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Fight Crab reviewClaws for concern
Claws for concern
If there’s one thing I respect in any creator, it’s commitment to a concept. I believe in going all-in on things, even when they’re ridiculous, on the principle that passion and dedication can elevate even the most outlandish nonsense to a state of beauty.
Fight Crabchallenged this belief.
There’s a lot of pressure on me here. I bang on about crabs all the damned time, as they’re just about my favourite things. I also like really weird, silly concepts presented with a straight face. And so if ever a game was tailor-made for me, it’sFight Crab- a game where you can play as any one of a suite of realistically-modelled crabs, using knives, hammers, revolvers and more to battle with other crabs. It is the glass slipper to my PC gaming Cinderella, it would seem, and the second RPS was offered code for it, it landed in my inbox.
Graham’s email to me. Didn’t even use a question mark, the villain.
That’s not to say I’m nonplussed. Fight Crab really is as brilliantly funny as I hoped it might be, and the reason for that is that it presents itself as if it is a completely reasonable game.
In fact, it feelsexactlylike something you’d expect to find in a downmarket Tokyo arcade, among a herd of cabinets left largely unreplenished since the arse end of the 2000s. It’s loud, both visually and acoustically, with horrible, clashing fonts, a boomingly inhuman announcer voice, and a non-stop soundtrack of pitch-perfect arcade-fighter music. Claws clink deafeningly when they clash, the screen is awash in flashing controller prompts, and explosions, lasers and coloured lightning sustain a perpetual assault on the senses.
I love how that crab is just casually armed with Excalibur.
Only, instead of the grimacing anime generica you’d expect to fill out these stylistic trappings, there are crabs. Really, really well-modelled crabs. From frog crabs, to carrier crabs, to mud crabs and my very favourite crab (the inestimableBirgus Latro), all the classics are here. If you take pleasure from observing crabs, as I do, there is a lot to be appreciated.
There’s no way I’m not going to love that.
So, as a joke, Fight Crab is perfectly crafted. And it’s a genuine love letter to the concept of crabs, which I can get behind. But is it, y’know, any good as a fighting game?
I have no idea.
The main reason for this is that, after a couple of hours of play, I started feeling a rising nausea, and had to stagger outside like a teenager after wolfing down a whole spliff, because I thought I was going to bark my yop. And while I can’t be absolutely certain it wasn’t something else, I’m fairly confident Fight Crab gave me actual sea sickness.
Each analog stick controlled a claw, with triggers punching, bumpers operating pincers, and the D-pad handling movement. Y activated an incredibly janky “wall run” ability, X and B threw the things held in the corresponding claws, and A did… something else. Oh, and the “back” button activated a baffling HYPER MODE which covered you in lightning, and let you fire laser beams with a special move that worked all the time, 60% of the time. Did you get all that? I certainly didn’t.
I am not sure I can ever be ready.
I sincerely appreciated the creativity of it all. But realistically, all I could do most of the time was flail, mash, hope, and batter my enemies when they got stuck in the scenery. And in the course of my desperate struggle against the controls, I was forever swinging the camera around, in accordance with its own arcane command bindings. That was a little queasy in itself, but it was just the gravy on a mind-pummeling roast dinner of unpleasant sensations.
Even though most of Fight Crab’s arenas are terrestrial (there’s a human city, a medieval castle, a table at a Chinese restaurant… they’re superb), everything moves in slow motion, like Kaiju fighting underwater. You’re forever swaying, tipping and lurching, with your face pulled into a grimace and your thumbs going white as youwillyour crab not to topple, and a great deal of your attacks either lash hopelessly into thin air, or end up feebly caressing your foe like a punch thrown in an anxiety dream.
A nice, relaxing game of Fight Crab.
Had I possessed the constitution to play much more, I certainly would have laughed more, and I suspect one of two things might have happened in terms of my opinion of the fighting. On the one claw, I was already finding after two hours that the novelty of the “heh, it’s crabs in a weird flailing sword fight” effect was fading. Without this, all that would have remained would have been pain. But on the other claw, I was also starting to see a surprising potential for tactical play.
As my crab levelled up, I could invest “money” in upgrading various physics-based variables, such as how fast the limbs swung, how heavy its body was, and so forth. Perhaps in time, I might have massaged these stats to mitigate the sheer frustration, and queasiness, of battle. Equally, advancement gave me access to a growing arsenal of weapons, all with an impressive range of stats. If I’d lasted long enough to achieve any sort of mastery over this decapod purgatory, perhaps those would have become more relevant.
Good lord that’s a grim-looking UI.
Indeed, I was even given access to a sort of henchcrab, its type chosen from all the different crabs I’d unlocked (again, each with their own stats), who I could arm with weapons of my choosing to assist me in battle. Right before I crossed thehroopnausea horizon and had to book it outside, I’d started experimenting with a coconut crab armed with a hammer to use as a sort of tank, while I stood behind it with nunchucks DPS-ing the shit out of enemies. There’s a lot of potential in that, for the strong of stomach.
Not gonna lie, I actually got quite attached to my big blue assistant.
And then, there’s multiplayer. I didn’t get to play against humans because I was playing before release, and so only had the campaign to work with. But that, I think, is where Fight Crab might come into its own. I’ll leave that to you to decide, however. I have very emphatically hung up my fighting claws, and intend to appreciate Fight Crab in the same way I have appreciated it to date: as a sublime joke. Much like crabs themselves, I am tremendously glad this game exists, but it’s something I’d rather appreciate at a distance.
