There is really only so much you can do to make a sports game fresh. NFL Blitz took tackles to the extreme, and #IDARB recently opted to create an entirely new sport, which allowed for matches that could make enemies out of the best of friends. Reign Bros’ Stikbold! looks like the next game to enter the “weird sports” genre, delivering a wacky ’70s-themed take on dodgeball.
“Stikbold is actually the name of a Scandinavian folk game often played in schoolyards and at playgrounds,” says Reign Bros designer Martin Petersen in a post on the PlayStation Blog. “Like most folk games, Stikbold has a ton of variations and abbreviations, but is always a type of tag played by chugging balls after each other.”
The announcement trailer makes that clear immediately, with characters flying across the screen and even off the map as they get struck by rubber projectiles. I’m not sure I’ve ever seen a van used as a weapon in any game of dodgeball I’ve played, though.
While Stikbold! looks like it’ll be best played with a group of (soon-to-be-ex) friends, it will also include a story component. It will be playable cooperatively, and Petersen calls it a “selfless rescue mission to save the rival team and win back the championship trophy.” From the trailer, it appears that the final boss might be Satan himself, and we all know that he doesn’t mess around with his dodgeball.
With more and more AAA games ditching local multiplayer in favor of online play, Stikbold! looks like a great option for parties or, you know, when you decide to spend time with a friend in person. It’ll be hitting (no pun intended) the Xbox One, PS4, and PC in April. With #IDARB not yet out for PS4, it should finally scratch that itch.
