“Fight Crab” Review

Why is the crab on top of the dinner shrimp holding a gun?
Yes.

As shocking and crazy as it is to know this game exists, it’s probably even more shocking and crazy to know that it’s actually pretty enjoyable.

What Is It?

Fight Crab is an arena fighter all about having crabs fight other species of crabs.

I’m dead serious.

I didn’t talk to the development team or anything, but I’m like 98% sure this game was made because of an insane meme of an actual crab holding a knife. If you’ve never seen it before, here. It’s absolutely hysterical, and the game is the exact same way.

Why Should I Care?

Nobody is going to play the game because it’s a technical marvel. It’s far from that. It’s even a little clunky, and as old as the meme is, it should hardly have anybody’s attention, but the reality is there’s some fun to be had with Fight Crab.

Spread the claws? Sure, somebody pass the butter.

Let’s start with the controls, as succinct as we can go here. The crab you’re in control of moves automatically, and you can change its direction with the D-Pad. The analog sticks control your crab’s claws, and you attack by punching with the back shoulder buttons or by pinching with the claws using the front shoulder buttons. You win by flipping opposing crabs over on their backs for more than three seconds, and that’s done by doing all sorts of damage. It’s similar to Super Smash Bros.’ damage system, the more damage you put on your opponent, the easier it’ll be to knock them over. The tutorial is actually pretty nifty, and the first few battles you have are a great introduction to the crazy world of Fight Crab. It’s all impressively responsive, and it feels good holding an enemy crab with your pinsirs while punching the hell out of it.

How crazy does it get? Well, one moment, you fight on the beach. The next moment you’re the size of kaijus fighting in a city and wrecking everything in your path eventually finding palm trees and rockets to use as weapons, and this is just the first hour. Wait until you have to fight onslaughts of crabs with swords and shields at a castle the next hour!

There are only two modes, the Campaign Mode and the Versus Mode. The Campaign puts you through various battles against all sorts of crab species, from blue crabs, to snow crabs, to even lobsters — they’re all delicious. Oftentimes, the action will be one on one, but you’ll also be forced to survive gauntlets and eventually have to deal with multiple foes at the same time. Couch co-op is available to make things easier should you have somebody to play with as crazy as you are.

My lobster dual-katana-wielding lobster doesn’t stand a chance against that Japanese crab that stole one of Cloud’s swords.

Versus Mode has both local and online play with ranked and casual matches. The matches, or rather–losses, I played were all with Japanese people, and it took about two minutes for the matchmaking system to find them. I got my ass handed to me in every single best of three fight, even with my double katanas equipped. Then again, I was going against another crab that was holding a revolver and what essentially looked like the Soul Edge, so I had that going on for me. There was no hope. Oh yeah, I lost another match because the other crab pulled off what essentially was a hadouken, which are pretty hard to perform in this game.

Yep, this is the kind of game we’re dealing with.

What Makes It Worth My Time And Money?

There’s all sorts of great indies out there to spend $20 on, and if you’re zany enough to spend it on this, you’ll be rewarded with one of the strangest experiences you’ll ever come across. The gameplay is surprisingly deep, it’s easy to learn, and it’s hilarious to take part in. The music is also fantastic. The campaign has quite a bit of crab meat and is roughly around three hours, and if you have people to play with, Fight Crab is quite the conversation piece.

A fatal four-way scuffle between giant crabs in Crustacean City. You love to see it.

That all said, the game isn’t bad. Is it a must-play? Definitely not. It’s an epic waste of time that I can easily recommend at a much cheaper price. This kind of game is really for a select cluster of intellectuals that don’t get crabby when it comes to trying new things.

Title:
Fight Crab
Platform:
Switch
Publisher:
Mastiff
Developer:
Calappa Games
Genre:
Fighting
Release Date:
September 15, 2020
ESRB Rating:
E
Developer's Twitter:
Editor's Note:
The game was provided by the publisher for review.

