Tonight We Riot

Developed by Pixel Pushers Union 512, Tonight We Riot is an unapologetically political title where you play as a group - a movement - of people looking to fight for what’s right. As you progress, more workers will be inspired to join your cause as you liberate their factories, and the more man-power you’ve got behind you, the better.

The pixel art style of TWR is gorgeous, filled with a surprising amount of detail and depth. Levels are varied, starting out in Factory Town before moving on through a Bayou, Dockyards and more before finally reaching the Bowling Green Estates, a fancy, upper-class neighbourhood. Character designs are simple with little red bandanas covering the lower half of your squads’ faces, making them easily differentiated from the enemies.

There’s plenty of humour within Tonight We Riot, and that is well appreciated, particularly in games with quite serious political undertones. It also helps to lighten the mood somewhat when you’re raging out, as the game sure does know how to be punishing at times. Making sure to have as big of a group as you can at all times is important, as things are significantly harder with fewer numbers. Having a larger crew also helps to prolong your game, as you only take control of a ‘leader’ of the group at any one time, with the ability to guide your troops to attack, but upon death you will switch to another of your group until there’s nobody left.

It’s not overly difficult to get to grips with the controls for TWR - there’s a single button to attack and you switch from one character to the next automatically upon death. The part that makes it difficult is trying to keep as many of your group alive as you can. Staying alert to dangers throughout the levels and picking enemies off with a strategic approach is going to work out far better for you than running in guns blazing - after all, the end scores are based on how many survivors make it to the end of each level. So slow and steady might just win the race after all.

Priced at £13.50 on the Switch eShop, it’s a little bit expensive in my eyes. I had fun, but at just a couple of hours in length, it left me wanting more - particularly at that price. I’d love to see more get added in future, but if not - I’d recommend you wait for a sale to pick this one up.

In the end, we decided to give Tonight We Riot the Collecting Asylum rating of 7/10.

Have you played Tonight We Riot yet? What did you think of it?
Let us know in the comments below!

- V x

Thank you to Means Interactive for the Tonight We Riot Nintendo Switch review code!