A game inspired by Splatoon shouldn’t be this bland and boring

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SHOULD I PLAY COLORBANG?

It might be worth revisiting on full release, but definitely skip it for now. ColorBang offers nothing more than the opportunity to play a simplified, top-down version of Splatoon on mobile. While the game feels naturally fun to play for a short time, it doesn’t deliver anything unique, creative, or worthwhile enough to keep me interested in the long run.

TIME PLAYED

I played ColorBang for three hours. In that time, I’ve played over forty matches with each one lasting around three minutes. I’ve acquired two of the six available characters, but there’s only one game mode available right now, and it got boring quickly.

WHAT’S AWESOME ABOUT COLORBANG?

• It’s a mobile version of Splatoon. ColorBang is a near identical mobile copy of Splatoon with the only differences being it’s top-down, way more simple, and easy to access than the original. The general gameplay feels naturally thrilling and enjoyable, even though there’s only one game mode available at the moment.

• Server stability. Despite playing on the Philippines server from my location in Australia, I had no serious issues connecting to the network which was pretty great.

WHAT NEEDS IMPROVEMENT IN COLORBANG?

• It gets boring fast. There’s not much to do in ColorBang besides playing normal quick matches. The game only has one mode to enjoy during its closed beta test, and that’s about all there is to it. Hopefully when ColorBang is ready for full release, there’ll be more activities, modes, and events, because the current version desperately needs more excitement.

• Progression walls. I applaud the developer’s choice to make the current test version void of any microtransactions, allowing me to farm characters and cosmetics freely. However, I hate how slow that farming process is. Even after playing for three hours, I only managed to acquire two characters. I wanted to play some of the other characters, but the progression milestones were too high for me to reach them before I got bored.

• Promising concept, bland execution. ColorBang builds on the fundamental gameplay of Splatoon to create something pretty similar for mobile, but that’s the only appeal here. Even as a blatant copy, I’m not terribly frustrated that it’s unoriginal. I’m just annoyed that there’s no sense of creativity here at all. For a game with such a strong inspiration, it seems like the developers have settled for something that feels notably less engaging. ColorBang holds so much potential to become greater than what it is, but it’s going to need to embrace its own sense of creativity to get there.

PLATFORM TESTED

Android via Samsung Galaxy Ultra S22 5G phone.