SpongeBob SquarePants: Battle for Bikini Bottom - Rehydrated Review

 

There's nothing like a good 3D platformer. If you were there for the birth of the genre, largely understood to be Super Mario 64, playing through one of these types of games is an extremely nostalgic, comfort food kind of experience. They're typically filled with beautiful and diverse environments and creative settings. Combine that with fun, intuitive platforming gameplay and a massive assortment of collectibles that send you around every nook and cranny of each level trying to find them all, and you have a solid, twenty-ish hour adventure across most games of this genre. Some 3D platformers are legitimately awful and not worth your precious time, but I find that more often than not, they're quite fun. I also grew up with SpongeBob and really have fond memories of that show, so when I got the chance to combine these loves and play Battle for Bikini Bottom, I just had a blast.

 

Battle for Bikini Bottom originally came out in 2003 for GameCube, PlayStation 2 and Xbox, as well as having bespoke versions for Game Boy Advance and PC. It was a beloved, cult classic of a game back then, and then the console version was remade in 2020 as SpongeBob SquarePants: Battle for Bikini Bottom - Rehydrated. This remake was immediately a sales success, which led to a quickly developed spiritual sequel: SpongeBob SquarePants: The Cosmic Shake. The remake is largely the same game, albeit with a beautiful fresh coat of paint on it. It also included a new multiplayer horde mode, as well as some content that was cut from the original release in 2003.

 

 

The gameplay of Battle for Bikini Bottom might be its weakest aspect. Even in the remake, it just feels a bit janky and floaty. You can play as SpongeBob, Patrick and Sandy, each with slight variations in the way they play. The platforming feels imprecise and you often have to make jumps that don't feel like your character can reach it, unless you're playing Sandy, who can glide further distances. The combat also feels pretty sloppy and unsatisfying. I don't go into these kind of games expecting great, dynamic combat, but given that you're pretty regularly having to fight various types of enemies, it's a frequent frustration. SpongeBob has a pretty terrible ranged attack, where he blows a bubble bowling ball and can toss it at an enemy, but the wind-up takes so long and it feels so awkward and inelegant to execute that I really didn't like using it unless I had to. Sandy on the other hand, can auto-lock onto an enemy, toss her lasso and cinch the enemy for an instant kill. I swear she's like the easy mode character for the game, she's just not available in every instance. Also on the topic of combat, the boss fights were far and few between, and they were all really simple and incredibly easy to proceed through.

 

 

The various regions and locales that you explore through the course of the story are the highlight of the game for me. Many of the awesome areas featured in the SpongeBob cartoon make an appearance. Rock Bottom is a full zone that you can explore, and it's every bit as weird and quirky as it was in the show. There's a really cool region called the Kelp Forest that's like a camp ground with a massive swamp surrounding it. The Flying Dutchman also makes an appearance in his spooky domain, which I was kind of unimpressed with. I love the occasional macabre-themed SpongeBob episodes, where they feature fish skeletons, ghosts, graveyards, Halloween, etc. This zone just didn't really live up to those kinds of examples we've had from the franchise in the past. There was just a ghostly green hue to the entire region, but it didn't feel haunted or spooky at all. There was also an interesting set of missions set at Sand Mountain, where you slide down a range of massive hills, avoid obstacles and try to collect things, as you essentially snowboard. I say essentially, because technically SpongeBob is "boarding" on his tongue. Rehydrated's graphics are genuinely gorgeous and I can't believe how great all of these various regions and locations look. It felt so authentic to the show's aesthetic. I will say, this game's graphics and locations made me really want to see a big, open world SpongeBob game with these areas more fleshed out and explorable on a deeper level.

 

The story is pretty bare bones. Somewhat predictably, the overall villain of the story is Plankton, who built a massive armor of robots to steal the Krabby Patty Secret Formula. This premise feels exactly like something from the show. The issue though, is that the robots go rogue and don't obey him, quickly taking control of Bikini Bottom and causing widespread mayhem across the town and its surrounding regions. This is a perfect, simple concept for a story for this kind of a game. It feels authentic for SpongeBob and gives a reason for you to venture around Bikini Bottom and vanquish the robots and help the townsfolk that you encounter.

 

 Ultimately, I think Battle for Bikini Bottom - Rehydrated is a solid experience. It's a little long for me, and there's some very annoying progress hindrance where they want you to revisit stages in order to move the story forward and collect more Golden Spatulas (this game's equivalent of Gold Stars/Shine Sprites/Power Moons from Mario games.) If you enjoy exploring this world though, it might not be frustrating to you to have go and complete more missions and see more of the game. It's a fun, lighthearted jaunt of a gaming experience, and I think if you can find it on a sale, you'll be in for a good time, especially if you're an established fan of the franchise.

 

VERDICT: Recommended