Grapple Dogs: Cosmic Canines PC Review
Summary: Grapple Dogs: Cosmic Canines is a charming romp though a bright and colourful world that makes fantastic use of its mechanics in order to fully engage the player.
4.3
Awesome!
It feels like we’re entering something of a new golden age of platformers at the moment. In the past twelve months alone, we’ve had Super Mario Wonder, Penny’s Big Breakaway, and Astro Bot. Three games that are shining examples of the genre and what can be accomplished.
Grapple Dogs: Cosmic Canines, the sequel to 2022’s Grapple Dog by Medallion Games fully embraces its platforming roots and adds a few twists to the formula to make things interesting.
As the name might suggest, this second game adds a second character to the proceedings. The protagonist of the original game, Pablo, is now aided by the mysterious Luna as they travel through many different worlds, on their journey to save the universe.
Each of the two characters has access to the titular grapple ability, which is used effectively throughout the campaign to traverse the level and find secret areas. Using the grapple maintains and can increase momentum by a significant amount. It’s incredibly satisfying to chain together jumps, grapples, and dashes to whizz through a level at speed. Even more so on repeat playthroughs once the player is more familiar with the stage. The devs clearly took this into account, as once beaten, each level has a time attack mode.
Aside from the grapple, each character behaves slightly different to one another. Pablo is a close combat specialist, punching his way through enemies and rolling into a ball to ground-pound foes and the environment alike. Luna, on the other hand, specialises in ranged combat and is equipped with a gun. The right stick moves a reticule around, which thankfully also snaps to nearby enemies to make dispatching them easier while moving around.
Along with their unique combat styles, both protagonists have some unique abilities that come into play throughout the game. Luna has access to different weapons across various stages. These are often used to fulfill certain conditions within a level to continue. For example, in the second world, she gets access to a rifle that also changes dirt blocks, into grassy ones, with the grass being climbable if it’s against a wall.
Progression throughout the campaign takes the form of Mario-style worlds, each with its own mini-world map. Each stage in a world has three items to find, and collecting these unlocks new places to go. Scattered amongst the regular levels are challenge maps. Most of them are short-time attacks, collectathons, or platforming challenges to be completed in a set time. Every map has dozens of collectibles to find, mostly taking the form of fruit that acts as a currency to be used in the shop, where alternate costumes, grappling hooks, and character upgrades can be purchased.
Each world ends with a boss encounter, with each having a gimmick that utilises some ability or concept from the gameplay, rather than being a straightforward hit-until-it-dies affair.
The visual side of Grapple Dogs: Cosmic Canines is that of a highly colourful, 2D platformer. Sprites are chunky and often have a thick outline to help them stand out from the background and myriad effects that are going off at any one time. It’s very easy on the eye and a pleasure to look at. It isn’t without flaws, however. Despite this being a 2D game that should run well on pretty much anything, it seems to have frame pacing issues on occasion. The framerate itself never once dropped below 60, but it occasionally felt like it was stuttering thanks to this. It seemed to affect some stages more than others and was by no means a deal-breaker, but it was very noticeable at times.
Audio is another highlight, with the soundtrack ranging from pretty good to outstanding in places. Music is memorable and effects are punchy and cut through the mix well. There’s essentially no voice acting to speak of, with all characters sounding as if they were auditioning for Banjo Kazooie, but this works and feels like it fits in with the world perfectly.
Final Thoughts
Grapple Dogs: Cosmic Canines is my favourite kind of game to review, not because of the specific genre, or any individual component that makes it up, but purely because it’s so unabashedly fun. It’s a wonderful experience from start to finish that everyone should play.
Aside from the occasional frame pacing issue (which strangely didn’t seem to manifest on Steam Deck), it was a flawless experience, at a budget price, that is easy to recommend to anyone. This one is definitely worth your time.
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