2048 Battles

Genre: Unlimited Pattern Puzzle

Players: 1-8 Competitive (Local Splitscreen)

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Review:

(Note: This game is included in Party Bundle: Ludomania & Flowlines VS & 2048 Battles, along with Flowlines VS and Ludomania. It is also included in 15 in 1 Family Games Mega Collection along with all of the aforementioned games plus Adrenaline Rush – Miami Drive, Airborne Grannies, Bubble Cats Rescue, Classic Games Collection Vol. 1, Classic Games Collection Vol. 2, Go! Fish Go!, Go Kart Mania, Jet Ski Rush, Klondike Solitaire, Pet Shop Snacks, Pocket Foosball, and Quick Golf.)

2048 Battles is a version of the 2048 Puzzle game that was super-popular for a hot minute on mobile devices a few years ago. For those who missed it, the premise is that numbers appear on a grid, and you can slide everything one of four directions. Blocks that hit other blocks with the same value combine into one worth twice as much. With this being the case, you must slide the blocks to try and combine as many as possible before you are unable to make any more moves.

The gameplay remains largely unchanged here, although you’re given a few different variations on the original theme – you can try to get the highest score in a timed game, or a game with a limited number of moves, play a variation where the highest-value block disappears from the board, making the game potentially endless.

In addition, this game includes support for up to 8 players competing at the same time, which is a nice inclusion, even if 2048 isn’t really a game that lends itself well to competitive play, as much as the game tries with optional sabotage power-ups. It’s more of a fun time waster, and in that regard, it does its job pretty well.

This is in part thanks to a number of unlockable skins, music tracks, and aesthetic options to pick from, allowing players to create their own customized experience. Some of the skins are quite nice, too – allowing players to combine buildings from various cultures into increasingly bigger buildings, making the game board look a bit like a miniature city. And purists will find multiple styles of plain numbered sets here as well.

There are really two main complaints I have about this version of the game. First, as much as this game tries to give players a variety of options, this game doesn’t really push 2048 anywhere especially new. Also, the slightly isometric view isn’t really ideal for this sort of puzzle game, which tends to be played with more simplistic and uncomplicated visuals. It’s still perfectly playable here, but purists might find this game a bit too “flashy”, although I use that term loosely, as there’s nothing especially impressive in the presentation. It looks nice, it works, but that’s it.

However, the isometric view does cause problems with one classic part of the game’s design – the touchscreen controls, which are apparently oriented with how the game board appears on the screen, not to an absolute up, down, left, and right. The game still plays perfectly fine with D-Pad or control stick, but it’s frustrating and a bit odd that a game originally designed to be played with a touchscreen plays terribly with a touchscreen here.

In the end, 2048 Battles is a decent version of 2048 on the Switch. It has a good feature set and looks nice, and the gameplay is as good as ever. It’s not without its flaws, but fans of 2048 will find this to be a good version of the modern classic.

tl;dr – 2048 Battles is a version of the 2048 Puzzle game popularized on Smartphones a few years back. This version looks good and plays well enough, but the isometric view is less than ideal and screws up the touchscreen controls, although it’s still a solid puzzle game when played with a D-pad or control stick.

Grade: B

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