The game has a few barriers and bugs preventing it from being seen as normally solid as we're used to with the previous Godzilla games. The game is not fully released so putting that aside, the game's plenty of fun depending on your perception and how much you personally would weigh down the alpha game based on its issues.
Monster targeting seems to be inactive when an attack is performed, so in many instances when I'm exchanging with the AI, I'll end up attacking past him and we'll be swinging at the air. What I personally believe needs the most work is many of the hitstun and knockdown collisions decisions. For example certain moves don't visually affect the opponent or cause hitstun which can look unnatural. Gameplay-wise, cases of this as well as some instances of awkward hit detection (missing an enemy with an attack you thought should have hit them) are probably the biggest downfalls from my assumption. Oh, as well as the ducking and grappling, but those are simply yet to be fully implemented. Well, you're able to duck, but from my experience it didn't protect me from damage caused by any attack type aside from the high attacks it avoided.
However, this game redeems in many ways. The animations and attacks look awesome. The gameplay around this as mentioned previously may cause some situations to look odd, but the animations and concepts for the attacks aren't to blame at all, and deserve some praise. This game even improves on certain mistakes from previous Godzilla fighters. For example, in Godzilla: Save the Earth, Anguirus had an attack where he threw himself in the air, hit the opponent with his spikes, then landed on the ground to roll around and be able to use a recovery attack. In CKC, Komododon has a move which causes him to throw himself in the air and land on the ground, but this does NOT chain into a recovery attack. Resulting in a much less awkward chain. On the topic of improvments, this game has, in my opinion, the best speed featured from any of the Godzilla fighters (this is not a "Godzilla fighter" but for the sake of comparison with the team's past experience). The matches are faster than ever, but not to the point where I simply dominated my casual gamer friend. The faster pace makes the game MUCH more considerable when the topic of competitive depth is brought up. At it's current state? No, as some key features have yet to be fully implemented, and the gameplay mechanics have pretty significant flaws, but with polish combined with the vision of balance patches being released, CKC could host great, interesting competition within its playerbase!
The music is also something that CKC hits just right. In some cases, Godzilla: Unleashed felt too heavy on the metal instrument vibe. But CKC hits the perfect mix of rock and orchestra. The menu theme is something I feel like I'll probably get stuck in my head soon enough. I say that in the best way possible, it's nothing irritating or too stand-out, but it's the best vibe they could have gone with for the game and it sounds great!
Sound effects are hit or miss so far, as in the sounds themselves are great, but the context some sounds are used in seem wrong. Smashing a grounded enemy with a big slam sounds as crunchy and satisfying as a good 2D beat-em up. Some attacks visually look big, but the sound to match is anti-climatic. I shouldn't complain, though. This is something I'm almost certain is being looked into and can be fixed easily. But for the most part, the sound effects are pretty solid.
The visual effects need work. Obviously the team's aware of the big visual effect issues, mainly the laser beam hitting an opponent, yet the beam still travels past them. And also the fact that the beam sometimes doesn't seem like it's pointing right at the opponent. But on the topic of beams, CKC introduces new beam attacks. When pushing the top face button with a direction up/down, the kaiju shoots a laser in a fixed pattern without costing any of your energy. I think this addition is great! And it's a nice compliment to the fact that fights in CKC are less beam-footsies than in Godzilla: Save the Earth.
There's one arena in this build, but it looks nice and serves its purpose. I especially like the "Monster Attack Team" logo in the background. Only real complaint is the foreground obstructions when fighting in the corners.
Overall, for me personally, it was certainly worth my 5 dollars for this. I think gameplay should be priority and it needs some fixes, but I'm definitely still spending plenty of time playing the game and enjoying it. I'm very passionate about the game and its future, so it's up to you to decide whether or not you'd feel the same way about this build. Thanks for reading!
