JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: All Star Battle R review (PS5)

Close to a decade after the game launched on the PS3, JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure is getting the remaster treatment on today’s consoles and PCs with JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: All Star Battle R. It’s out for all major systems – we playtested the PlayStation 5 version.

When I first played JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure on the PS3, I was completely unaware of the anime/manga series that inspired it – or the many earlier video games that came before it, going back to the SNES days. And while I’m not a massive manga/anime fan, I’ve since dipped into the source material a bit, and as a result I appreciate this new remaster a lot more than I did original game.

Part of it is the obvious inclusion of fan service, with a lot of characters, events and references that have been lifted straight from the source material – with a wealth of content that should delight even the most hardcore fans of the IP. It’s easy to pass over when you’re just here for the fighting mechanics as well, so background knowledge isn’t a requirement here.

Fighting game fans will marvel at the game’s impressive 51-character roster, putting it right up there with the likes Tekken 7 AFTER all of its season packs and DLCs were launched. It’s hard to mark any of these characters as filler content as well, as they genuinely feel like a very diverse cast of fighters – which is where a ton of fan service meets an excellent foundation for a fighting game.

From that last perspective this isn’t just an easy IP tie-in with a generic gameplay style either. What’s on offer here is actually very involved, with the usual special and super moves as well as cancels, assists and even side stepping. Of course you can connect an arcade controller and mash away, but take the time to learn the controls and you’ll find this to be a very complex and rewarding fighter.

The game’s also been given an audiovisual overhaul to support today’s higher resolutions and also to include brand new voiceovers. The online component of the game feels like it was left untouched though, and suffers from serious performance issues that really stand out in 2022. Hopefully these can be fixed with a post-release update for JoJo fans who want to take their battles online, which right now isn’t too exciting a prospect because of the associates issues.

JoJo’s Bizarre Adventure: All Star Battle R is a great homage to the source material, and thanks to a huge roster and intricate combat mechanics it stood the test of time very well. If you’re only interested in the single player/local modes, you can add at least half a point to the score below, maybe more.

Score: 7.5/10