Beatbuddy: Tale of the Guardians

Beatbuddy: Tale of the Guardians has some good music, cute character and is fun!

The premise of beat-based platforming is interesting but is used way too infrequently to be interesting or challenging. I only made it to the second level before I got bored. Most of the game is simple platform moving and moving around levels that are way too large, where you have to move into every corner to find all the collectibles. There is no real exploration, just simple busy work if you want to get all the shiny goodies. The game has sections where you really need to move with the beat to avoid damage and maybe they get more frequent later on. But I don't want to play through a basic platformer without being challenged at all to get to a few seconds of actual gameplay. If you look for a simple rhythm based game with good music, this game might be for you though.

This game sucks

Kind of a whatever beat based puzzle game.

Fun game!

Beatbuddy is a charming underwater adventure where the music genuinely comes alive through the environment — watching creatures and obstacles pulse in sync with the electroswing soundtrack is something I hadn't experienced before in a game. The hand-drawn visuals are gorgeous, and the first couple of levels kept me grinning as each new creature layered another beat into the track. That said, the controls feel frustratingly floaty, and I lost count of how many times Beatbuddy refused to pick up an object or darted off in the wrong direction at the worst possible moment. The gameplay also gets repetitive fast, leaning heavily on the same bounce-pad and reflector-tile puzzles throughout all six levels, and I hit at least one progress-blocking bug that forced me to restart a chapter from scratch. If you can catch it on sale and you're drawn in by the music concept, it's worth a few hours of your time — just go in knowing the 'game' part doesn't quite live up to the 'beat' part.