DKC: Tropical Freeze Review Thread (81 on metacritic)

[theRepublic]

DucksUnlimited said:

theRepublic said:

DucksUnlimited said:

sundin13 said:
The reviews that review it for what it is seem to praise it where the reviews that review it for what it isn't (namely, Metroid or something "new") seem to complain

Oh well...as most of these reviews have stated (even the not so great ones), this game is better than DKCR, aka the best platformer of last gen...so I am pretty confident that this will be my favorite platformer this gen too

Which site included not being Metroid as part of their criteria?

First four paragraphs of this review:

"The first big Wii U release of the year is a new game from the makers of Metroid Prime, but is another 2D platformer really a good idea?

If there’s one thing the Wii U needs at the moment it’s probably not another platform game. When Tropical Freeze was first announced there were howls of protest, not just because the game seemed an unhelpful indulgence but because it tied up Nintendo’s only Western developer – Metroid Prime creator Retro Studios – on a game that seemingly any number of their Japanese studios could’ve made instead.

It’s rather like the chief engineer on the Titanic suddenly deciding he doesn’t want to work on fixing the engines, but would rather show off his skills as an amateur violinist by popping on deck to join the band.

Since Retro already made Donkey Kong Country Returns for the original Wii it’s obvious they are indeed highly skilled at creating 2D platformers, but we still struggle to understand why they thought this game would be a good use of their talents and resources during Nintendo’s darkest hour."

http://metro.co.uk/2014/02/17/donkey-kong-country-tropical-freeze-review-monkey-business-4307342/

 It seems to me like a brief aside about the business sense of tasking Retro with another DKC, not something that has an actual influence on the score. Once they get into actually reviewing the game it is never brought up, and it isn't mentioned on the pros/cons list either. Mentioning that they're not sure another DKC game was a good decision for the Wii U =/= reviewing it based on not being a Metroid game. That's just reaching. Still, it is kind of out of place in a review. It probably belongs in its own article so as to not give people the wrong idea.

I would argue that using the first 4 of your 18 paragraph review to complain about what the game isn't, isn't really an aside.  More of a core complaint that seemed to affect the whole review.  Especially when it comes up again at the end, "...does absolutely nothing to move forward...the case for buying a Wii U.

In Short: A highly competent 2D platformer, but one utterly devoid of any new ideas or any reason to buy a Wii U in order to play it."

By the way, this was the first and only review I read on the game.  I just picked out a single low review to see if what Sundin13 said was true.  And it was.