There will always be a place in my heart for action-packed platformers and they get better and better as time goes on. Sonzai Games and X PLUS Co., Ltd. have teamed up to make this beautifully created 2D side-scroller, which if you play retro games, you will be as invested in as I was.

Bat Boy is a 2D side-scroller where you control the main protagonist, Bat Boy. You are put into this narrative where you meet the evil villain known as Lord Vicious. Lord Vicious has brainwashed all of your friends in order to compete in the Trails of Darkness. You’ll also meet a crow on your first leg of the adventure by the name of Garou, who helps you along the way of your adventure by giving you helpful hints to help you.

Like all great side scrollers, you can collect diamonds along the way, and if you are super tricky and want to adventure a little more, you can open chests that help you collect everything by the end of the level. These things are designed for those players that thrive on collecting everything and does not necessarily affect the gameplay.

The controls are basic in this one, and you’ll learn more throughout the journey, but the only downside is that you’re not told them through a tutorial or anything, so you need to smash that “ESC” button and learn the controls from there. You utilize the W, A, S, and D, and the spacebar most of the time, and use “J” to perform attacks. The controls feel like they were well utilized and very responsive – I didn’t find myself hitting space without something happening as you do with some side-scrollers.

Your friend Garou teaches you some special moves along the way, including the buttons you need to use to activate them, such as holding J, which throws the sword out in a spinning frenzy, and you can then jump off of it to gain extra height or even kill enemies using this method. When you unlock one of these new moves, you are put into a little training section of the game where you can play around and learn how to best use it.

Like all perfect side scrollers, this game is built beautifully with pixel art styling and bright colors. There’s a lot to look at, and for something so basic, it’s perfect. The developers did a fantastic job of bringing back that retro look we all grew up loving.

Even the chat UI had a retro look to it, using big comic book speech boxes you see in a lot of other retros titles. There were a couple of times I would get what I could describe as a texture glitch, and this would bug the game out a little, but then we would be back in action again very quickly.

The sounds have been done so well with this title, with the soundtrack featuring fast-paced retro arcade music, again something we all grew up to love. It was fitting for the pace of the title. The other little sound effects thrown in, like when you jumped and hit someone, or made those pink pigs roll into others, were incredibly well done which increased the immersion of this game drastically. There was no voice acting for the dialogue, so there was plenty of reading, but the lack of spoken dialogue only helped to further bring back those retro memories.

If you love 2D action-packed side-scrollers with an immersive story and plenty to look at, Bat Boy has been created just for you. The game has all the simple aspects of your side scrollers with bright and beautiful colors, and you’ll be able to listen to some bad-ass tunes while jumping and hitting your way to victory.

Written by: Hayden Nelson