Review: Sideway: New York
The first time I saw Sideway: New York, I knew that I would instantly fall in love with it. It’s not often that we get a 2D platforming title that is actually good; especially when we live in an era where they’re nearly obsolete. Surprisingly, this game is truly something when it comes to staying true to 2D platforming.
Sideway: New York is about a graffiti artist named Nox and a rival turf leader named Spray. However, Spray isn’t like your ordinary bad guy. For one he isn’t even a human at all. In fact he doesn’t even live in our world. Spray resides in the world of graffiti, where he has assembled an army of his own paintings. Now wanting out of this world, Spray devises a plan to swap places with Nox. Like many of your classic 2D platformers you’re presented with a story-line of rescuing your princess (Nox’s Girlfriend) from the treacherous villain. Only this time your viewing the world at a whole new perspective.
Now one of the things that I loved about Sideway is that it’s not following your traditional viewing point of a 2D platformer. The buildings are all in 3D, but your still moving in your traditional 2D plane. What makes this game so interesting is the fact that the camera is constantly switching as you travel on different faces of a building. So if Nox is making his way onto the roof of a building, the camera will then quickly shift to an over-the-top view of that building’s rooftop. However, rather then be standing on the rooftop, Nox would still be in the same 2D plane view. Other times the camera may even be at an angle, supplying a whole new feel to the platforming genre.
Like any 2D platformer you’ll have an easy time getting use to the controls. For the basics we have our directional stick and then the standard jump button. Much like in Mario, jumping can be used to either kill enemies or jump onto new platforms. Nox also has a basic melee attack along with a few upgrades such as the slide or spray paint move. The slide move allows you to daze certain enemies and even helps you squeeze between tight places. By pushing R1 in certain areas, you’ll activate the spray paint move, which will then create a new landing platform. There are loads of other upgrades to be unlocked, but I’ll leave the rest for you to find out.
Along your journey into this vast and colorful graffiti world, you’ll encounter many dangerous foes. In comparison to Mario, you have your patrolmen, flying patrolmen, and even monsters that are much similar to the Piranha Plant in Mario. Then we have some of the more advance ones like the thugs and the spray monkeys, which create more enemies. The bosses however, aren’t always restricted to a 2D plane.
httpv://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6mKEsClQSZk
As you can see here, the Knuckler is as much 3D as everything else, however you yourself can only move within the 2D structure. Boss battles can be quite fun, but after solving their patterns battles quickly become a bit repetitive.
The visuals for Sideway: New York are really something. As I mentioned earlier the game does have some 3D structures. These look nice and all, but what really makes this game shine are the visuals on the buildings themselves. Much like in real life, the walls are painted with vibrant colors of graffiti. Everything looks as if it were drawn as a cartoon. This gives the game a nice feel and glow to it.
For music we have a funky mix of hip-hop. I have to say I really enjoyed how nicely it blended in with the game setting. The music is great and quite enjoyable to listen to, but the problem is that it all sounds the same and becomes a bit boring after a while. Although bosses do have their own music, which is always nice to listen to.
Sideway: New York is a wonderful new addition to the Playstation Network and I would definitely recommend this title to anyone. It truly is a game worth checking out and hopefully will continue on to become something bigger in the future.
Pros:
- Easy to play
- Great visuals
- Excellent platforming and level designs
- Does have Co-op play
- Great variety of enemies and upgrades
- Lots of levels to play
- Lots of challenges and collectibles
- Contains easy check points so you don’t have to start over
- Fun boss fights despite the repetitive battles.
Cons:
- At times the controls can seem a bit unresponsive
- Enemies can easily over power you if there are too many
- Could have used more variety of music
Sideway: New York is now available exclusively on Playstation Network for $9.99
For more information on how we review games check out our criteria here. A copy of this game was provided to The Paranoid Gamer by the publisher for review purposes.