• the_nmac
• On February 26, 2020

Break the truce that two warring planets made after stitched together what remained of their planets… to return to your family. Check our Spirit Roots review!

Spirit Roots Nintendo Switch Promo

Go on a fun and family-friendly platformer adventure in 5 fantastic worlds, and discover the touching story of their population.

Your destination is on the outskirts of the stellar system, where a hundred years conflict created a unique situation: the small remaining parts of the two fighting planets had to be stitched together to create a surviving larger one. Welcome to the Stitched-Together Planet!

Both populations agreed on one condition that should never be broken: nobody can cross the border that separates them. But what exactly happens if someone breaks the rule? That’s what you will find out!

Run, jump, fight, avoid traps, collect coins and beat bosses in this fun and family-friendly platformer adventure. In each of the 5 worlds you will discover new challenges and enemies and evolve in unique and fantastic sceneries.

What exactly can you expect with Spirit Roots:

– Wonders and variety. 50 levels in 5 worlds with their own atmospheres, enemies, mechanics and music;

– Platformer gameplay. Run, jump, collect items and fight mean creatures on the way;

– Epic boss battles. Farmer robots? Huge spiders? Flying skulls? Mud monsters? We’ve packed it all into our game!

Spirit Roots is an old school 2D platformer that has been ported from mobile and brought to the Nintendo Switch. Considering its origins, I was pleasantly surprised and impressed by the look of the game. When I started to play Spirit Roots, it gave me a feel of an almost Ubisoft art style, and the game continued to deliver great looking graphics in the many worlds I explored.

The story of the game is about a boy who is forced to break a truce. Two planets were at war with each other forever ago, unfortunately, the war was bringing both planets close to not being able to survive. They ended up stitching the planets together, with one rule. No one from one side of the planet is allowed to go to the other side of the planet. Your character wants to see what happens on the other side though and you’ll explore what is going on as you get further into the story.

Spirit Roots is a mishmash of other 2D platformers you have seen over the years. There are 5 areas of the planet to explore each with 10 different levels and a cool boss fight. In the levels, you can slash with your sword, fire a gun and jump around the level. There are collectible spirits all over the world and it will keep track of how many you collected as you will want to get them all, as they unlock the other worlds. Each of the different worlds has a unique art style that really sets them apart from the game. Right now you must be thinking this sounds a lot like all of the other 2D platformers I’ve played. You are right, it takes a lot of inspiration from other titles, while not finding what makes it special.

There is nothing special in terms of jumping around the level you get three hearts, but they are not hearts in what you would normally expect. Each of the hearts represents life and when you are hit you are booted back to the last checkpoint. Lose all three hearts and you need to start the level from scratch. I guess this would be fine, but the checkpointing isn’t done well in the game. They are few and far between leaving large areas to recover from if you take one hit from an enemy. Honestly, this system feels very antiquated, when most modern 2D platformers have not only figured out you don’t need lives, but made checkpointing a much better system overall, making platformers challenging, but not frustrating which is how felt during Spirit Roots.

At the end of each level, it will award you stars based on spirit collection, defeating all of the enemies and just completing the level. This gives some replayability to the levels making you want to return and get the three stars, but honestly with the issues above with the checkpointing and lives it didn’t really endure me to the game to return for 100% completion.

I do think the boss fights were off the wall and fun, really some of my favorite parts of the game. They kept me engaged and honestly I think the best-designed thing in the game as each felt unique and different requiring different skills to get through it.

I praised the visuals in the opening and I’ll do that again. For a game that has been ported over from Android, the visuals are significantly better that they should be. The game has hints of Rayman and shows why I miss the Ubi-art imprint of games. Every character, enemy, world looks hand-drawn creating this beautiful design. I was really impressed by this.

Final Thoughts

Overall Spirit Roots is a mixed bag. While the game looks great and has a unique story, I struggle with everything else that seems so mundane in the action, platforming, and collecting. Take into account the unforgiving and bad checkpointing and lives situation and this creates a struggle to recommend the game.

Disclaimer
This Spirit Roots review is based on a Switch copy provided by