King Oddball

The layout is different on each level, but you’ll mostly be relying on luck rather than skill. Still, this has a weird moreish appeal to it, and it’s got our claws into us again. Obviously, this type of title is best suited to smartphones or handhelds, but it’s so easy to zone out with it that we can see ourselves returning to it a lot over the coming weeks. Odd, indeed.

King Oddball joins the increasing number of mobile titles making their way onto Switch; it is a competent, quirky yet basic puzzle game. It highlights the type of titles that the Switch can attract, for better or worse, and as cheap, whimsical fun, it will probably consume more time than you'd care to admit.It's not a bad game, but the hard to ignore mobile origins - and seeing what else is available and what the Switch can do - makes King Oddball a fun little distraction and nothing more. It's worth picking up if you have a yearning for a quick, simple palate cleanser, and whether you've previously become addicted to the projectile flinging / destruction puzzle genre, avian or not, there is nothing here that will change your mind either way.

Inexpensive and familiar physics puzzles with a quirky art style will grant any King Oddball player with a few short hours of mindless entertainment. The lack of any new content or utilisation of the DualSense controller means if you’ve already played this on the myriad platforms it’s already on, there’s no need to double dip. This one’s for those that have already completed all of the PS5 launch games and are scratching around for anything else to play.

King Oddball is a fun arcade release that is easy to pick that is worth your time on Nintendo Switch. There is more than enough content to justify its price point, with well over a 100 levels to complete and a good challenge that increases at a steady pace.

King Oddball readily entertains with its quirky demeanour, putting an entirely unexpected body part to work to unleash wanton destruction upon the world. It may have riffed on someone else’s concocted formula (and with less breadth at that) but, especially for those longing for an alternative to Angry Birds on Nintendo Switch, it’s hard not to come to appreciate the game’s warped nature.

While it will take some time to fully master, this physics-based puzzle title has quite a bit to enjoy with its many levels and varying degrees of challenge and extra modes.

If you can look past the missed opportunity that is the lack of motion controls, and the fairly simplistic gameplay, you'll probably find a title that is entertaining in short bursts. Don't expect it to light your world on fire, though.

King Oddball stands apart from its counterparts and that's an asset in a genre where there are too many games featuring unoriginal content. Thanks to its different modes and balanced difficulty curve, King Oddball is certain to be a good recommendation for short gaming sessions on the Nintendo Switch, even if it will not convince those who don't like the genre to open up.

The question will be whether you'll want to stick out the ride long enough to enjoy it all. That will ultimately come down to tastes, what you're looking for, and how you're planning to play the game. Using it to fill gaps in your day 15 minutes at a time would probably be great, playing for hours at a time probably not so much.

King Oddball is a quietly charming, explosive puzzler.