Play like a kid again and pit your toys against evil forces. Crumbling lets you take your figurines on another adventure.
Making toys the heroes of their own story is a beloved pastime many experience. Crumbling brings back that sense of wonder. It may evoke feelings of nostalgia and imagination that were once forgotten. Many manner of creatures can exist in a given universe. Adventure through multiple worlds, encounter magic that brings toys to life and restore the comics that share their stories.
Crumbling is the work of developer Crumbling Games. An action-adventure game at its core, the virtual reality title sees one work with special magic in a comic book store. Only by restoring the pages of their stories can the shop and its inhabitants be at peace once again. It is important to defeat the malevolent forces at play to acquire the many pages. Gather the forces of the Crumbling and see to it that the evil is defeated.
The game presents an interesting concept to the action-adventure genre. Instead of exploring worlds directly as the hero, the Crumbling is sent into many worlds to take action. Invisible hands guide their actions, making combat feel far more immersive than games with similar controls. Before heading into a world, you have to tear open the blister pack containing each figurine. This is done by grabbing with either top trigger and tearing with the other hand.
All four triggers can be used to navigate the building inside the comic book shop. No teleportation movement is available, but there are arrows at each workstation. Depending on what part is pressed, it can send the player either left or right. Getting to each place without such movement is a huge chore.
Using two triggers, you must ‘grab’ at the air and drag your invisible body toward your objective. Arrows in the shop alleviate this problem, but movement inside the Crumbling worlds is exclusively restricted to dragging yourself around the instance. Of course, if there is not a whole lot of space, the ‘dragging’ movement makes sense. Provided there is at least a 6×6 area free, you can freely walk around the shop. This lends a little more to helping a player get immersed. Unfortunately, it is one option I had to forego due to the lack of space.
Once combat becomes available, it is important to drag the Crumbling Knight to the first available world. With a simple design, including the typical sword and shield, this figurine has what feels like a basic set of moves. The toy will execute a basic attack using the top trigger on whichever hand is holding it. Additionally, an AOE attack can be triggered using the X button. The Special doesn’t feel like it can do very much at a base level.
Stacking upgrades felt like the only thing that mattered with the Knight. He can dodge by pressing A at the last possible moment. It might take some practice, but this is most effective against singular enemies when done properly. It provides a great way to sidestep the critical strikes from a boss-level enemy.
After each level, though, a set of upgrades becomes available, giving one of three options. What upgrades are available depends on the Crumbling taking part in the adventure. It’s easy to choose enhancements with the Knight figurine, as this figurine can have its attack speed and attack force stacked repeatedly.
Second up to bat is the Shaman Crumbling figurine. Compared to the Knight, this character’s skills have a bit of a learning curve. Instead of a physical strike, pressing and holding the attack trigger charges a beat emitted from the toy’s staff. The best part of this ability is that it can strike at various intensity levels. If there are too many enemies in a given area, you can execute low-level beams, hitting one enemy multiple times or causing chaos for a group.
The constructs can be fun. But in the heat of battle, choosing which one to deploy becomes hard. A radial menu is presented when pressing and holding A. While holding the action button, a hard-to-control reticule is what chooses the desired construct. Because the ‘target’ is moved whenever the hand is, things become extremely difficult when surrounded by multiple enemies.
Aside from the magic beam, this Crumbling can also summon constructs. The red constructs offer a delayed detonation, hitting multiple enemies if they are too close to the deployed mine. Blue constructs, when multiple ones are deployed, will chain together with electricity. Whether they are Crumbling or malevolent toys, anything passing through the threshold will be shocked with electricity.
The most versatile for combat, though, has to be the green construct available to the Shaman. When deployed, this construct occasionally shoots a small ball of energy. Whichever enemy is closest receives the damage, making things especially chaotic when multiple ones are deployed. With enough enhancements, it can be total hell for enemies with as many as six or seven of these baddies. It is hilarious swinging the Crumbling through the air and watching enemies get totally wrecked by the turret constructs.
In addition to stacking offered enhancements, power-ups become available after recovering a comic page, defeating an enemy, or collecting a couple of magical souls. The most effective, of course, will always be the vitality power-up. Exponentially increasing HP for whichever Crumbling is being used provides a great buffer for a player like myself, who cares little for dodging when the battle is already won.
