Rumble Club is a new cartoon brawler from Lightfox Games, tossing players into hazard-filled arenas to partake in everything from classic deathmatches to cupcake-chomping competitions. Published by Mad Mushroom, a label owned by content creator group OTK, the game is focused on the kind of wide appeal and simple fun that could make the experience appealing to streamers and their audiences. There’s such a thing as too simple, however, and Rumble Club is definitely toeing that line.
A glance at Rumble Club reveals some unavoidable points of comparison, with Fall Guys in particular providing an obvious inspiration for the game’s aesthetic and flavor. A greater focus on ostensibly physics-based fighting invokes Gang Beasts and Party Animals, and although Super Smash Bros. and Mario Party both came up in Screen Rant’s interview about the game, Mario Kart battle modes feel like the more tangible Nintendo influence. Defining a title by its similarities to others isn’t necessarily ideal, but Rumble Club feels especially aware of the party game market and how to arrange a grab bag version of it.
If Rumble Club managed to pull together the best aspects of these games, it would be easy to ignore the lack of a unique identity, but the play experience frequently feels half-baked in a way that quickly loses its luster. On a macro level, the mayhem-focused approach does usually end up being fast-paced, but the player’s actual interactions with the game mostly feel sluggish. Rounds start with a slow descent from Rumble Club‘s equivalent of the Battle Bus, and this largely unnecessary sequence sets the pace for a lot of the mechanics.
Regardless of which game mode is being played, there’s usually going to be a lot of punching and lifting, neither of which offer any quick gratification. Although instant punches can be useful to throw around ledges, knocking players out when a fall death isn’t in sight requires long wind-ups. Picking up an item or a downed player is simply achieved by standing nearby for a few moments as a progress bar circles around to complete a loop. It’s all polished and feels fine, but it’s never exactly joyous.
There are a couple of obvious justifications for this game design — the slower pace of actions is easier to manage on a phone, and the vulnerabilities opened up by attempting to do virtually anything create opportunities for opponents to seize. The problem is that it’s just not all that exciting, and the lack of immediacy isn’t countered by anything interesting about the mechanics. Most games claiming to be physics-based have somewhat organic systems of interaction between players, but Rumble Club doesn’t delve much deeper than basic knockback.
It’s similarly difficult to get excited about most of the Rumble Club game modes, which offer very different prerogatives that don’t always feel different in moment-to-moment gameplay. The cupcake mode can be fun, focusing more on collection than fistfights, and Punch Royale offers a solid last-man-standing experience. The tile-based map design feels too one-note to elevate any of these experiences, even if a vibrant palette makes the monotony palatable.
At its worst, the chaotic element of the game devolves into a feeling of completely arbitrary gameplay. In Deathmatch, standing in a crowd near a ledge and flinging quick punches tends to rack up more points than actually putting effort into knocking players off. King of the Hill represents a nadir for player agency, as winning mostly comes down to getting lucky with the path between zones, and playing out the latter half of a match feels pointless if any unfortunate interruption occurs early on.
Gameplay is occasionally shaken up by laying hands on a gadget, and these power-ups usually make for a bit of extra fun. From a tank that fires boxing gloves to a transformation into a giant donut, the gadgets are consistently cute and fun. Extending their length of use is unfortunately tied to battle pass progress, which does at least reset each season.
Both the randomness and generally mindless involvement of Rumble Club make sense within its goals as a game that can work for streamer communities, and it generally seems to function well for this particular purpose. The biggest point of appeal is a stream queue system that can set up massive lobbies to cycle every game, and even queuing with a regular group of friends feels more frictionless than in most competitors. A free-to-play model supports the general ease of play, and setting aside the gadget issue, cosmetics seem simple enough to acquire without paying.
If there’s one big hitch in the casual element, it’s that keyboard control leaves a lot to be desired. For no clear reason, using WASD or arrow keys only offers stiff eight-directional movement, necessitating the use of a mouse movement system for any PC player that wants fluidity and doesn’t have a gamepad on hand. The latter option works reasonably well, but an update for proper keyboard options is desperately needed.
Rumble Club feels like a natural evolution of streamer-oriented games, with quick matches, inoffensive styling, and no real skill requirement. Everything that makes it go down easy has the side effect of making it uninteresting, sadly, and its lack of distinct appeal is compounded by a number of sticking points that become apparent all too quickly. There’s no reason that Rumble Club won’t work within its intended context, but for anyone seeking it out with the expectation of a memorable experience, there are far better places to look.
