups and new abilities on the Dojo menu that will help you by increasing the effectiveness of your attacks and your likelihood to survive attacks from enemies with a total of fifteen Dojo items available to purchase. The smaller carrots are worth one point each, while the golden carrots are worth three points, while achieving trophies will also provide you with five points for each one.

Dojo power-ups and abilities are split into four separate categories including: single use items, artefacts, outfits and automatic power-ups. Single use items tend to be the sort of power-ups you turn to when you are in a bit of a tricky situation in a level and want to get rid of the enemies ahead of you; while artefacts grant you with permanently impressive benefits; outfits allow you to dress in style for the occasion; and automatic power-ups are unlockable as you progress through the adventure and once you have gained their power, you will not have to equip them.

You always have to be careful about the precision of the timing of your jumps as there is black grunge surrounding the majority of the environment and if you are unfortunate enough to make contact with it, then you will definitely have to restart the level. You can easily tell the weak point of each enemy as the weak area of the enemy will always flash blue, although if you make contact with an enemy in any other position than the weak point, then you are likely to have to restart the level.

The controls are simplistic and easy to master, although the timing of your jumps from platform to platform may require some practice as you have to be precise. The face button controls consist of pressing X to jump; square to use a Dojo power; changing the direction of the left analogue stick or using the left and right d-pad buttons to manoeuvre your character; holding the left analogue stick to the left or right or holding the left or right d-pad buttons after jumping to cling to a nearby wall to slow the pace of your descent down the wall; and start to display the pause menu. The controls are partially customisable as you can change the jump button from X to the touch screen or rear touch pad, which a positive design choice as it allows the player to have their choice in how they want to interact with the character, while providing compatibility with two additional areas of the Vita to one of the most important mechanics of the game in the form of precision jumping.

The graphics are somewhat simplistic, which if anything adds to their charm, while being colourful and rather oriental in design with the main character, environments, enemies, hazards and more besides rendered in a visually unique art style that really complements the game very well and draws you into everything that is happening on screen.

The presentation of the game is solid with a great touch screen based user interface across various menus such as the level selection menu, trophy list menu, instructions menu and options menu with support for navigation via the left analogue stick, directional pad and face buttons, although it does not include support for navigation via the right analogue stick or rear touch pad. The background of the menu screens looks very colourful and vibrant as they contain a bright sky with stars and four worlds that represent the four sets of levels that you can choose from.

The audio consists of oriental music, which certainly helps to set the scene in harmony with the graphical design of the environments, while the sound effects include the black grunge gurgling away almost as a teasing reminder to you that one false move or poorly timed jump will result in your character being swallowed by the black grunge and you restarting the level; the enemies laugh at you whenever they defeat you and your character makes a rather odd sound whenever you perform a jump or double jump, which actually ties in well with the background oriental music.

The trophy list includes seventeen trophies with fifteen bronze trophies and two silver trophies. The trophies are mostly easy and will be earned even without really trying as the majority of the trophies will be earned naturally through playing the game. Some of the easier trophies include the I Love Carrots bronze trophy for picking up a carrot; The Big Fat Carrot bronze trophy for picking up a gold carrot; the Gourmet Ending bronze trophy for collecting fifteen carrots; the Bulimia bronze trophy for collecting sixty carrots; the Rabbit Avenger bronze trophy for killing more than 100 enemies during your journey; the What Power bronze trophy for using a Power Aura; and the Wrong Settings bronze trophy for dying twenty times in the same level. The harder trophies tend to be harder because of how far you have to progress to earn those trophies, such as the Master Of The Secrets silver trophy for finishing all of the bonus levels; the Back With A Vengeance bronze trophy for completing all three worlds and the Grand Dragon silver trophy for completing the entire game. I would estimate depending upon skill, a good trophy guide to provide some helpful tips and the precision of your jumps and tactics that it would take between five to ten hours to 100% the trophy list.

There are two difficulty levels including normal and hard with the hard difficulty level unlocked when you have completed an entire world of twenty levels or it can alternatively be purchased for fifty carrots on the level selection screen. The normal difficulty level is challenging enough with lots of enemies and hazards to avoid that will provide an ever increasing difficulty curve throughout the eighty levels and will see you restarting levels more and more as you progress through the game.

There are no online multiplayer modes, although it would have been nice to see some form of co-operative multiplayer locally or online or perhaps even a hotseat multiplayer mode to attempt to beat the other players’ best time for each level. There are surprisingly no leaderboards either, which would have added some competitiveness to the game with potential leaderboards for the best times and the most carrots collected for each level and overall throughout the entire game.

The replayability of Kung Fu Rabbit is excellent as it has a pick up and play feel that will see you coming back to the game and trying to progress through a level or two of the eighty levels on offer, although it also has that one more go feel to it that could result in you potentially playing for far longer than what you had anticipated and the unlockable hard mode provides you with a reason to try and conquer all of the levels again from beginning to end.

Overall, Kung Fu Rabbit delivers a fun, entertaining platformer at a budget price of just £3.99 with eighty levels and plenty of charm; you will certainly find yourself playing this in small accessible chunks or for hours at a time without realising it. Kung Fu Rabbit is a throwback to the days of the classic platforming adventure of yesteryear that you should definitely experience.

Jason Bonnar

At A Glance