Review: Breakout Beyond for Nintendo Switch

Breakout Beyond—man, what a twist on a classic. It’s like they took your regular brick-breaking gig and went, “Hey, let’s make this playfield longer and see what happens.” Honestly, a cool way to kill time, but you’ll find yourself locked out of a bunch of stuff at first. Some folks might just shrug and move on, but others—especially if they’ve got a buddy to play with—will keep coming back.

Now, I gotta say, the real draw for me? Two-player co-op. Picture this: I was getting a bit bored playing solo, but then my wife jumped in with a second paddle. Bam! Whole new game vibe. Leaderboards say I’m in the minority? Whatever, I’ll ramble about that later. But first, there’s this thing called “voyage” you gotta conquer.

In voyage, it’s like you’re collecting special bombs, powering up your paddle and those crazy balls, and hey—you can even slow stuff down (though they dock you points for it). Truth be told, you’ll need it. This game ramps up in difficulty after the first few levels, especially if you’re flying solo. Yet, it nails the “just one more try” itch. Play around with paddle sensitivity, though; the wrong setting can wreck your streak. With 72 levels staring you down, my inner completionist wanted to smash through them all—but, meh, not required. Remember, it’s a straight path; beat one level to tackle the next batch.

Presentation-wise, Breakout Beyond keeps it old-school while jazzing up the essentials. “Procedural audio and visual effects”—yeah, that’s their pitch, and it gets flashy the better you do. For Choice Provisions fans, you know what I mean. It’s cool watching the game explode with color and sound the longer you last. And hey, thank goodness for those music and sound sliders.

But wait, what’s the deal with locked content? Seriously, keeping leaderboards and modes like infinite or the original arcade under lock and key from the start—bizarre move, and not in a good way. The game would’ve been much tighter with those open from the get-go, either for practicing skills or mixing things up. At least leaderboard sorting by global or friends gives you something. And yeah, don’t mean to brag, but my wife and I are topping the co-op charts… though maybe that’s more about most folks going it alone.

Breakout’s kind of impossible to ruin ’cause it’s been fun forever, you know? But wow, Choice Provisions teetered on the edge with their decision to lock content, leaderboards included. It’s kind of a miracle the game still rocks, a big thumbs up to their skill and the classic roots.