Let's Talk About SpongeBob SquarePants Battle for Bikini Bottom Rehydrated

SpongeBob SquarePants is one of the greatest cartoon success stories of all time. While one could argue that Nickelodeon have made better cartoons before or since, no one can deny that SpongeBob is their biggest hit and has had the largest impact. Almost overnight SpongeBob became as recognisable as Mickey Mouse or Bugs Bunny becoming the face of Nickelodeon for multiple generations of kids. I should know, I was there when SpongeBob first debuted and I loved it back then. Hell I still love it now, those first three seasons are some of the funniest shit I've ever seen and I still quote it often even today. Hey you wanna hear a joke, 24. Want to hear a better joke, 25. HA HA!

Being the big hit that it was, SpongeBob SquarePants naturally found itself adorned on various merchandise including the prerequisite videogame tie-ins. There were quite a few SpongeBob games released back then some were pretty bad but some were actually alright. I played two back in the day, Lights, Camera, Pants which was a pretty fun party game and the SpongeBob movie tie-in game which I really enjoyed. What I didn't know at the time was that the movie game was actually a reworking of a previous game, Battle for Bikini Bottom. I always wanted to play that one but never got around to it. A few years later I find people talking about Battle for Bikini Bottom with fond reverence, some even calling it one of the greatest 3D platformers ever made. Seems the game's gained a bit of a cult following, especially within the speed-running community, so much so THQ Nordic, the ressurected version of the original games publisher THQ, has seen fit to deliver a remaster in the form of Battle for Bikini Bottom Rehydrated. So now I can see what I've been missing out on all this time.

Battle for Bikini Bottom begins with SpongeBob and Patrick playing with their toy robots. Wanting real robots to play with they use Patrick's magic wishing shell to wish for some. Meanwhile, Plankton is cooking up another scheme to get the Krabby Patty secret formula by using an army of robot duplicates. Unfortunately he forgot to switch the robot duplicator machine to obey so the robots go on a rampage across Bikini Bottom. When SpongeBob wakes up the next morning and see's the havok the robots are causing, he thinks they're the robots he wished for and thus sets out to clean up the mess. The plot isn't too far off from something you'd see on the show, just with a bigger scale to match the fact that it's a videogame. What I like about Battle for Bikini Bottom is how well it manages to get the shows humour down, well the first three seasons anyway. While I wouldn't say it's as funny as the show it definitely nails the style of humour the show is known for and there were some genuine laughs that I got out of it. You can tell the original developers were fans of SpongeBob because a lot of care went into the writing.

Same goes for the presentation but I do have some complaints. On the whole though it's not bad. Visually speaking it's fantastic, while I don't have any nostalgia for the original and therefore can't comment too much on the changes and improvements I will say that, based on the comparisons I've seen that Rehydrated is a lot brighter and more colourful and the cutscenes are also more expressive. Even the cutscenes where you're talking to NPC's are more expressive despite the game using a lot of recycled animation loops. It's a game from the early 2000's, there's only so much you can do when remastering it. I even like some of the new background details and idle animations that reference recent episodes of the show. However, while I like how this game looks, it's performance could have been a lot better. For the most part it keeps at a steady 30fps but I did notice it drop on occasion, The Flying Dutchman's Graveyard was especially bad because it felt like the framerate was lower in that level than the rest of the game. It's not unplayable but it's still baffling. Then there's the texture pop-in. I don't mind texture pop-in too much but in Battle for Bikini Battom Rehydrated it happened everytime I entered a new area and this is after the game had been patched to supposedly fix this.

Audio wise the game is fine. While this may come across as heresy to some, I only found the music to be just ok. It's not bad by any means but it's not the best soundtrack I've heard. It definitely has a Spongebob feel to it I'll grant it that but it's also a little repetitive. The voice acting is also pretty good with the cast of the show reprising their roles with two notable exceptions being Ernest Borgnine and Clancy Brown as Mermaidman and Mr Krabs respectively. Sadly the guy they got to replace them both didn't do a very good job with Mr Krabs sounding like a discount birthday party pirate. This was the same in the original release, because Rehydrated basically just re-used the audio recordings from the original. Maybe they didn't have time to do new voice recordings? Even the music is the same. There was also a weird audio bug where the sound effects for the Sponge Bowl move would cut out when charged for too long. I can't call the presentation bad by any means because it really isn't but it definitely suffers from a lack of polish. I won't hold that against the developer because it's clear that they are talented and put a lot of care into this but lacked the budget and time needed to make it as good as it could have been.

Alright, time to dig into the meat of the game, the gameplay. Battle of Bikini Bottom Rehydrated is a collectathon 3D platformer where the goal of each stage to to scour each level for hidden collectables which unlock more levels to play in. The main collectables are the Golden Spatula's which are rewarded for doing a variety of missions in each stage. The other collectables are Patricks Lost Socks which can be traded in for more Golden Spatula's and Shiny Objects which can unlock side areas and challenges or can be traded to Mr Krabs for more Golden Spatula's. It might seam odd that the Lost Socks and Shiny Objects lead to the same place but this helps keep things focused. I've played a lot of collectathons and many of them have collectables that felt unecessary so it's nice that Battle for Bikini Bottom gives each of them a purpose. There is one more collectable that can only be found in the hub world in the form of the golden underwear that give you an extra hit so be sure to look out for them.

