Castle Crashers

Castle Crashers is a side-scrolling beat-em-up involving knights who need to retrieve a stolen gem and many princesses for their king. Using a hand-drawn style as seen in Alien Hominid, players can initially choose from four different knights with separate fighting styles, along with the alien from Alien Hominid. Other characters (20 in total) are later unlocked or discovered through the course of the game. Although the game can be played by a single player, up to four player can fight together on the same screen in the cooperative game modes, both offline and online. Some elements in the levels can only be activated or interacted with by specific characters.

Starting with basic moves, defeating enemies fills up an experience meter (up to 99 levels) that provides skill points. These can be attributed to strength, magic, defence and agility and consequently unlock a large amount of new moves and combos. Basic movement includes jumping, a light and a strong attack, blocking and magic. While playing, there are 40 different weapons to collect (included ranged ones such as a bow), each with different attributes. Only one can be wielded at a time, but all discovered weapons are stored at a blacksmith. The different levels are shown on a map where the player can move around and revisit locations. Some are locked until the player is strong enough. There are also shopping areas where life potions can be stocked, along with new weapons. Characters can also move around on mounts such as lizards, when they are captured.

Another element is the animal orbs. They become available through the game and acts as companions that assist the player, through attacks, defence or special abilities such as digging up hidden items in the levels. As in all games by The Behemoth, there is a focus on wacky humour in the game design and animations. When playing together with other players, after defeating a boss the knights need to fight each other to win the princess' kiss.

Next to the main game there are also arena fights against increasingly difficult waves of enemies and the All You Can Quaff mini-game where players button-mash to eat as quickly as possible. Through the different playing styles of the characters, there is plenty of replayability.