Jet Set Knights Review (PlayStation 4)

by Jim Smale · October 7, 2020

Jet Set Knights

Jet Set Knights is an old-school arcade action platformer inspired by classics from the golden age such as Mario Bros, Snow Bros, or the newest Super Crate Box. If You love retro 2D platformers mixed with tower defense and RPG elements, Jet Set Knight is for You!

Pros:

Pixel art graphics.
112.5mb download size.
Platinum trophy.
3 difficulties-easy, medium, and hard.
Scanlines- on/off.
Four initial characters-Jarvis, Hisgarus, Arthurus, and Lanslet.
Map level select.
Daily login bonus.
Tower defense gameplay.
Gameplays out on a screen full of platforms and you must build defenses to protect your Princess from the enemies.
Loot/materials will spawn randomly in the level.
Wave based attacks from enemies.
Upbeat creepy Chiptune like soundtrack.
Power-ups and temporary new weapon pickups.
Quests given by the Princess grant rewards.
Loot Goblin like enemy randomly spawns and every hit drops gold.
Earn EXP, level up, and put a point into stats like speed/health/damage and critical chance.
Unlock a new character.
Fast-paced combat and gameplay.
Multiplayer-2 player survival and 2-4 player battles mode.
Help button.
Mini games-Bug raiders, Skull Breaker, and Chicken walk.
Retro atmosphere.
Artifact o Matic machine-use gold to try and win artifacts.
Artifacts grant a buff or boost, you can only equip one at a time.

Jet Set Knights

Cons:

No tutorials.
Small levels.
No online leaderboards.
Offline multiplayer only.
The help button is just the controls.
No real story and all feels aimless.
You have to unlock the mini-games.
Very busy so it’s hard to see things like health.

Jet Set Knights

7/10

Graphics - 7/10
7/10

Sound - 7/10
6/10

Accessibility - 6/10
7/10

Length - 7/10
8/10

Fun Factor - 8/10

7/10

Summary

Jet Set Knights is a game that has a lot going for it but you have to put the work in. With no actual tutorials, it took a short while to grasp what my goal was and what the gameplay loop was, I got there eventually and fun was had but it has many caveats. Your goal is to defend the Princess from waves of enemies by killing them or building defenses that can do it for you. You collect materials from random drops and navigate the platforms to open chests and collect coins, every 100 coins give you a token for the mini games. It all plays fine but the platform is not as good as it could be as not all levels allow you jump up and down platforms from anywhere on the platform, the combat is kinda one-note. It’s a slow-paced build up that eventually explodes into a frantic fight but with this, the screen gets so busy it’s hard to see what’s what especially in health knowledge. I don’t like how random the material drops areas this dictates how good your run will be, the unlocks are so slow and I suspect this is because there are not many of them. Overall Jet Set Knights is a good idea and fun can be had but you need to put a lot of work into it.