Battle for Bikini Bottom begins with SpongeBob and Patrick playing with their toy robots. Wanting real robots to play with they use Patrick's magic wishing shell to wish for some. Meanwhile, Plankton is cooking up another scheme to get the Krabby Patty secret formula by using an army of robot duplicates. Unfortunately he forgot to switch the robot duplicator machine to obey so the robots go on a rampage across Bikini Bottom. When SpongeBob wakes up the next morning and see's the havoc the robots are causing, he thinks they're the robots he wished for and thus sets out to clean up the mess. The plot isn't too far off from something you'd see on the show, just with a bigger scale to match the fact that it's a videogame. What I like about Battle for Bikini Bottom is how well it manages to get the shows humour down, well the first three seasons anyway. While I wouldn't say it's as funny as the show it definitely nails the style of humour the show is known for and there were some genuine laughs that I got out of it. You can tell the original developers were fans of SpongeBob because a lot of care went into the writing.because the levels are designed in such a way that there are bus stops in areas where swapping between characters is needed and you only have access to certain character in each level. While SpongeBob is playable throughout the game, Patrick and Sandy are only available in levels that require their specific abilities, keeping the level design focused without devolving into needless excess.

Which leads us to the levels themselves. There are two different extremes when it comes to level designs in 3D platformers. On one side you have the linear platform challenge heavy design as exemplified by Crash Bandicoot Super Mario 3D World and on the other you have the open world level design where you're dropped into a level and allowed to run around and do chalenges in any order you want as seen in Banjo Kazooie and Super Mario Odyssey. Battle for Bikini Bottom sits somewhere in the middle of the two. The levels are structured in a linear fashion with each having a goal to reach by traveling through linear platforming challenges but they also allow for more open areas with optional side challenges for additional callectables. Some levels even feature missions that require you to collect a certain number of objects and return them to an NPC for a Golden Spatula. It sounds like a weird mish mash but it surprisingly works. Because the levels have a linear structure to them they never feel bloated but they're open just enough to reward those who like to explore.

The level design is solid but that's only one half of what makes a good platformer. The other half is control and Battle for Battle Bottom performs itself admirably in this regard. Now if you're expecting it to be as tight or to offer as much acrobtic freedom as contemporary platformers like Super Mario Oddyssey, this ain't it chief. The move sets in this game are more rigid than most 3D platformers, outside of Sandy there isn't much to experiment with here. That's not to say it controls badly because it doesn't. Control is responsive and while the jumping is floaty it's also not floaty enough that platforming becomes too frustrating aside from jumping on tiny platforms which some will find annoying. My only issue with the controls is how tight the steering is when going down slides. It's nothing you can't get used to but later slide sections have very tight turns that are easy to overshoot. But really that's the only complaint I have with the controls.

So we've got good level design, a fun cast of characters and decent controls. On the surface Battle for Bikini Bottom appears to be a solid 3D collectathon platformer, because it is a solid 3D collectathon platformer. Collectathons beyond anything else need to make the act of collecting fun and rewarding and Battle for Bikini Bottom nails this. You don't just get handed this collectibles, except for one instance which is played for a joke, you do have to work for these things. Batttle for Bikini Bottom isn't a difficult game, it's pretty easy overall, but it's just challenging enough to be engaging while being forgiving enough that kids can get into it. Battle for Bikini Bottom is a good little 3D collectathon, but I do not agree that this is one of the all time greats. This game is fun but it has a lot of flaws.

Firstly, this game is jank. Now I don't know if this was the case in the original or if this is a problem with the Rehydrated version but the physics in this game are all over the place. It's hard to describe but there were instances where the game never felt like it worked right. Take the swinging for example. It works fine enough but it's not as tight as the swinging in, say, Ratchet and Clank for example. It was fun but it never felt quite right to me. There's also this one ball pushing puzzle in the Mermalair that's a nightmare because of how bad the ball physics are. Then there's the knock back. Every time an enemy hits you, you get sent flying back and sometimes this can lead to an unfair death. It doesn't happen too often but the enemy placement in this game can really screw you over. The game also had some bizarre glitches. At one point during the Mermalair level, a platform requiring the Sponge Bowl wouldn't activate so I killed myself to reset it, only to spawn at the end of the area. The hell? The game also crashed on me once. I said it before but it deserves repeating, this game could have used a lot more polish.

