Just Shapes & Beats is elegant in its simplicity and altogether remarkable in how it brings its intertwined music and aesthetics together to create something demanding, but rewarding, and ultimately unique. Just Shapes & Beats is a challenging blast by yourself, but to really see where the joy of the game is found, it’s best experienced with others. Playing on the Switch is great because it lets you use individual Joy-Cons to play locally, as well as join others online. Players can revive one another during hectic segments, and in a way staggering each other’s lives becomes a strategic act. While playing solo is a punishing and occasionally even frustrating experience, playing with others cooperatively alleviates some challenge and feels like the way the game is ultimately meant to be played. It’s certainly playable without hearing the accompanying music, but even if the soundtrack wasn’t already a stellar and eclectic snapshot of modern EDM, it’s depriving yourself of something that was clearly meant to be experienced in tandem with something else.īut while Just Shapes & Beats can be played alone, and has a cute, simple story mode for you to unlock new music and levels on, I easily had the most fun playing the game with a group of friends to bask in the chaos alongside me. This perfect marriage of each song and the ever-changing obstacle course that would spawn feels lovingly crafted, and made me revisit even the hardest levels just to hear a track I loved and really wrap my head around how each instrument or melody was captured on screen. The thing I found most impressive about Just Shapes & Beats is how well it managed to bring together the audio and video to create something that requires a sense of musicality to fully grasp. I was glad to be playing on the Switch because it made getting into and playing bite sized bits of the game simple, and made getting out and away when I found myself fuming at a challenging level equally simple. It’s a punishing, tough as nails experience alone and one that, in order to progress, I had to learn and memorize not only the way a level would unfold, but how each song would develop and change in each level.
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