River City Girls (PS5)

Does the name River City ring a bell? If it does, you’re likely familiar with River City Ransom, an old Beat ‘em Up/Brawler game from the NES days. For others, however, River City, the localized name for the Kunio-kun franchise, wouldn’t mean much due to the rather niche awareness of the series for the longest time. That would change, however, with River City Girls, a 2019 Beat ‘em Up co-developed by WayForward and Arc System Works that brought more mainstream attention to the River City series. So much so that a related 1994 Super Famicom game, Shin Nekketsu Kōha: Kunio-tachi no Banka, would finally receive an English localization under the name River City Girls Zero in 2022.

Since I had no familiarity with the River City games, however, I didn’t have any interest in River City Girls at first, but wondered if I had missed out on something when I saw enough praise. Because I prefer physical discs, I patiently waited for a Limited Run “Blowout Sale” that included the PS4 PAX cover variant and snagged a copy. Even after I got the game, however, it took the announcement of a sequel and River City Girls Zero to finally see if I actually liked it before investing further. For the most part, I actually enjoyed the game (via the free PS5 upgrade) and feel more comfortable with playing more of the series, or at least the Girls portion. However, some design and writing quirks nearly stopped me.

While in detention, highschoolers Misako and Kyoko receive a text informing them that their boyfriends, Kunio and Riki, were kidnapped. The girls spring into action and go on a rampage through River City in search of their boyfriends, beating up anyone who gets in their way.

In spite of such a simple premise, River City Girls has an engaging story that easily grabs your attention and keeps you increasingly invested in Misako and Kyoko’s quest. What helps is the colorful cast of unique characters that all have only just enough depth for the sake of the story, but leave a very strong impression during the brief time you spend with them. Aside from the artwork shown during exchanges of dialogue, the game also delivers some story through manga-style cutscenes, usually filling in the backstory of a boss before you fight them.

You certainly won't forget Godai anytime soon.

Much like in traditional 2D brawlers, players must fight through waves of enemies before they can continue to the next area. While Misako and Kyoko both have unique moves and playstyles that tie into their own interests, they can both pick up and use or throw weapons and items placed within the environment. Though the game doesn’t explain this mechanic, players can also juggle enemies for continuous damage, but thrown weapons can still inflict damage on the player if they get hit. Characters gain EXP from defeating enemies, which lets them gradually level up to a cap of 30, as well as money that they can spend at different shops for various healing items and Accessories. Money is also useful for learning new moves, including Specials, at the Dojo.

What sets River City Girls apart from a game like Scott Pilgrim, however, is that the world is designed with an interconnected map like a Metroidvania, a genre WayForward develops for the most part. This means there’s some amount of backtracking and running around the map completing various tasks, though each area is mercifully small enough that it usually doesn’t take too long to get from Point A to Point B. Due to the overall size of the map, Fast Travel is an option, though only between bus stops. One character, Godai, will occasionally ask Misako and Kyoko to complete multiple side quests for him, which each grant additional rewards like money and EXP (the Pepper Spray Accessory even increases the rewards received from Godai). Within the world, players can find 25 statues that will award a special bonus when they’re all destroyed, but some are pretty well-hidden. Additionally, the combat has the flavor of an Arc System Works fighting game, which makes it accessible and fairly easy to grasp, but doesn’t completely remove the challenge, even on Normal difficulty. Mastering the combat system is important for the bosses, which all have unique patterns and attack methods.

The bosses all feel unique.

When the player buys healing items from shops, they can either consume them on the spot or save them for later, but only as much room as their inventory allows. In an interesting twist on the formula, nearly every healing item provides a permanent stat boost the first time they’re used, which encourages buying everything at least once. Though players can’t use healing items on each other during Co-op, they can revive one another when they go down by attacking their body. The surviving player must be quick, however, since they only have until the downed player’s angel reaches the top of the screen before they suffer a game over and all the penalties that come with it (more on that later).

River City Girls also introduces a new mechanic, the Recruit system. At the end of a wave of enemies, the last enemy standing might beg for mercy. If they do and you grab them, you can press a button to recruit them and summon them to help you out in combat. Each recruit has a different ability, so players can experiment until they find the ideal recruit for them. Potential recruits also have their own set of variations, though these are simply palette swaps and exist solely for a “collect them all” motivation from the game.

