Super Crazy Rhythm Castle Review: A Rollercoaster of Frustration and Confusion

I’ve never played a game that actively made me want to hate it, and then I played Super Crazy Rhythm Castle. I did my best to reason with this game as if I were the one missing something important that would explain its existence, but I came out with nothing but I wasted weekend and a headache. If you’re into zany experiences that should have probably never been greenlit, stick around because Super Crazy Rhythm Castle is exactly that.

Super Crazy Rhythm Castle has a story, I think. The opening plops you near the front gates of a castle where, outside, you learn that the owner defeated all the other owners who came before. Now, for some reason, you’re on a quest to defeat him at a rhythm music game and take his crown. However, the king is a trickster and forces you to do a bunch of other stuff before you can even stand before him.

Now, there’s a lot of weird s**t that happens in this story. For starters, one of the tutorials has you shooting cardboard cutouts of what look to be children for no reason. I mean, it doesn’t even teach any meaningful gameplay systems that you need at that time. Further, you’re trapped in a fun house where this King guy will try to trick you, oftentimes causing you to lose mini-games due to trial-and-error systems. Then, for some reason, you need to resurrect a demon or fight an eggplant. I also want to mention that there are some strange item descriptions that refer to putting glasses on your groin.

Unraveling the Madness: Super Crazy Rhythm Castle’s Bizarre Narrative

The entire narrative experience feels like multiple people wrote different scenes, and they just placed them all together. Nothing makes sense, and nothing is sacred. oftentimes dialogue between characters is gibberish or one word that will likely leave you confused as to what it has to do with whatever it is you’re doing in this game. I tried my best, I wanted to understand this bizarre video game, but I was left defeated by the haphazard and extremely annoying characters.

The gameplay only makes this experience worse, but there are some interesting puzzle mechanics that some might find enjoyment out of. The foundation of each puzzle is a rhythm game tied to the worst royalty-free music I’ve ever heard. Again, I got the idea that not even the developers were taking this seriously, as the lyrics of the first song say, “Woogle with your ziggle, when you wiggle with the ziggle, you giggle.” I won’t dare include the music from this game in the video review as I’m sure they will Copyright these tracks, but let me just tell you, the music only gets worse and encompasses a variety of genres for added cringe.

Musical Missteps: The Cringe-Worthy Soundtrack of Super Crazy Rhythm Castle

What weighs on the experience even more is how long these puzzle music segments are and how you’re never really sure how to play them, so you’ll most definitely fail your first couple of tries. Retrying a song isn’t instantaneous either, as you have to sit through the opening dialogue of each mission before trying the song again. While there is a Fast Forward option, you can’t skip the scenes, and depending on how many times the devs throw out some curveball in a mini-game to cause you to fail, you’ll be watching these scenes and forced to listen to that stupid king’s grunts over, and over again.

It turns into a test. Constantly you’ll encounter small hints from the developers to stop playing and move on. These songs will leave you exhausted as you’re forced to listen to their repeating loops and terrible lyrics, tapping away using R, L, and Y on the Switch controller, which absolutely doesn’t make sense for a rhythm game, but okay. Further, you’re expected to move around in many of the mini-games, but this is also not explained to you, meaning it’s just another means for you to fail a few more times as you attempt to beat the game that has very well already beaten you.

And then it occurred to me, after my 24th try at a puzzle 5 hours into the game, that I should have put this game down back when that man sang about wiggling his ziggle. I was over it. I was defeated and honestly scared of the lingering emotional damage this game would leave on me. I even played the multiplayer, which made the experience worse. Trust me, don’t play multiplayer unless all players are experienced masochists who are somehow good at this game.

You’re essentially playing alone, but the points are a bit tougher to acquire since both players are independently doing exactly what you’d do playing solo, except with everyone in your way; it just makes the experience tougher. On top of that, as I said, one screw-up could mean restarting the puzzle, which means watching the damn story scenes another time, and it all just comes around full circle.

Controls during the rhythm portion are a bit unresponsive, but there are options to adjust for delays. Running around is also a little wonky due to the strange camera position that makes it tough to navigate the 3D environments. As you navigate your way through the hub town, you’ll have progress checks that require you to collect stars from the stages for clearing them. I actually did laugh when I delivered the stars, and this strange creature started singing some rock ballad for absolutely no reason.

Is It Really a Game? Exploring the Unconventional Charm of Super Crazy Rhythm Castle

Super Crazy Rhythm Castle is a game that you’ll want to end as soon as it begins. I feel like it’ll find success as a novelty game where people challenge their patience or within indie circles of pretentious gamers who argue that this narrative is genius and we’re the ones not capable of understanding its brilliance. Regardless, it’s not a good game, but in retrospect, I’ve never experienced anything like it, so that’s a positive.