As shocking and crazy as it is to know this game exists, it’s probably even more shocking and crazy to know that it’s actually pretty enjoyable. What Is It? Fight Crab is an arena fighter all about having crabs fight…

Why is the crab on top of the dinner shrimp holding a gun?
Yes.

As shocking and crazy as it is to know this game exists, it’s probably even more shocking and crazy to know that it’s actually pretty enjoyable.

What Is It?

Fight Crab is an arena fighter all about having crabs fight other species of crabs.

I’m dead serious.

I didn’t talk to the development team or anything, but I’m like 98% sure this game was made because of an insane meme of an actual crab holding a knife. If you’ve never seen it before, here. It’s absolutely hysterical, and the game is the exact same way.

Why Should I Care?

Nobody is going to play the game because it’s a technical marvel. It’s far from that. It’s even a little clunky, and as old as the meme is, it should hardly have anybody’s attention, but the reality is there’s some fun to be had with Fight Crab.

Spread the claws? Sure, somebody pass the butter.

Let’s start with the controls, as succinct as we can go here. The crab you’re in control of moves automatically, and you can change its direction with the D-Pad. The analog sticks control your crab’s claws, and you attack by punching with the back shoulder buttons or by pinching with the claws using the front shoulder buttons. You win by flipping opposing crabs over on their backs for more than three seconds, and that’s done by doing all sorts of damage. It’s similar to Super Smash Bros.’ damage system, the more damage you put on your opponent, the easier it’ll be to knock them over. The tutorial is actually pretty nifty, and the first few battles you have are a great introduction to the crazy world of Fight Crab. It’s all impressively responsive, and it feels good holding an enemy crab with your pinsirs while punching the hell out of it.

How crazy does it get? Well, one moment, you fight on the beach. The next moment you’re the size of kaijus fighting in a city and wrecking everything in your path eventually finding palm trees and rockets to use as weapons, and this is just the first hour. Wait until you have to fight onslaughts of crabs with swords and shields at a castle the next hour!

There are only two modes, the Campaign Mode and the Versus Mode. The Campaign puts you through various battles against all sorts of crab species, from blue crabs, to snow crabs, to even lobsters — they’re all delicious. Oftentimes, the action will be one on one, but you’ll also be forced to survive gauntlets and eventually have to deal with multiple foes at the same time. Couch co-op is available to make things easier should you have somebody to play with as crazy as you are.

My lobster dual-katana-wielding lobster doesn’t stand a chance against that Japanese crab that stole one of Cloud’s swords.

Versus Mode has both local and online play with ranked and casual matches. The matches, or rather–losses, I played were all with Japanese people, and it took about two minutes for the matchmaking system to find them. I got my ass handed to me in every single best of three fight, even with my double katanas equipped. Then again, I was going against another crab that was holding a revolver and what essentially looked like the Soul Edge, so I had that going on for me. There was no hope. Oh yeah, I lost another match because the other crab pulled off what essentially was a hadouken, which are pretty hard to perform in this game.

Yep, this is the kind of game we’re dealing with.

What Makes It Worth My Time And Money?

There’s all sorts of great indies out there to spend $20 on, and if you’re zany enough to spend it on this, you’ll be rewarded with one of the strangest experiences you’ll ever come across. The gameplay is surprisingly deep, it’s easy to learn, and it’s hilarious to take part in. The music is also fantastic. The campaign has quite a bit of crab meat and is roughly around three hours, and if you have people to play with, Fight Crab is quite the conversation piece.

A fatal four-way scuffle between giant crabs in Crustacean City. You love to see it.

That all said, the game isn’t bad. Is it a must-play? Definitely not. It’s an epic waste of time that I can easily recommend at a much cheaper price. This kind of game is really for a select cluster of intellectuals that don’t get crabby when it comes to trying new things.

Date published: 09/24/2020
3 / 5 stars