Star Clash

There are a lot of ways to describe Star Clash. The game’s own promotional materials casually switch between “artistic puzzle fighter” and “anime combat game,” and both phrases are pretty accurate. This clash of elements creates some interesting results, but it’s hard to shake the feeling it could have led to even more.

Star Clash takes place in an anime-inspired, vaguely futuristic world like something out of a later Final Fantasy game. Everyone has spiky hair but they’re fighting oppressive robots instead of evil wizards and the music is funky electronica instead of low-rent orchestra. Continuing that RPG trend, players have access to a party of characters and can upgrade them with earned skills points. But from there it just becomes a competitive puzzle game - albeit a fairly unconventional one.

Players duel one foe at a time using the puzzle board as their weapon. The board is a constellation full of pulsating lights that occasionally blossom into stars. Once that happens, players tap on a star to lock in a place. By tapping on stars, players will create shapes - and once a shape is finished, they launch it towards the enemy for damage or towards themselves for health. More stars mean more power, but lines can never cross. Meanwhile, the enemy presumably creates shapes on their own unseen board. There are some power-ups too, but balancing speedy, efficient, and powerful shape-making is the game’s unique bread and butter.

It’s an intriguing, tense hook, but the rest of the game doesn’t fully flesh out the concept’s potential. There’s a cool endurance mode where players balance health and time instead of opposing life bars, but besides that it’s just these single enemy encounters. More annoying though, is the fact that players must purchase pretty much everything from stronger foes to new characters to new stages. Granted they can use in-game currency, but it’s still an unnecessary roadblock. The game’s painted backdrops are so lovely too, so why hide them? But most importantly, in a game all about one-on-one combat, the lack of competitive multiplayer is a glaring omission.

Star Clash is definitely worth checking out for its curious concept alone. But here’s hoping a more actualized version is on our future, written in the stars.