As many as nine of these buffs can be acquired. It provides a good variety for anyone who wants to mix and match their stats. You have to take care to choose their buffs carefully, as only three can be used at any given time. In my experience, the Vitality buff should always be part of the chosen set. My second choice is almost always the treasure buff. Fully upgraded, the treasure buff will make enemies drop way more magic souls.
The buffs never come without cost. Magic souls collected by the Crumbling are how these buffs are buffed. When one of the snow globes is approached by hand, the option to spill magic onto each statuette will come up—the first level costs anywhere from 30 to 50 souls, which is fairly easy to gather. To fully upgrade the buffs takes what feels like a ridiculous amount of souls. Vitality alone cost me more than 1000 souls altogether. At this point, it is most certainly worth keeping in a permanent line-up.
Enemies come in a variety of shapes and sizes. Some of these creatures are what you might come to expect from a game involving magic. Others, however, are weird regardless of the title they’re seen in. One of the most ‘what the hell’ moments will always be when encountering the flying demon cow. A ranged attacker, this unit shoots milk at a high velocity, damaging the Crumbling it hits.
A few enemies might cause a laundry list of problems. There is a great deal of ‘minor’ minion characters, with some especially strong minions mixed in. One of the most frustrating to deal with is the poisonous cobra creature. Not only can this legless reptile strike physically, but it can also shoot out venom that lingers in the air. When facing multiple snakes, the venom hangs in the air for what feels like an eternity.
Lingering venom is annoying, sure. Proximity mines, I think, are far worse when it comes to danger and how annoying it can be. In the first world, floating cactus heads are one of a number of enemies. Like the cobra enemy, this one has an attack that lingers. Taking the appearance of cactus pears, these little bombs begin a countdown when a Crumbling approaches the object too closely. Just before it detonates, a sphere will appear, warning the player of the bomb’s blast range.
Dealing with the cactus heads isn’t too hard, provided there is a plan before engaging them. When enemies are few in number, a good strategy is purposely triggering the proximity mines. These units drop anywhere from 1 to four mines when a Crumbling gets a little too close. Some fights might see as many as five of these bastards spawning simultaneously. If your thoughts reading that last sentence are “that seems unfair,” it would be an understatement. With so many in number, there is almost nowhere to go when up to 15 proximity mines are deployed.
The overall look of the comic book shop is nice. It is reminiscent of many that are available to explore today. As the title’s only ‘real-world’ location, it is important to design the place with the proper aesthetic. With the Crumbling, there is some stuff you can do to ‘enhance’ their game in a way. Using the paint station, you can change the color of whichever figurine is in your possession at the time.
A 2.5D perspective makes sense for a title like Crumbling. Each world is presented as a diorama, giving you different environments in the same world. Some of these, at first glance, might seem a little cluttered. But after some time, it provides useful cover in more dangerous situations. Zooming, of course, is done by ‘dragging’ yourself using the bottom triggers and pulling outward.
The audio for the game is fantastic and probably my favorite part. While you take part in major events within the Crumbling story, a faceless narrator seemingly re-tells events from his perspective. It is always a treat to hear a pleasant voice narrating the goings-on in a given title. Each of the figurines has mostly the same sounds when exerting physical force. Their attacks and abilities, however, sound unique enough that they are never confused with one another. With the Shaman, though, there is a weird whistling noise every time the construct menu is summoned.
Crumbling does provide a decent adventure in the virtual reality space. Being able to activate buffs the figurines use is pretty cool, though some might feel useless compared to others. It has a very good, well-thought-out story, but my venture forth is motivated by progressing the story in the comic books. You could go without ever playing with the toys and their worlds. The story is written well, and with a proper narrator, it’s a wonderful way to experience what a comic book has to offer.
A few of the problems might be personal hang-ups. But some should be able to relate to the frustration of feeling like a legless zombie. Even when playing through one of the pocket dimensions/dioramas, I still had to drag myself around. Having to move like this in the comic book shop is fine. But within the confines of a pocket dimension, it can take focus away from the fighting going on. Despite the few issues and the frustration Crumbling can cause at times, I’d say the game is still worth a shot.
