God of Rock

God of Rock is one of those games that are pretty straightforward with the formula they push. What if you combine a rhythm game's frenetic pacing and a fighting game's stylish visuals? You get a game that focuses on multiplayer action with some awful flaws regarding the execution.

Easy to pick up and hard to master, God of Rock has to be one of the most engaging games to come out so far this year.

When I first saw that announcement for God of Rock, I thought “yea, this makes total sense!”. Decisive buttons combos from the likes of rhythm games in a fighting game skin, sounds like the perfect blending of genres. I knew right away that this was a game I definitely had to experience, even though I am not typically a huge fan of fighting games.

God of Rock is a unique rhythm game experience that offers a lot in the way of gameplay options and content. Online and crossplay are also present alongside a custom notetrack maker for songs that easy to use. And even if I like the idea and the aesthetics, I felt that the game doesn’t really know whether to focus on being a fighter or a rhythm game and I ultimately left the game with middling feelings.

Creating something innovative is a massive gamble, and God of Rock is trying to achieve something like that, but it sadly falls short. Some strange design decisions and a gameplay style that doesn’t really excel at any of the genres make this one an honorable but ultimately lacking effort – this isn’t quite the new challenger we were hoping for.

It seems like God of Rock would be better enjoyed on other platforms due to its controller input bias and some game crashes on PC. Issues with the game’s PC performance aside, its character designs can feel derivative and uninspired. Many of the strange backstory cutscenes for each character come off as half-baked and don’t add much to the overall experience as well. Not to mention, there’s a serious lack of accessibility features such as being able to increase the size of the grid in order to see the notes better.

God of Rock has a great premise but struggles to make fighters and rhythm games play nicely together

While we can appreciate what Modus Studios was aiming for with God of Rock, we struggle to recommend it to anyone but the most ardent of music rhythm or fighting game fans. It’s a unique concept that sounds like it should work, but ultimately it’s neither fun as a music rhythm game or entertaining as a fighting game.