If you’ve ever listened to a song and thought “Man, I wish I could punch someone to this”, then your prayers may have been answered with Draglade. The game is a typical 2-D fighter with an atypical focus on beats and rhythm, combined with a magic power system, all wrapped up in some well trod anime inspired aesthetics and story elements. For all the game tries to do, it’s still not all that exciting, which is a shame given just how much gameplay is available, however fighting game junkies looking for new and interesting ways to deliver beat downs may find enough here to sate their bloodlust.

In the world of Draglade, matter is everywhere, much like in the real world. Unlike in our world, this matter can be channeled via a device called a G-Con and used to make imaginary weapons. These weapons, wielded by Grappers, are used to beat up other Grappers in gladiatorial style combat. There are also bullets in this world, but they’re not bullets fired from a gun, they’re magical powers, also used by Grappers. There’s also something called a Draglade which is a big, mythical dragon, or maybe it’s a weapon based on a dragon. It’s all very confusing.

You play as one of four young lads looking to become the next Master Grapper, and deal with their own personal demons at the same time. There’s the spiky haired fire guy, the rotund animal loving earth guy, the ex-pirate water guy and the running-from-his-past electric guy. None of the characters are remotely interesting, as they’re all so clichéd and none of their stories are useful for anything other than leveling them up and obtaining more bullets and unlocking additional fighters to be used in multiplayer.

As you progress through the stories, you’ll fight some fellow Grappers in arena style matches, as well as fight beasts, called Variants, in a very basic platforming mode. The combat system is an interesting one, consisting of light attacks with the Y button and heavy attacks with the X button. Using the d-pad allows for some directional control over these attacks for extra variety. Blocking is accomplished with the right shoulder button while the left shoulder button allows you to pull off a beat combo. Combat revolves around the idea of beats, with each successful strike on an opponent filling up your beat meter. This beat meter is used to not only fuel your bullet attacks, but also the aforementioned beat combo. Once you have enough beats store up, launching a beat combo will display the combo in a bar at the bottom of the fight screen. If you’re able to hit your opponents in time with the beats as they move across the bar you’ll pull off an unblockable string of moves, doing extra damage and wowing the crowd at the same time. Bullets are used with a combination of the A button and the d-pad. Three buttons can be equipped at any time; however an extra three can be held in reserve and swapped out by touching them on the touch screen.

It’s a complex system, and when playing in multiplayer against other humans, you’ll have to employ a good mix of bullets, beat combos and general jumping around, but when playing the single player game, it’s much to easy to ignore the beats and beat combos altogether. As your beats recharge slowly without hitting opponents, single player matches against other Grappers becomes a simple affair of jumping around the arena, eluding your opponent while waiting for your beats to recharge and then launching a bullet attack. The AI rarely takes to the air to attack, so unless you’re in an arena with airborne environmental hazards, it’s fairly easy to just jump around, healing and launching attacks all the live long day. As you and your opponent both take damage even when blocking, it’s easy to just grind out an opponent as you make like Jumping Jack Flash. The fact that you can so easily ignore the beat combos in the single player mode is both odd, as that’s the entire basis of the combo system, and somewhat dishonest as going into a multiplayer match without knowing how to land a beat combo is a recipe for disaster.

The platforming portions require even less strategy as the enemies have very few attacks and can usually be dispatched by running up to them and wailing on them with your light attacks. After each Grapping match, and after the various platforming stages, you’re rewarded with cash based on how varied your fighting style is, so there is some incentive to mix things up, but even with these financial incentives, you can easily finish each of the single player campaigns without ever pulling off a beat combo. If you find yourself enamored with the beat combos and use them frequently, the game allows you to purchase new beat combos and then customize them to your funky fresh likings. Players can save up to 20 custom beat combos as well as trade them online. Bullets can also be traded, which is nice as you’ll come across multiple copies of the same bullet.

Visually, the game has a bright look to it, and the character animations are fluid. The various bullet attacks are well modeled and run the gamut from the normal fireball attack to a humungous speaker that appears and blasts opponents with sonic waves. The platforming areas are nondescript, unlike the well designed arenas which bristle with fireballs and electrical beams to deal damage to unsuspecting combatants. The enemies in the platforming stages are equally nondescript, consisting of the same beasts, repeated ad nauseam with only their color change to announce that this isn’t the same monster as before. If you’ve ever wondered what it’s like to fight a floating, malevolent butterfly, or kick a giant mutated bear in the groin, Draglade is the game for you.