Review: Antonblast

2024 was another large game year with enough to keep everyone busy for the foreseeable future. Yet despite the constant decision paralysis, the eight hours I spent with the deranged, demolition-happy Dynamite Anton and his associate Annie in Antonblast I had the most fun playing games all year.

Since Summitsphere Buckwild’s platformer was first announced, I was I’m getting ready to play the spiritual successor to some lost Wario Game Boy Advance game. However, I was not prepared to play on the Sega Genesis. This is exactly it; has a very specific character and I say this with love, funk to the fact that you can only get it from the Genesis or Sega CD library. Perhaps in some alternate universe, Antonblast was released in the mid-1990s on both the Sega Genesis and Super Nintendo, with the latter version playing a bit brighter and with some difficult edges. Maybe with less burps, screams and vulgar statements.

Our gruff title character is on a mission to retrieve the coveted spirits from Satan, who wants Anton for himself so he can become the reddest person in the world. Anton and Annie – playable from the start – set out to stop Satan, with the lend a hand of a beleaguered casino owner named Brulo. To do this, they’ll have to go through 12 stages, find Anton’s ghosts, set Brulo’s detonators on fire, and get out of there before the whole damn level explodes.

Despite different aesthetics, Antonblast wears its Wario inspirations thunderous and proud. Jumping on specific pads allows him to jump in and out of the foreground with ease. Anton can also charge in a similar fashion, paving the way for momentum-based platforming that is especially useful at the end of each stage. Once Anton sets off the detonator, it’s HAPPY HOUR and he has a few brief (but relatively generous) minutes to return from whence he came in the most explosive fashion possible. These escapes are often the most hard and thrilling sections. One sec Antonblast is rife with checkpoints throughout the main stages, you’ll likely still try to escape success multiple times.

Everything swallowed with Earth Wario the series is strengthened by an order of magnitude. And by the way, there is always room for more like this. Bricks, garbage cans, and discarded bathtubs crack and shatter as Anton crashes through them, and the screen freezes for a split second each time to raise the force of the impact. Enemies standing in your way fly out of the screen with a cartoonish whoosh – one of dozens of Saturday Morning sound effects that make the game Antonblast feel like a spoonful of cereal sprinkled with sugar injected straight into your veins. Even as the credits rolled, I never tired of Anton’s exuberant screams or the sound of him sounding like a bomb falling from a B-52 as he dives from incredible heights.

All stages are spread out in a tiny area, complete with shops that stock exorbitantly priced health upgrades, some single-use items, and other unnecessary trinkets. Antona will eventually be able to afford most of them, given the way she tends to accumulate casino chips on her path of destruction. All you really need is maybe one extra heart to lend a hand deal with the damage, especially in the increasingly hard boss battles that dot the hub.

The bosses are truly a delight. They all have their own absurd tricks, and none of them feel like a retread, even if you end up facing off against more than one mole picked up. You can see that they paid a lot of attention to them, from the first fight in the ring to the multi-stage final battle with Satan. It’s Jim’s Earthworm Treasure. You’ll likely die and try multiple times to figure out the best strategy against each enemy, but luckily longer fights have checkpoints before each novel form. It’s one of those little pieces of grace that they keep Antonblast from sliding from fun to frustrating.

With tight controls and a set of moves that are thrilling to master, pushing Anton through all these challenges is a lot of fun. There are some areas that require more precise platforming, but most problems can literally be solved by repeatedly poking your head into them. The overwhelming graphics perfectly suit this style of game. It never feels like Antonblast is overacting because nothing else would make sense. When Anton or Annie turns into a pinball player or goes off on a rocket swordfish – two of the many stage tricks that fail to tarnish their welcome – the cacophony of screams and the resulting violent environmental eruptions feel appropriate.

All this madness combined with a perfect soundtrack from top to bottom created a peppery atmosphere that opened my eyes more than once. Ultimately, this is what impresses me most about Antonblast. It is such a tightly realized vision that it is impossible not to appreciate and respect it. The energy level is absolutely amazing. There are undoubtedly a few frustrations to be found, and some of the saltier, fully voiced dialogue may keep you from showing it to younger family members; none of this should stop you.

Everyone should play Antonblast at least once, but good luck. There are still ghosts left to collect and soon I will be able to ride this roller coaster again. Now take part in speedruns; it will be… I won’t say it, but you understand.