Since Steam reviews and the gaming press are just ceaselessly repeating the same already tired jokes and sharing videos of people playing the game poorly, allow me to offer a modicum of actual thought about this game.
Trombone Champ is a mechanically fine rhythm game. As every other reviewer feels the need to qualify it, yes, I too played trombone for a brief moment in time in juniour high band. The trombone sounds silly, its exacerbation of glissando especially so. Trombone Champ leans hard into the comedy of slide instruments, where being slightly off can make a recorder sound sophisticated in comparison. That's probably the only aspect in which the game's humour lands successfully. The gameplay itself works surprisingly well, kind of like an evolution of Wii Music's instruments which utilised the gyroscope. Hold the notes, slide as needed, it's nothing groundbreaking if you've played osu! or any rhythm game really. The controls defaulting to the mouse inversely matching pitch is novel but I turned it off quickly. There's a breath mechanic that literally does not come into play unless you play the game incorrectly.
And that's the gameplay! Everything else is separate from the actual meat of the game and its twenty-ish songs. The tracks available are fitting to the trombone but it means a predominance of pre-twentieth century tunes. I don't find that to be a problem, but part of me feels if there isn't a need to pay for licensing most of the music, there could be a hell of a lot more. As the tracks are usually accompanied by busy visuals, that would certainly prohibit a massive amount of content but when some of these amount to a static image with some fading pictures of beavers, that effort argument falls a little flat. The eyecandy is stellar at times, and I particularly love the use of old woodblock prints and magazine cartoons which are almost never seen in games. At times it's like playing John Tenniel's cartoons for Punch.
The rest of Trombone Champ is where I take umbrage. When you fill your Champ metre during a song, you hear airhorns. Some tracks have MLG frag video style effects, you get to see sunglasses on Mozart, your character has the same flat sausage-ish vibrant aesthetic as a Mount Your Friends or Human Fall Flat avatar, the way they move as you play has the vague physics silliness of QWOP or Surgeon Simulator. The collectible cards you can unpack come in a loot box style bag, emblazoned with faux-truths about trombonists all ending with how many hot dogs they can eat in one sitting. The loading screen 'tips' state similar falsehoods about things like the world record holder for most trombones owned has two whole trombones. There are baboons scattered about because baboons are funny? It all feels so temporally separated from the year it came out in, and the year it was announced. I guess comedy equals tragedy plus time but to me this just feels old and tired, maybe lacking enough separation for an ironic enjoyment. And it's a shame because its all superfluous! The game is fine without any of it. It's a misstep akin to The Stanley Parable Deluxe, it's like a Frog Fractions without the shock value. I hesitate to use the phrase 'flavour of the week' but I see no timeline where this is remembered, much less thought of fondly, in a few months. But who's to say, I mean, we all still love Goat Simulator and Fall Guys and I Am Bread and GIRP and What the Golf and Happy Wheels and...
Trombone Champ is a mechanically fine rhythm game. As every other reviewer feels the need to qualify it, yes, I too played trombone for a brief moment in time in juniour high band. The trombone sounds silly, its exacerbation of glissando especially so. Trombone Champ leans hard into the comedy of slide instruments, where being slightly off can make a recorder sound sophisticated in comparison. That's probably the only aspect in which the game's humour lands successfully. The gameplay itself works surprisingly well, kind of like an evolution of Wii Music's instruments which utilised the gyroscope. Hold the notes, slide as needed, it's nothing groundbreaking if you've played osu! or any rhythm game really. The controls defaulting to the mouse inversely matching pitch is novel but I turned it off quickly. There's a breath mechanic that literally does not come into play unless you play the game incorrectly.
And that's the gameplay! Everything else is separate from the actual meat of the game and its twenty-ish songs. The tracks available are fitting to the trombone but it means a predominance of pre-twentieth century tunes. I don't find that to be a problem, but part of me feels if there isn't a need to pay for licensing most of the music, there could be a hell of a lot more. As the tracks are usually accompanied by busy visuals, that would certainly prohibit a massive amount of content but when some of these amount to a static image with some fading pictures of beavers, that effort argument falls a little flat. The eyecandy is stellar at times, and I particularly love the use of old woodblock prints and magazine cartoons which are almost never seen in games. At times it's like playing John Tenniel's cartoons for Punch.
The rest of Trombone Champ is where I take umbrage. When you fill your Champ metre during a song, you hear airhorns. Some tracks have MLG frag video style effects, you get to see sunglasses on Mozart, your character has the same flat sausage-ish vibrant aesthetic as a Mount Your Friends or Human Fall Flat avatar, the way they move as you play has the vague physics silliness of QWOP or Surgeon Simulator. The collectible cards you can unpack come in a loot box style bag, emblazoned with faux-truths about trombonists all ending with how many hot dogs they can eat in one sitting. The loading screen 'tips' state similar falsehoods about things like the world record holder for most trombones owned has two whole trombones. There are baboons scattered about because baboons are funny? It all feels so temporally separated from the year it came out in, and the year it was announced. I guess comedy equals tragedy plus time but to me this just feels old and tired, maybe lacking enough separation for an ironic enjoyment. And it's a shame because its all superfluous! The game is fine without any of it. It's a misstep akin to The Stanley Parable Deluxe, it's like a Frog Fractions without the shock value. I hesitate to use the phrase 'flavour of the week' but I see no timeline where this is remembered, much less thought of fondly, in a few months. But who's to say, I mean, we all still love Goat Simulator and Fall Guys and I Am Bread and GIRP and What the Golf and Happy Wheels and...
Detchibe
1 year ago