In a nice bit of narrative design, pausing the game brings up a smartphone, with the phone’s design reflecting each character’s personality. No matter the design, the phone offers the same useful functions apart from adjusting the settings or quitting to the menu. The Map screen keeps track of the player’s general location within each part of River City and their current Quest progress. On the Moves screen, you can view the moves you’ve unlocked through the Dojo. Accessories lets the player equip up to two Accessories to their character, each granting various specific effects such as dealing slightly more damage to male/female enemies or slowing down the other player’s ghost during Co-op. Recruits take up their own screen, though it’s meant more for tracking what variants you’ve recruited. The final screen, Character, is where you consume saved healing items and view your character’s stats: EXP, ST (Stamina), AT (Attack), WP (Weapon), SP (Special), AG (Agility) and LK (Luck).

The smartphone comes in very handy.

Visually, River City Girls features a very attractive art style that lends itself well to not just the cutscenes and well-animated boss introductions, but also the modernized retro throwback aesthetic during gameplay. More impressive, however, is how every character feels different not only in their animation-friendly appearance, but also their animations. The manga-style cutscenes also fit the vaguely Japanese setting, though they noticeably read left-to-right rather than the traditional right-to-left seen in actual manga.

Megan McDuffee’s soundtrack, simply put, is straight fire. While not every track will stick with the player, there’s plenty of variety while also maintaining a sense of unity in its tonal aesthetic. The contributions on some tracks from Chipzel and Dale North enhance the game’s old-school flavor while NateWantsToBattle helps provide great opening and ending tracks. Speaking of YouTubers, there were some that I recognized among the voice cast, including ProZD, Jacksepticeye and Arin Hanson and Dan Avidan from Game Grumps. Players may also notice that some audio also comes out of the controller speaker for added immersion, though it’s a little loud and for some reason only comes out of Player One’s speaker during Co-op.

Although River City Girls is made really well, there are some questionable design choices that hold it back a little from true greatness. The first is that you can’t see what items actually do until you buy them, which wouldn’t be a big deal if shops also didn’t stock multiple items that have the exact same effect, differentiated only by their price. Saving up can also be a hassle at lower levels, since you lose half of your money on death (or if a player changes screens without reviving their partner during Co-op). Since you may have to fight early bosses multiple times to get their pattern down, this penalty feels extra punishing, since it’s also before you have regular access to food or healing items and you may not even notice how much money you’re losing if you’re not paying attention. The only way to avoid this penalty is to quit the application when you fall and before the game autosaves.

Why give three items at three price points the same effect?

Speaking of bosses, each time you fight one, you have to go through multiple cutscenes. This isn’t so bad the first time, but if you’re retrying after death, the Skip option only skips one cutscene at a time, so you’ll be holding the Skip button up to four times. While the variety in the actual boss fights helps them feel fresh, Hibari almost feels out of place, since the design skews closer to the Shantae series in presentation.

Difficulty can also be an issue at times, even on Normal. While the learning curve isn’t too bad once you get past the first or second boss, enemies scale with your progress, so it can feel like you’re doing the same amount of damage at LV 30 as at LV 1. I also found at least one move from the Dojo difficult to execute thanks to the button combination registering a different unintended move instead.

What can really sour the experience, however, is the Normal ending. After everything Misako and Kyoko go through, the twist at the very end of the game renders the entire exercise pointless. There is a Secret ending obtained by beating the Secret boss (itself unlocked by entering the final boss room with two specific Accessories equipped), but this ending originally led to the same outcome, just with an additional meta joke about Shin Nekketsu Kōha: Kunio-tachi no Banka that was supposed to magically make it funny. Fortunately, the game received a 1.1 patch (included with the PS5 release) that fixes the Secret ending so that it has a much more satisfying conclusion.

Whether you’re familiar with the River City franchise or are just getting into 2D brawlers, River City Girls offers a pretty good time with engaging combat and solid writing. Its shortcomings may understandably stop some people from continuing forward, but it’s mostly smooth sailing if you can get past the early barriers.