Earthbound vs Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn
Earthbound
Earthbound is a rather unique RPG featuring a group of four kids with amazing superpowers, namely Ness, Paula, Jeff and Poo, and a nefarious alien race that is hellbent on causing unspeakable destruction on Earth. Help them battle the swarm of monsters, aliens and even dinosaurs that are unleashed upon the by the powerful Giygas. Travel through various landscapes in hopes of finding and confronting the ultimate manifestation of evil to save the world from certain apocalyptic event. Learn more about each of these kids as they own personal stories, as well as funny quirks, gradually unfold as you progress in the game.In addition to its story-driven gameplay, Earthbound is an adventure-themed RPG that manages to evoke a feeling that is a mixture of dread, mainly due to the gravity of the situation these kids are in; and hilarity - these kids can be quite amusing. It'll give you a game experience like no other, that's for sure!
Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn
Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn is a fun and hilarious beat 'em up game that takes quite vicious, satirical jabs at various pop culture, celebrities, people stereotypes, and even the developers' own indiegogo campaign. The game starts you off in China where Shaquille (Shaq for short), a black baby was raised in a small village in China after he was found drifting down the river in an expensive-looking handbag. He was naturally bullied by the local kids when he was little because he was so much taller than they all were but his taller and bigger stature helped him gained the mentorship of the local village elder and he was eventually trained in the ancient martial arts of Wu Xing. Sounds like a the generic start of a kung-fu story, right? Well, the game does it so much better by peppering it with plenty of humor.Anyway, one day, his fighting skills were called into action when the god of death, Yen Lo-Wang, once again escape from the underworld and unleashed his plan to take over the world... that is by possessing various celebrities with his demons and brainwashing the world's people into subservience. Of course, this is not something Shaq will simply ignore, especially not when his elderly mentor was murdered by one of Yen Lo-Wang's minions.
Now, the gameplay in this game isn't what you'd call "hardcore", but the boss fights are quite challenging and the enemies you go fist-to-fist against have their respective sets of abilities in which you'll need to find ways to counter, besides being downright amusing. Just look at the animations! Controls are very simple to get into, especially if you had played such beat 'em ups before, and it's really nice that the developers put in the extra effort to vary their range of enemies and background art.
The best parts about the game though, aside from the funny dialogues and the cool moves, include crazy fun power-ups that can turn Shaq into a spikes-spewing cactus-man or equip him with an Iron Man-like suit, albeit a suit that is powered by diesel, which allow him to dish out a flurry of fists to any enemy unlucky enough to be standing in his way!
Shaq Fu: A Legend Reborn's brand of humor may not be everyone's cup of tea, but if you enjoy beat 'em up games, and you like to see the amusing side of things and you don't take the world too seriously, then this game is definitely right up your alley. It'll be able to make you cough up a chuckle or two, at least - I daresay I laughed a bit too much at some of the jokes in this game. Oh and a quick tip if you will - make sure you listen closely to the lyrics in the game's very own theme song. I got my first chuckle from it!