Max and the Book of Chaos

Genre: Action-Platformer / Arcade

Players: 1

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Review:

Max and the Book of Chaos is a family-friendly Arcade-style Action-Platformer released on PC, PlayStation 4, Xbox One, and Nintendo Switch in 2020. Players take the role of a kid zapping invading enemies with an energy gun in single-screen stages.

The presentation here is mostly decent, featuring cartoony 2D visuals and a goofy soundtrack. Characters are colorful with decent animation, and there’s enough detail in the stages to make them interesting as well. Unfortunately, despite that there’s nothing here to really stress the Nintendo Switch’s hardware, the game still ends up suffering from slowdown when the action gets more intense and enemies start to fill the screen.

There are other issues as well. The story here is absolutely terrible, poorly-written with plenty of spelling errors, and focusing on a completely disposable tale where we’re not properly introduced to any of its central characters, and everything seems contrived for the purpose of setting up a videogame. I suppose this wouldn’t be horrible if there wasn’t so much story – if the story is an excuse to set up the gameplay, then get over with it quickly and get to the actual gameplay!

What’s more, tiny text is difficult to read on the TV screen in docked mode, and it is an absolute pain to read in handheld mode. And again, if this were just a matter of skipping the story, well, you could hardly be blamed for wanting to skip this game’s story, but text in in-game shop menus is difficult to read as well.

The gameplay here does promise some decent old-school thrills, with single-screen Arcade-style gameplay that’s slightly reminiscent of the Buster Bros./Pang series. There’s a decent variety of enemies, power-ups, and extra tasks to complete to improve your score, as well as unlockable upgrades. Unfortunately, the gameplay has problems here too. The controls feel a bit sluggish, and unfortunately this is one of those games where players really should be able to use the right stick to aim independently of movement, but can’t.

In the end, Max & the Book of Chaos isn’t a terrible game, but its positive qualities are hard to appreciate due to its multiple problems. Poor performance, unreadable text, and frustrating controls all result in a game that’s difficult to enjoy through all of the frustrations. Players looking for an inexpensive Arcade-style Action game may still find some enjoyment here, but it’s a game I’d have a hard time recommending.

tl;dr – Max and the Book of Chaos is an Arcade-style Action-Platformer that has you blasting enemies in single-screen stages reminiscent of the Buster Bros. games. Unfortunately, this game performs poorly on the Nintendo Switch, has control issues, and has tiny and at times unreadable text. This game still has its charms, but you have to put up with multiple frustrations to enjoy it.

Grade: C-

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