Unbeatable Review – An Ambitious, Flawed Indie Rhythm Game

Unrivaled visibility

Unbeatable is a story game rhythm game with colorful visuals inspired by Jet Grind Radio. The gameplay of the game is a unique combination of adventure game and rhythm game, the balance of which the video game world has never seen before. Its music and visuals are sure to attract curious gamers, so read on to find out if the gameplay matches the aesthetic and whether this unique indie game is right for you.

Right off the bat, Unbeatable allows players to choose between story mode and arcade mode. Arcade mode is designed in the same way as classic rhythm games like Guitar Hero. There is a list of songs, each with difficulty options, ratings, scores, and leaderboards. Each song has an individual difficulty that changes depending on which of the six difficulty levels the player selects.

Rhythm game Fight

Each song is disguised as a combat song, although the gameplay is clearly a rhythm game. Objects move towards the player character, Bit. L1 punches low and R1 jumps punches high. Sometimes obstacles have to be overcome, and sometimes they have to be avoided. Some targets must be hit simultaneously, continuously and/or quickly. There are goals that can be knocked from one track to another. There are some visual changes, such as scenes where the cops attack Beat, but the controls remain the same even if the visuals have changed.

I enjoyed the core rhythm gameplay. It was easy to understand, but very difficult to master. But the tutorial sections disappointed me because it was too easy to skim through the instructions. I decided to play the story mode before trying the arcade mode, which was a huge mistake that I'm sure many players will make. I'll talk more about this later, but completing the tutorial in arcade mode before it appears in story mode would have alleviated a lot of my frustration.

Disappointing camera

Another big disappointment for me was the camera during the rhythm sections. Sometimes the camera switches from objects moving towards Bit on the right to objects moving towards Bit on the left. Sometimes the camera zooms out and objects move towards impacts from both sides, leaving less time to react on both sides. While it looks visually impressive, it was annoying and unfair most of the time. The camera can move and immediately detonate an object in the Beat, without having enough time for the player to react. This leaves players simply memorizing levels to catch these moments, which is a shame because they could easily be left out of the game entirely.

The story mode lasts around 10 hours and is basically a walking adventure game. 95% is just walking around and chatting with people. There's shockingly little rhythm to the gameplay. Each chapter features an action-packed storyline that combines arcade mode gameplay with action-packed QuickTime action. But it took me at least 30 minutes to get to the first one. Before the tutorial even appeared, there was a change in characters. I like that there's an expansive story mode, but Unbeatable really needs to figure out its pacing. I highly recommend starting with the arcade mode before touching the story mode. It was an awkward way to start my Unmatched experience.

Terrible dialogue

The story is about a girl named Beat who lives in a dystopia where music is outlawed. This is monitored by the HARM organization. Bit and her friends form a group to rebel against the status quo. There are truly touching moments in this story. But it's really let down by terrible dialogue that comes across as sarcastic and mean-spirited.

The play has a “Yes and” concept. This means that when someone tells you something during a speech, you positively continue what they say, despite any inner voices telling you to contradict it. The dialogue in Invincible is the opposite of this. Everything that is said is met with a sarcastic, contradictory reaction. Because of this, none of the dialogue flowed smoothly for me and I didn't like every character. Some people might like the dialogue and humor, but it really turned me off.

Bumpin' tunes

Luckily the music is great. The basic version of Unbeatable contains over 70 songs that can be unlocked. Unbeatable is female-fronted pop rock in the same vein as Metric or the Yeah Yeah Yeahs. But there are many different genres. Even the score is often interesting, with strong synth melodies and jazzy lines. The voice acting was successful. A lot of it was very good, but every now and then a character would show up with a “friend of the developers” energy.

The visual presentation of Unbeatable is phenomenal. It's obvious that this is an indie game, but much of the budget game is hidden behind layers of style. The story sections feature 3D environments to explore using 2D sprites that change size as they transition from foreground to background. The character sprites are hand-drawn with a North American anime and Scott Pilgrim indie aesthetic. The menu and user interface are colorful Person-similar style, with bold lines.

Animated videos

Unbeatable features a variety of animated cutscenes that often blend seamlessly with the gameplay. The animation has a low frame rate, which isn't usually a problem, but it often doesn't match the music. This distracted me from several important points. These cutscenes are well choreographed, but many of them lack connective tissue. There are a lot of cool set pieces, but sometimes it's hard to tell what's going on because the moments between the action aren't animated.

Unbeatable is an ambitious rhythm game that has some serious flaws. The main one is that the camera sometimes spoils an impeccable system during rhythmic gameplay. The second problem is that the story mode has pacing issues and very little rhythmic gameplay. And the third major problem is that much of the dialogue will be a serious obstacle for many. Playing a little in arcade mode before starting story mode will correct some of these issues. And I love that Unbeatable has an extensive story mode. But I can't recommend the game to everyone as it is. However, Unbeatable is probably a must-play for most rhythm game fans. I'm really rooting for this.

***PS5 code provided by publisher***