Plot: What’s it about?
So you want to be a superhero? All you need is PowerUp Heroes, as this is the closest you can get to superpowers without a cape. You step into the shoes of…yourself to battle the forces of darkness. That’s right, you play as yourself or at least as the X-Box Live avatar you created to represent yourself. You are tasked with carrying on an alien legacy of justice, doling out beatings to the bad guys one after another. You have a core set of powers at your disposal, but as you defeat enemies, you absorb their powers and can even adopt the look of their suit. As you stockpile your superhuman abilities, you’ll be able to craft just the right blend of powers to suit your fighting style. You can even switch between two different suits during a battle, so if your opponent catches you off guard, mix it up on the fly to regain the advantage. Just down your foes in best of three slugfests and viola, the world can once again be a safe, peaceful place.
This game is exclusive to Kinect, so as you can imagine, the fights can be quite intense. After all, if you want your hero to throw punches, launch fireballs, and jolt enemies with electrical blasts, you have to make it happen. The gestures used to trigger your various attacks are simple to learn and work like a charm. Not all games are precise when it comes to the Kinect sensor, but PowerUp Heroes delivers a crisp, responsive experience. But of course, you’ll want to blame the sensor if you get your butt kicked, even though you know you’re to blame. In addition to your basic attacks and powered up abilities, you are able to bob and weave, to dodge your opponent’s incoming assault. In other words, if you’re going to thump your enemies and emerge unscathed, you better have some solid cardio on your side.
PowerUp Heroes can indeed be quite a nice little workout, especially if you run through multiple enemies in a single run. While some might dislike the high activity level, I found it to be a lot of fun and when you nail your foe with a powerful attack, it is all worthwhile. My issues with PowerUp Heroes are that the campaign is rather short and while on-line battles are possible, I wasn’t able to find many to test my skills with. There is some good replay depth to the game, given the various suits and powers you can wield, but a longer campaign would have been welcome. Not much can be said about the on-line element, though of course a more active community would be great. But these problems are overshadowed by how awesome PowerUp Heroes is when you fire it up. The game is a ton of fun, gives you a light workout, and makes great use of the Kinect tech. So if you want to see if you have what it takes to be a superhero, PowerUp Heroes is highly recommended.
Video: How does it look?
The game has a cute, cartoon inspired visual design, but still boasts some impressive moments. The avatar (your avatar, not the Last Airbender) inspired worlds look quite cool, but the best element has to be the various powers. Punching your enemies in the face is awesome, but seeing a huge ball of fire engulf them…well, that’s just a little more awesome. The visual design of the powers is excellent and really drives home that superhero feel. So this is like a bright, vibrant comic book world that your avatar can explore and beat people up in, very cool.
Audio: How does it sound?
The audio doesn’t dazzle as much as the visuals, but this is still rock solid sound design. The in-battle sound effects are great, from the blazing fireballs to the impact from standard strikes. A fighting game needs that oomph when you make contact and this game delivers it. I wasn’t in love with the music, but it wasn’t bad either. The soundtrack here does what it needs to and makes sure the battles have the impact required.
Supplements: What are the extras?
N/A
