Joe Danger Review - Chasing The Dragon Till 4 AM

Years ago I owned Sonic the Hedgehog, and like some of Hello Games developers I played it obsessively – immersing myself in the fast paced platform fun for endless hours in an attempt to beat my personal all time speed record for the first stage. I got this down pretty tight and for all I know I was the fastest in the world.

“Sonic, on a motorbike with multipliers.”

This was before the time online play could disprove such myths, so I really couldn’t check but I like to believe that my time was pretty fast. This combined with my inherent competitive streak, meant that I’d simply rinse and repeat the first level with the aim of shaving a millisecond off here or there and combining a multitude of moves in perfect sequence to score a little better as the hours passed. In retrospect this may have some connection to my lack of social skills, and overdeveloped reactions for such a young brain. Now okay – this was my own sonic mini game I played with myself and isn’t even the point of the game particularly; however it does hold masses of comparison with Joe Danger in its addictiveness for competitive score hungry people.

You see I have played Joe Danger for a good ten hours prior to writing this review, however potentially seven of them have been spent on level 1. In my vain attempt to be the best of the best I have been replaying the first chapters repeatedly to try and achieve the best scores possible. I have a number of scores in the top 500 in the world; however have decided to concede as I really can’t improve upon that for now without revisiting an unhealthy pastime I’ve tried to steer clear off. Time will tell If have what it takes, although I’m guessing I don’t.

So what is Joe Danger? and why have I spent ages on it without actually progressing particularly?

You take control of Joe; a biker stuntman on his comeback tour after a prior stunt went wrong and resulted in your injury. You will control you bouncy stunt bike and flip, dash and bounce your way to the highest stunt combo’s across a number of varied and deviously designed tracks that involves shark tanks and school buses.

Joe begins each level by haring off towards a series of course setups that find him hitting ramps at top speed and pulling a number of poses mid air for big point’s ala SSX and the Tony Hawks skateboarding games. Perfectly releasing the pose just in time for a slick landing with only help to top up your multiplier and stunts must be varied in order to keep the points rolling in. Crash once and your scores are reduced to diddly squat.

Don’t fear, if like me you are a crash-aholic and clearly should never drive an actual motorbike, because unlike in life - there is a magical reset button that allows you pick up your mangled body and revives you like Bruce Willis in Unbreakable to start all over again unscathed.

As rudimentary as it seems, part of the beauty of this title is the ability to restart each level in under a second, which means that the draw of the select button is just too strong to allow you to go to bed or in fact have any semblance of a life when chasing the dragon just one more time.

Please note the game does not feature actual dragons, this however seems a fair comparison as high scores are gamer heroin ...so there.

So what about value? Well at £9.99 in the PSN store, JD actually represents excellent value. The ability to create levels and share them with your friends and the chance to compare your level high scores with your friends list mean that you’re going to spend a good number of hours wasting your life on this cute little ‘stunt-em-up’ platformer.

What screams at you whilst playing JD is the fact that you can feel that it’s been built with 1000 percent perspiration and another 500% percent love (maths not being my strong point) The dev’s clearly have played their own game to death and have made an experience that ticks so many gamer boxes like some of the best and most addictive games do. Ok it’s not the pong of it generation but you’re not going to feel ripped off by the production standards in the least. The vibrant colours and creative design within the game holds bags of charm and will call to you as you navigate yet another dark and dreary landscape in your favourite FPS.

“Come and play Joe Danger...when you die there its still fun. ...Come on...Come and play in the pretty colours and jump the shark whilst pulling the ‘Blue Steel’ pose move tilting your hat to Zoolander...Do it. You could be the best in the world and all it takes is just 45 seconds of unadulterated genius...you can impress your friends and perhaps win some new ones with your innate stunty skills...”

Well Okay that example of my brain monologue got a little weird but the point is clear. Joe Danger is addictive. It’s fun and it’s the gaming equivalent of colouring in whilst paying no attention to the edges.

It’s just straight up more fun than the majority of games in the store. With his devil may care attitude Joe Danger is the puppy your convinced you don’t want, that’ll cause you more trouble than it’s worth but you love it because it’s mischievous and keeps you young. Essentially it’s my dog, Zen.

I hope that helps.

The developers debriefed us and they acknowledge that Joe Danger pays homage to some great games as Excitebike, however it’s totally respectful in how it emulates. It’s like making a really lovely meal from ingredients found in other food. No-one has a right to complain but we all like to feel clever by telling the chef that it’s reminiscent of a wine poached salmon with black truffles.

When you’re stunting it up through the levels there are a series of other challenges you can try your hand at. Completing in under a time limit, collecting all the stars like sonic would and collecting the letters to spell DANGER as in Tony Hawk. Combining all the sub challenges with insane moves mean super high scores and some very smug youtubers.

Two player split screen is available and this means you could drag your friends into the insanity. This is a true pass the pad over a beer game and I can imagine it already has the beginnings of a cult following. The style feels very Nintendo for all the right reasons, visually vibrant and aurally slick, without the sickly oriental vibe that makes you sick in your mouth on occasion, combined with an ongoing good humour and sense of self, Hello Games may have already hit a winning formula as they lose their development cherry.

Graphically Joe is lush. For a straight up platformer, the level design is decidedly wicked and the colours and textures ring of experienced development. The sandbox level creator is just as much fun as the game and will bring out your devilish side too. Hello Games have certainly opened their doors with an impressive debut and one I can’t but help recommend to you. Clearly a developer with a lot to offer, I for one can’t wait to see what’s next from the developers funky coloured pixels and will cross my fingers it’s made with just as much love and wonder what they’ll do with the extra funds they’ll undoubtedly earn from this stellar pick up and play production .