Game:Â Crayola Scoot
System:Â Nintendo Switch
Developer:Â Climax StudiosÂ
Publisher:Â Outright Games
Age Rating:Â E
Price: £34.99|€39,99|$39.99|AUS$ 59,95
Release Date:Â 16th October 2018 (Europe and US, 26th October Australia)
( also available on XBox One, PS4 and PC)
Review code kindly provided by Outright Games
Crayola Scoot has local split screen co-op for up to four players and no online. It supports dual joy-con and pro controller, and the split-screen can be played in tabletop mode.
Get Your Cray-On
Crayola Scoot starts you off making your own character with a few customisation options before putting you into the tutorial. Here you’ll learn the controls, and about how to spread paint around. As this is a Crayola game, the scooters release paint after you boost, grind, or do tricks. Boosting is tied to a boost bar which you can refill faster by riding over your own colour. Your position in a game also determines how fast it refills, if you’re in first place it will take longer. There are also colour triggers you can boost or trick over to spread more paint. Three triggers on each map have “wonders” which when all three are your colour do different things like drop a lot of paint on the park.
From then on you will travel across three worlds with four stages each, competing in various events. All in the name of earning the coveted Crayola Cup. You earn points from trying or completing events on easy, normal or hard difficulty. Obviously the higher difficulties and success give you more points. There are also three medals you can earn, listed at the start of a game such as, least crashes, longest grind and so on.
Each time you level up you will receive a challenge from the next person on the leader board. After which you will earn new clothes and scooter parts to customise your appearance and stats.
Stacking It
It takes a little bit of time to get used to the controls, as tricks are done with both the left and right stick while in the air. If you press straight forward when going up a quarter pipe you’ll ride on top instead of getting air. While more complicated tricks will take some time (after the tutorial you can practice them in an anti-gravity area) it wasn’t hard for my little sister to pick up.
From previews I saw it looked a little janky. In the full version it’s a lot more common to stack it either from not landing combos, tripping over something or going too fast into a wall. There are still points in the game when I land on an angle not possible in real life but for the most part it’s far more accurate.
S-C-O-O-T and Colour Frenzy
The worlds aren’t set in a linear path as you have to reach a certain rank to unlock more events for each world. The game mode the other characters challenge you to is S-C-O-O-T. In which they set a trick combo you have to beat. If you can’t beat someone’s combo you get a letter added to ‘scoot’ if that happens five times you lose. If they fail, then it’s your turn to set the combo. For the first two characters it seemed like they weren’t even trying, but after them I had to become even more familiar with the game to beat Katya and beyond.
One of the other six game modes is colour frenzy. Wherein six players compete to cover the park in their paint. Riding in another player’s colour slows you down. Doing big tricks, and activating the triggers is very important. You can also paint over another person’s paint as you would any other spot. Team colour frenzy is the same but it’s a three versus three game, with only two different colours.
Splat Tag, Crazy Crayons and Trick Run
Splat Tag, is the kind of tag where each person that has been caught stays it. So if you’re it you have to directly scoot into another player. In single player you might have to avoid being tagged an entire round, or start off as the tagger. As with any other mode, the opposing player’s colour slows you down. Making avoiding the tagger’s bright green trail important. I found the avoiding being tagged more stressful than possession mode in Doom (2016) and in this game I can’t shoot the scooters! If you are the tagger you can still fail the event even if everyone is caught, as you must get the most points. So then not only do you have to win but also you must tag more opponents than your CPU teammates.
Crazy Crayons is a type of race mode. Crayons will spawn in a few different places each park and you have to be the first person to collect five.
Trick Run is the mode wherein all players are around the park at the same time trying to get the biggest score in the time limit. The more complicated combos you can pull off the higher numbers you can add to your score.
Arcade Mode and Cruise
Arcade mode is where you can get access to the splitscreen multiplayer. Although you can play it by yourself. It also allows you to play as the much cooler characters such as Katya the Witch Cat and Dillon the Crocodile. On a switch profile you can save up to five characters which each have their own game progress but can be played with on Arcade mode.
Any of the games modes can be played here, and you can adjust the COMs levels, numbers or remove them entirely. Arcade mode has a different progression to the main game. So you can play parks you mightn’t have unlocked in the single player by playing enough arcade mode.
It also comes with Cruise mode, wherein it’s a no time limit free-play on any stages unlocked in Arcade. This is something younger players that aren’t interested in competing against CPUs may like.
Overall
My little sister had a blast playing Crayola Scoot just in the tutorial and practice area. She very much enjoyed “killing herself” due to the ragdoll-esque crash animations. I imagine she’ll try the main mode soon as she wants to dress up her character.
I’m a little disappointed that we can only make human characters when the other characters are a lot cooler. Crayola Scoot has plenty of stages and game modes. I do wish there were a lot more tricks, as there’s only about ten different ones in this game. It’s perhaps not the best option for adults wanting a wheel sports game. Having the split screen option makes it a great game for families, especially those who aren’t yet interested in paying to play online games. It’s definitely a good kid’s game and will provide them with some challenge, if they feel like taking it on. I like Crayola Scoot.