Headbangers: Rhythm Royale Reviews

The "royale" genre has come a long way from its typical action-focused roots. What started with H1Z1 and PUBG pitting players against each other in a fight to the death with a large map and limited weapons has evolved to the point where games like Tetris 99 and Super Mario Bros. 35 essentially take a large-scale LAN party and make it a "royale" to determine who's the best of the best.

Enter Headbangers: Rhythm Royale, a rhythm-based take on the genre where you play as a pigeon trying to best 29 other pigeon players in an assortment of mini-games to become the "Master Headbanger". Yes, that's ACTUALLY what's happening.

First off, the Presentation alone is enough of a sell. There's something innately hilarious about loading into a lobby of 30 players and being greeted by strangely dressed pigeons frantically waving their heads around while quoting random internet memes. The Art style is simple yet effective, with bright arenas and a vibrant color palette at every turn, and the Sound is pitch perfect, both in its individual sounds and even its music.

The Gameplay consists of 4 rounds of "mini-games", all focused on some rhythm or sound premise. Some rounds will have you pressing buttons to a rhythm (similar to the likes of Guitar Hero), while others will test your memory or reaction times with sound-based challenges. Players are eliminated each round until a pigeon emerges victorious at the end.

As it's a rhythm-based game, the game does open up with a Calibration Test, which helps to set your expected Latency to ensure a responsive experience during mini-games. This test can be redone at any time, and Latency can also be set manually, along with a preferred region and Crossplay toggle.

The Mini-games themselves are quite varied. Games like Yes Commander and Faster Than Sound test your reaction times, either by copying a motion fast enough to survive or by finding a certain sound in a sea of noise. Others like Run Pigeon Run and The Space Race are your typical QTE-style minigames, testing your timing and consistency with staying in rhythm. Mini-games are also "locked" to certain rounds, so games like The Ring or First Piano Shooter will only appear in Round 2 while The Final Ride will only appear in Round 4. This does mean that games eventually get a bit repetitive, especially since the mini-games can be somewhat "predicted" each round.

Along the way, you'll collect XP to level up the current "battle pass", unlocking new cosmetics for your pigeon, along with Crumbs, which can be used to purchase other cosmetics and alterations from a rotating shop. There isn't any form of monetization in the game at launch, so all of the items are earned just by playing. The cosmetic selection is also fairly "limited" at launch, but it is expected to grow with time.

Mini-games also have Items that will fly in as the game progresses. In addition to providing XP and Crumbs, they can also trigger "Global Attacks" in the form of visual and audio distractions to other players, as well as effects unique to each game mode, like revealing the answers for a short time, providing generous score bonuses or even penalizing players by distorting audio or inverting controls.

Most of the end-game progression comes in the form of Challenge Cards, which are full cosmetic sets locked behind a series of challenges, with each getting harder as you progress. Some challenges will just require you to get a certain number of wins/games or spend some Crumbs, but other will require you to complete certain mini-games with a high enough score or a quick enough reaction time. These Cards aren't locked behind completion of previous ones, so you can focus any card you like at any time.

But, completing these challenges is where issues start to arise. Most of these challenges will come with general play, but some require a great level of skill and HEAVY RNG, especially those revolving around specific mini-games. Finishing any card requires completion of ALL its challenges, with no way to auto-complete any of them. So if there's ONE challenge holding you up, you're at the mercy of the game providing you with the chance to clear it.

As an example, take the following challenge, located on Challenge Card #7:
- Complete an 8-note sequence perfectly in Glottissimo.
(This is a bit of a detour, but I feel that detail is important.)

To start, Glottissimo is a mini-game in Round 3, meaning that you need to be either good enough or lucky enough to reach the Top 10 in a game. Once you get there, Glottissimo only has a 16.6% chance of appearing, due to sharing the Round 3 slot with 5 other minigames. So just getting into the correct minigame can be a hassle.

Then there is the actual minigame, which consists of repeating the actions of an opera singer via button inputs. Rhythm doesn't matter, just the order of actions, with the correct inputs relayed via the opera singer's sound and movements. The actions become gradually harder over the 90-second game, with the "harder" section randomly presenting new longer sequences of inputs at you. Even if you spam through all irrelevant sequences to find the one you need, there is NO GUARANTEE you will even SEE the 8-note sequence, let alone have enough TIME to complete it.

This also doesn't take into account the Items, which provide a semi-random effect. The Bonus for the mini-game can highlight the correct inputs for a single sequence (essentially giving you the challenge completion in the right scenario), but the odds of getting THAT item out of 6 possibilities is low (even WITH the weighting leaned towards the Bonus itself), not to mention the odds of getting an Item at the EXACT moment you need it while other players are ALSO going for them.

And finally, if you fail the challenge, it means starting up another game, getting to Round 3 AGAIN and sitting through another 16.6% dice roll just to get another ATTEMPT.

Given how many RNG factors are at play at all times, you can remain stuck for HOURS trying to complete just ONE of these challenges. And this isn't just a one-off, as SEVERAL of the game's challenges can be infuriatingly difficult due to randomness.
- Earning a 0.44s average response time in Faster Than Sound requires near inhuman speed and a GOOD understanding of the 30+ individual sounds in the game's library.
- Earning a 1.3s average response time in The Ring is nearly impossible on a controller due to the delay that occurs between inputs, in addition to having a good response time.
- The 40 Perfect notes in After Party can be difficult, as players are eliminated after a single mistake in this version, meaning the round can end before 40 notes have even been played!

- NOTE: This section also previously referenced two specific Garden Party challenges for getting 30 and 42 Perfect notes, respectively. The developer has since relaxed the requirement of these challenges to 20/25, which is FANTASTIC as these challenges were VERY RNG dependent.

Okay, that's more than enough rambling.

The point is: While the Challenge Cards are a good concept, their over-reliance on RNG doesn't really fit with the game's rhythm and skill focus. Your completion time for the game can be inflated as much as 10 HOURS from ONE challenge that you just can't complete due to randomness.

Speaking of completion, the Achievements are fairly straight-forward, with most of the difficulty coming down to the in-game challenges. There's an achievement for completing each of the 9 Challenge Cards, earning set numbers of Wins/Matches, spending Crumbs and wearing costumes. Overall, the completion should run around 30-40 hours assuming you have good luck and decent skill, but this can very easily balloon into a 40-50 hour completion due to factors outside of your control.

The "easiest" way to combat a lot of this is to turn Crossplay off and set your preferred region to somewhere in Asia, essentially allowing for a lobby filled with bots (and the occasional player doing the same thing). Bots are decent at the game, but they can mostly be taken down with little to no effort. Most times you can qualify by brute-force alone, and most mini-games don't even require you to hear the game to feasibly pass them in a bot lobby.

This also brings up the point that there's no Private Match capability or any way to practice individual mini-games. You can jump into games with your friends, but the game will often pit you directly against those same friends if it has to, leading to some awkward moments. Eliminated players can still spectate, but the game's reliance on sound means that there can't be too much backseat discussion amongst friends.

Overall, Headbangers: Rhythm Royale is a fun and challenging take on the "battle royale" genre, with great presentation, interesting and unique gameplay. While it's endgame Challenges can suffer from HEAVY RNG and Skill reliance, much of its cosmetics and charm can still be acquired from just playing, by yourself or with patient friends, and maybe that's good enough.

The game is also available through Game Pass if you want to try it out for yourself, without parting from some of your own "bread". (Pigeon jokes are weird.)