I have to admit that I longed for Power Rangers Super Megaforce to be good. You see, I'm not just a Power Rangers fan, I'm a Super Sentai fan. Super Sentai, for the uninitiated, is the Japanese originating source of Power Rangers. When we first got the Mighty Morphin' Power Rangers as our first season, that was Japan's 16th. Super Megaforce is based on what is easily my favorite Sentai series, Gokaiger, a pirate-themed force which utilizes Ranger keys in order to transform into any of the previous 34 incarnations. So naturally, a game based on my favorite series had a lot to live up to. But I'm not naive, especially after reviewing last year's Megaforce which was also quite underwhelming.
As I mentioned before, Super Megaforce revolves around being able to play as Rangers from past seasons, though only Red Rangers seemed to have made the cut (aside from Mighty Morphin' which includes the full cast). That in itself should appeal to Ranger fans, but the downside is that unlocking many of these will require some extra purchases of Ranger Keys.
I wish I could say the gameplay was redeeming but it's actually the game's biggest downfall. Much like a Power Rangers episode, it sticks to a single formula that it repeats for every single stage. Run forward to collect a few coins, get blocked off by walls and defeat enemies, then run forward to collect more coins, then get blocked and defeat enemies, then– well, you get the point. That's the whole game. Boss fights are just slightly more agile enemies with larger health bars, and their giant counterparts that have to be dispatched with your Mega Zord work on a sort of Rock-Paper-Scissors mechanic that feels extremely sluggish and non-responsive.
Even though you start off with the entire cast of Super Megaforce, the only two rangers that matter are the Blue and Yellow Rangers, as their attack stat is the highest, meaning two hits can dispatch any enemy right from the get go. The game has a leveling mechanic where the base stats raise each time, meaning those same rangers will just continually keep getting more over-powered, making all other Ranger pale in comparison.
There's a buddy system where you pick a secondary Ranger to act as your AI companion, but as you might expect from a game like this, the AI is absolutely laughable. You can switch its tactics from melee, ranged and balanced, but even that doesn't make much sense, since ranged attacks are extremely weak, so you're much better off keeping their standard tactic at melee the entire game.
The environments themselves, though varied, are all just reskinned versions of one another. Whether you're in the city or in a volcano, you're still jumping over obstacles, collecting coins and being blocked off by walls to defeat enemies. Even the Super Nintendo version of the original Power Rangers game was more fun.
It also doesn't help that controls are pretty unresponsive. You can now move in 8 directions which is a good addition, however combat still only takes place on a 2D plane. You can't slash up and down or diagonally, which means you always have to position yourself to the right or left of the enemy. It's annoying.
The game doesn't look terrible, and I think for what it is, it gets the job done visually. Much like Megaforce, Super Megaforce also doesn't support the 3D slider. This might be due to the game being for younger kids which shouldn't be playing games in 3D anyway, but it's strange not to see it supported, especially since the levels now allow you to move in multiple directions.
If there is one other positive aspect of the game that Super Megaforce fixed from its prequel, is that the Rangers no longer keep continually shouting advice or support. Not having to hear "Yeah, we did it!" every five seconds is refreshing to say the least.
As much I had hoped that Super Megaforce would have been better than Megaforce, it really just reinforces the fact that I may never get the Power Rangers game I'm hoping for. Shallow gameplay mixed with shallow mechanics and odd controls just don't make for a fun game. With that said, younger fans of Power Rangers will surely overlook these shortcomings and eat up every second of Super Megaforce.
