Drinkbox studios has a history of churning out classic games, whether that be Tales From Space: About a Blob or Guacamelee!. So when they announced Nobody Saves the World, there was of course lots of excitement around the web. After spending over two weeks with the game, I dive into whether it follows up on the greatness of past titles or if it falters.
This Calamity Needs to Go
Nobody Saves the World drops you into the shoes of a literal nobody, a blank slate who can’t remember his past and wakes up in the middle of the oncoming calamity. Right away he is deemed to be sketchy and thrown in jail, only to break out and luck upon a magic wand. With wand in his hand, he now must work to defeat the evils of his world and stop the calamity.
To stop this calamity, players are tasked with traveling through the world, clearing various dungeons and completing quests, all while leveling up and gain new abilities. Each dungeon you come across has an enemy attached to it and some have added quirks. For instance, some will have enemies with certain wards active, forcing you to clear those wards first. Other dungeons might increase the cost of your mana or cancel dropped healing items. The only knock with dungeons is they could have used a little more variety to them. Too often they feel like carbon copies of the others, just with different colors and wards.
Drop the Zero, Get With The Heroes
Now this quest to stop the calamity can’t be done as a nobody, so players must now seek out and unlock new forms to help in their journey. This is the core of Nobody Saves the World, as players must juggle between over 15 different forms. These range from typical forms like Knight or Ranger, to things a bit more out of left field like robot, rat, and snail. Each form has it’s own little unique twist to it, with the ability to switch between any form at a moments notice, creating a really nice strategic element to combat and exploration.
Where things can really get twisted is with the ability to edit your passive and active abilities for each form. Say you grab the Bodybuilder and his bench press move and throw in a little horse gallop. Then to really give in some extra, the zombies convert skill to create legions of undead. All of it gives you role of a mad scientist, bringing your own versions of each character to life.
The passive abilities mentioned above give you perks such as added lighting damage to your attacks or increased speed and defense. Players will want to pay attention to each dungeon they visit so things can be adjusted before you proceed. Each skill can be upgraded as well.
Quirky, Audible Excitement Throughout
Nobody Saves the World shines in a lot of areas, but maybe none more so than the story and sound throughout the game. There are so many interesting characters to interact with, all with something memorable to say and hardly any wasted dialogue. It’s really a delight to find people to talk with and hear the really out there stuff that comes out of their mouths.
Musically, different areas of the map have a tone playing in the background, and it’s just beautifully selected for each spot that at times I was borderline dancing to some of the tunes. The sound team really put in the effort to give you a fun and vibrant sound to slay enemies to.
Nobody Saves the World Review: The final verdict
Nobody Saves the World is yet another in a growing list of strong titles from developer Drinkbox Studios. From the world design and characters, to the sounds and combat, there aren’t that many hairs out of place. It’s not perfect by any means. Local co-op is great and works wonderfully, but online is severely limited, with friend to friend being the only option. If you are looking for a good dungeon crawler with flair, then you really can’t go wrong with Nobody Saves the World.
