It’s surprising that LBX: Little Battlers eXperience doesn’t have more buzz surrounding
it.
Here’s a game that’s developed by Level-5, published by Nintendo, and features tiny robots
fighting each other with a ton of customization available to players.
Yet, few people seem to care and that’s likely because of the way the game was introduced
to American audiences.
It’s been billed as a tie-in game to a kid’s anime that ran on Nickelodeon despite the
fact that the game came years before that anime.
Many people have written it off as something just for kids.
But while kids will absolutely find a lot to like about LBX, older players shouldn’t
immediately write it off either.
The story of LBX takes place decades in the future where a new toy called an LBX has become
a massive hit amongst kids.
It’s actually a sophisticated robot that can be customized in countless ways and battled
with each other.
However, these toys are dangerous and led to injuries before a special battle arena
was developed that could absorb the damage.
It’s in this setting that a young boy named Van, who dreams of becoming an LBX champion,
comes into possession of a special model.
From there he and his friends must protect this model while stopping the world-conquering
plans of a group called the New Dawn Raisers.
It all seems tailor-made for kids, which it is, but I was continually impressed by how
often they made the admittedly silly events work.
These are dangerous robots when used in the open so it somehow becomes plausible that
defeating a bad guy’s LBX makes them run away.
After all, you have a literal weapon to threaten them with.
And the plot gets so crazy that I found myself enjoying it and curious how it was going to
top itself.
The second chapter of the game focuses on the kids stopping an assassination of the
Prime Minister.
It’s hard not to enjoy something as insane as that when the characters take all of this
so seriously.
And it helps that the gameplay is there to back it up.
Each LBX has five parts that can be interchanged, the head, the torso, both arms, and the legs,
and can equip two different weapons that can be swapped between during battle.
There are a lot of different parts and even higher quality parts of existing ones.
Players can mix and match to their heart’s content and each part does feel like it causes
a real change in the LBX’s performance.
It really depends on your playstyle.
There are parts that have better defense at a sacrifice to speed due to its heavier weight.
But even then, you can mix lighter parts with heavier parts since speed is determined by
an overall class.
As long as you don’t drop a heavier class, you can use the heavier parts for better defense.
Weapons also have plenty of variety and are broken up into several types, each with their
own style.
But LBX goes a step further with a rock/paper/scissors take on damage types.
Each kind of weapon is classified by the type of damage it does, slashing, piercing, or
blasting.
But even the same type of weapon could do different kinds of damage.
So players are actively encouraged to look at their opponent’s loadout and customize
their LBX accordingly.
This is made even simpler by allowing up to 30 different loadouts that can easily be switched
between.
The actual fighting in LBX is relatively simple.
You can run around in the arena, use objects as cover and employ either long-range or close-range
fighting depending on the situation.
Battles are often short, rarely going longer than a minute though some of the harder fights
will easily double that.
Each action taken during battle feels purposeful thanks to several systems.
A Tension gauge drains with every action but refills quickly when guarding or just moving
around.
If it’s emptied, all of the LBX’s attacks will be incredibly weak so players can’t
just go all out in a fight.
Items can be equipped and used at any time and range from the typical healing, buffing,
and offensive types.
Special attacks can be used as well though a special meter must be filled first, which
is done through normal fighting.
There’s plenty more to how the fighting works, with new options appearing in each
chapter.
While the shortness of most battles can make it feel a bit repetitious, more involved fights
were engaging and fun.
The game was at its best when I felt like each action I took made a real difference.
But fighting can become addictive since almost everything can be leveled up.
Every part of the LBX levels with experience with the armor becoming better, granting increased
stats, the weapons gaining new special attacks, and Van and his friends gaining levels in
order to expand the LBX cores.
The cores can be customized so that the LBX is better with certain weapons, has more health,
or even has access to more special attacks at any one time.
The level of customization and personalization really is astounding, which is a good thing
since the entire game is based around that concept.
Different battle rules help keep things fresh, but the only thing that players can do outside
of battles is taking on Quests.
These quests can range from finding lost items, giving items from your inventory, or having
a special battle.
They don’t do much but they are a good way to earn more money and rare parts.
If you can get into the battle system, there is a ton of content in LBX.
I can’t even list it all here, but suffice to say, it’s a very meaty game.
And that’s just single player.
Multiplayer options are available but only locally.
Unfortunately there’s no online which means I didn’t get to test it out myself.
However, if you do have friends to play with locally, you can participate in battles with
up to five others for three on three battles.
Even if it’s only with one other person, you can do three on three fights with AI taking
over the extra units.
There’s also a cooperative mode where you can work together through a series of 100
increasingly difficult fights in order to unlock even rarer LBX parts.
Graphically, it’s obvious that this is an older 3DS game since it was released in 2012
in Japan.
But its style is good enough that I never really minded.
It has a clean look and each character is distinct.
Even the LBX designs are great with some taking some pretty clear inspiration from classic
giant robot animes.
Battles are fast with no hint of slowdown and each area is surprisingly detailed.
However, there is one thing that sold me on the look of this game.
Battles are not limited to themed arenas.
Sometimes, fights can take place outside of those such as on coffee tables, in air vents,
and even against a giant construction vehicle.
As I said before, it’s so crazy a concept that I couldn’t help but be endeared by
it.
And there is quite a bit of voice acting and animated cutscenes to help flesh out the story.
The voice acting is about on par with your typical children’s anime dub, but none of
them ever annoyed me.
If anything, it helped sell that I was taking part in this show.
And the music is great with some real variety to the themes ranging from more ominous pieces
to hard rocking battle anthems to pleasant everyday life songs.
LBX might not be on many people’s radar, but it shouldn’t be discounted.
If you’re a fan of customization and robot fighting, it might be the game for you.
I was surprised how much I genuinely enjoyed it.
Outside of the customization options, it doesn’t do anything incredibly special, but I liked
it for what it was.
I can see myself continuing to play it just to see what it does next.
Thanks for watching and be sure to stay tuned to GameXplain for more on LBX and other things
gaming.