Combat is also rather shallow. I know that complaining about the combat in a 3D collectathon platformer is pointless because it's not the main focus but Battle for Bikini Bottom has a pretty healthy veriety of enemies each with their own methods for needing to take them down. Credit where it's due for trying to add more depth to combat but since most ecnemies take one hit to kill it doesn't add much. Honestly I found the stronger enemies more annoying to fight than fun. Luckily the boss fights are great and do a good job of testing all of your abilities. The game uses the three characters abilities effectively throughout the game. Even the abilities you unlock later on don't go wasted which I like to see, but because you have to unlock certain abilities that also means backtracking to certain levels. The funny thing is, I'm not compaining about the backtracking here because there's too much of it but because there's so little of it I wonder why they bothered. Only 2 levels require backtracking to get collectables and only one of those is a Golden Spatula, the others are Lost Socks. If you took the two Lost Socks that requiire backtracking in Jellyfish fields and put them in other levels and reworked that Golden Spatula slightly you wouldn't need to backtrack at all. Even if you're not as thorough as me and you do need to backtrack to get things you've missed, the game does have a fast travel system that let's you warp to any challenges you've missed at any point. That's a nice touch.

There's also the issue that plagues most 3D platformers in the form of inconsistent challenges but I won't hold that against it because, well it's just something you expect from a game like this. Some challenges just aren't that fun but, on the bright side, you don't need to do them all just to gett to the end. Of the 100 Golden Spatula's in the game only 75 are required to beat it so if there's a challenge you don't like you can skip it. You'll get more than enough playing through the game normally so don't worry about it. Then there's Kelp Forest, easily the worst level in the game. It's better than the original because you can actually see where your going now but it still sucks. It's too cluttered which makes it hard to keep track of everything. It's a mess. The levels also tend to drag a bit too. Some of them go on a bit too long for my liking

But the biggest issue with the game is getting 100%. Not because it's hard but because it's really not worth it and can become very tedious. Not only is the reward for getting 100% weak but trying to get enough Shiny Objects to buy all the Spatulas from Mr Krabs I a pain the ass. Even if you try to get all the hidden Shiny Objects in every level, of which there are plenty, you still won't be anywhere near the amount needed to buy them all, mostly because you need to use them in the levels themselves. This means you have to grind for Shiny Objects to get 100%. No 3D platformer should ever require grinding in any capacity. Also don't bother trying to get into the movie theatre, it isn't worth it.

I should also mention that I played the Playstation 4 version. I initially planned to play it on Switch but I heard that they screwed up the control layout in that version by making the A button jump. I can't say anymore beyond that but I thought it was worth mentioning. Battle for Bikini Bottom is not one of the greatest 3D platformers ever made as some have claimed. It's a fine game but I wouldn't call it a masterpiece or anything. It's just a nice solid little platformer. As I was playing it I wondered “what do people see in this that I'm missing?” and then it dawned on me. Maybe it's not just the gameplay, maybe it's the license.

There's also the issue that plagues most 3D platformers in the form of inconsistent challenges but I won't hold that against it because, well it's just something you expect from a game like this. Some challenges just aren't that fun but, on the bright side, you don't need to do them all just to get to the end. Of the 100 Golden Spatula's in the game only 75 are required to beat it so if there's a challenge you don't like you can skip it. You'll get more than enough playing through the game normally so don't worry about it. Then there's Kelp Forest, easily the worst level in the game. It's better than the original because you can actually see where your going now but it still sucks. It's too cluttered which makes it hard to keep track of everything. It's a mess. The levels also tend to drag a bit too. Some of them go on a bit too long for my likingis the same. If this were a random 3D platformer with an original IP no one would care about it but when you add in the SpongeBob license, the character, the setting and it's style of humour, you elevate an average game to a good one. Plus if your a fan of SpongeBob then you'll get a kick out of all the references, this game is loaded with fan service. The good kind, not the pervy kind.

I suppose the only thing left to talk about is the new multiplayer horde mode added to the Rehydrated version. This was made up of cut content from the original game and it's, not very good. You get a decent selection of characters but they all feel basic and the gameplay is super simplistic. It's a throwaway bonus at best. I wouldn't bother with it.

So that was Spongebob Squarepants Battle for Bikini Bottom. How does it hold up? Pretty well I'd say. It is not a timeless classic but at the same time it's an enjoyable game that anyone can pick up and play. A decent collectathon ellavated by great use of it's license. If your a fan of 3D collectathons and your looking for a fun time killer for a lazy afternoon then this is worth a look. And if you have kids that like SpongeBob then it's a definite recommendation. It's technical shortcomings and design flaws aside this is a decent little game and i'm glad I finally got to play it after all these years. Spongebob is still going strong today even if the quality of the show itself has waned in recent years it shows no sign of ending anytime soon. What does that mean for the videogames? Who knows but here's hoping the creators of this game are given another chance in the future because with enough time and polish we could have a truly great game. Also remake Lights, Camera, Pants, that game is awesome and had a Mermaidman ad Barnacleboy special as a bonus. Do it THQ Nordic! Until next time, remember to stay safe and have fun.