Rhythm Heaven Groove review

In all likelihood, the last big release for the original Nintendo Switch, Rhythm Heaven Groove is the latest entry in the long-running Rhythm Heaven series. Boasting over 100 minigames to test your rhythm timing skills with, Groove manages to be an insatiable pick-up-and-play experience, perfectly ideal for short burst game sessions. If Groove is truly Nintendo Switch’s swansong, then it  sends the Switch shucking and jiving out in style.

Before getting stuck into the cluster of modes and options featured in Groove, you can select whether you want a chirpy A.I.-sounding companion to guide and read text for you. You might be familiar with the voice, as this synthesized assistant mirrors the quirky character sounds in Tomodachi Life. Although you can read and follow along with everything by yourself, it is pleasant and within the game’s spirit to keep this companion with you because she’s almost like a host as you get to grips with each individual minigame.

Most of your time will be spent in Solo mode as you clear eight stages, each containing four minigames and a unique remix challenge that throws together all four of the preceding games you learned into a rhythm game sequence. Once you’ve completed one minigame, you unlock the next one and keep proceeding in this way until the stage is complete. These minigames scale up in difficulty in a progressive fashion, so you’ll be challenged in a fair and refreshingly accessible way, where learning and timing supersede repetition and frustration. 

As for the minigames themselves, they’re an eclectic bunch full of whimsy and liveliness. Each of them are memorable and distinctive from each other in a gloriously fervent way. One minigame gets you chopping veggies in time to the beat, another has you bouncing apples and melons along the muscle contours of a gym enthusiast, and another engages you in rhythmic synchronized dancing. These examples obviously don’t cover the sheer amount of diversity on offer with each minigame, but the variety and the steady incline of challenge will keep you busy.

While every minigame has you tapping face or directional buttons in time to the beat, they vary in terms of context. For instance, several minigames include three CPU facsimiles, who you need to copy move-for-move with exact timing. This can be very tricky, and you may find yourself colliding with your cohort. One of these minigames includes a group of dancers, who include an elbow movement in their routine. You don’t wanna be bashing your buddies with elbows to the mush, but considering you are a learner, you’ll struggle with the choreography at first.

The great thing about Groove is that the game does everything it can to teach you the timing of each challenge. You can click the Y button on your Switch controller to watch an example of how to perform rhythmic actions, and you can replay these as many times as you like until you start to get the timing down for yourself.

Sometimes a helpful on-screen prompt will be on hand to assist you, like a frog who nods its head to guide your accuracy when swinging a huge hammer to crush cans on a conveyor belt, or a puppy who’ll jump up when it’s time to catch a frisbee thrown by your owner. These auxiliary forms of assistance are excellent for your ability to execute a precise and consistent rhythm, and it’s hard to know how far you’ll get without them. 

The remix challenges are tough to nail down, so your best chance of overcoming them is to keep practicing each individual minigame until you’re confident enough you can manage the constant switches between them during a remix. Thankfully, you’ll only need to interact momentarily with abridged segments of each minigame, but the back and forth between different controls for the different minigames is tough. 

At the end of each stage you’re graded on your performance, not in a traditional A, B, C, D, F format, but in a straightforward way telling you to keep trying if you haven’t got the basics down yet, a good or a really good if your rhythmic skills are impressive. This system tends to work really well, but sometimes you’ll be convinced that you’ve done enough, but if the game doesn’t think so,  then you’ll be forced to try again. No matter what though, Groove does a tremendous job of reflecting the “practice makes perfect” idiom.  

Perhaps an argument can be made that Groove demands preciseness too stubbornly, in a way that might turn off players if the game isn’t satisfied that you’ve learned enough to proceed onwards. However, it can be surprising and rewarding to struggle persistently at first, just to eventually nail the rhythm and pass triumphantly. Groove ain’t no Souls game, but it is very satisfying to see struggle turn into strength, and the game’s teaching methods do a great job of boosting your rhythmic skills.

Co-operative gameplay keeps the fun rolling with 30 minigames, adding teamwork to the timing-based rhythm action experience. These games are made for joyful couch co-op play, and they pile on the wacky and weird just like the single player minigames do. Fancy plucking hairs off an onion with a face on it, or sprinting against each other whilst dressed as professional wrestlers? Well then, you’ll find yourself right at home in Groove’s two-player suite. 

Then if all that single player and couch co-operative multiplayer isn’t enough for you, there’s the RPG Beatspell to indulge in as well. Beatspell is a turn-based RPG with a rhythm-action twist, where you time button presses to doll out magic spells that’ll damage and destroy the nefarious monsters you come up against. You can swap out magic abilities and upgrade them too, and honestly this entire mode could be its own spin-off game because it’s both addictive and outstanding. 

The Toy Box is another addition that packs in toys and casual activities without the pressure and stress that comes with the other game modes. Two stand-out games here are Who’s Got Rhythm? Where rabbits compete by clapping their ears to the rhythm as persistently as possible until one of them can’t keep up anymore. Bouncy Pufferfish, meanwhile, has you play as a tennis racquet trying to bounce pufferfish on it until the momentum is strong enough for the pufferfish to land inside a water tank. Take note that the pufferfish’s size changes with the tempo of the music, so you need to adjust your timing to keep it aloft. 

There are a cavalcade of options in Groove that it’s surprising how moreish it is and how much content can be stuffed into what outwardly looks like a straightforward rhythm-action title. You could say Groove is a deceptive title because there’s no way you could possibly predict how much substance lies beneath its surface. 

You might be sad that Rhythm Heaven Groove is the last big Nintendo Switch game, but just like the system itself, it’s full of surprises and quirks that’ll likely catch you off guard. Groove might appear to be a tough and demanding cookie on the surface with its emphasis on precision timing, but the way the game teaches and rewards you for playing are boundless, and it’s a breezy pick up and play game with a treasure trove of extras that’ll keep you wanting and craving more of it. Yeah you’ll need dedication and will incur bouts of frustration, but with all that’s stuffed into it-you’ll keep on coming back for more.