Trifox [PC] | REVIEW

You know the old phrase, ‘jack of all trades but master of none’? Well, I feel that perfectly sums up Trifox. This is a 3D platforming-adventure that tries to introduce a lot of ideas with its multi-talented protagonist, but never does anything in a stand-out fashion that makes it feel like a ‘must play’ release. It’s a lot of fun, but never feels special.

Check out some screenshots down below:

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Trifox doesn’t open its adventure with some epic ‘good versus evil’ catastrophe that sets events in a motion, but rather a more PERSONAL crime (that in many ways feels much more vindictive). You play as a Fox who was ready for a nice evening of watching TV, when a loud bang grabs your attention. Whilst you’re distracted, a vicious villain breaks in and steals your TV remote, leaving our poor hero stuck with nothing to watch. Shock, gasp, horror! Thus, you venture out across the world to catch this dastardly thief and get your TV remote back.

It’s a silly little story that doesn’t really amount to a lot thanks to the game’s lack of dialogue, but there’s something incredibly charming about it too. Trifox keeps things simple and doesn’t try to force some grand tale of epic proportions on players, with it instead featuring something you might see on a one-off episode of a kid’s TV show. I liked it, with the narrative fitting the vibe of the experience perfectly.

At its core, Trifox is an action-platformer with levels full of platforming challenges, enemies to beat up, and secrets to discover. Players will venture through a multitude of colourful environments on their journey that are full of pretty sights to see, whilst some challenging boss encounters spice things up with their pattern-based attacks and tricky set pieces. Basically, it delivers everything you’d expect from a 3D platformer and makes for a pretty fun time.

“You can even mix-and-match the varying abilities you unlock between classes, allowing you to make this unique build that caters entirely to your playstyle.”

What makes the game feel a bit different to the norm is the fact that it utilises a class-based system, with our hero Fox able to play as an Engineer, Warrior, and Mage. Each of these classes bring their own skills to the fray, whether that’s the Engineer and its ability to launch homing missiles and zip around the area with its built-in helicopter, the Warrior and its hammer that can pummel foes or its dash that allows him to leap out of the way of danger, or the Mage and its protective bubble, homing spells, or blink teleportation that allows the Fox to reach inaccessible areas. There are a ton of abilities to unlock for each class throughout the game that offer plenty of flexibility to each player’s playstyle, and the majority of them are really neat to use.

You can even mix-and-match the varying abilities you unlock between classes, allowing you to make this unique build that caters entirely to your playstyle. Each of the different classes have their own strengths and weaknesses after all, so it’s nice that you can grab the best bits of each and use them to your advantage. The only caveat here is that you can’t actually switch them around mid-level, but can only do it before starting a new level from the game’s hub world. This is a really inconvenient flaw and actually discouraged me from experimenting with each ability, especially since I found a skillset that worked well for me early on. Believe me, there’s NOTHING worse than going into a level with an ability you just can’t gel with, and I actively found myself annoyingly restarting levels a few times just to change to something I was more familiar with.

Check out some screenshots down below:

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It actually made me get into a bit of a routine of using the same abilities over and over again in the game, which is a bit of a shame. I found it easier and more convenient to just use those I was comfortable with, and with no real challenges of the game catering to a specific skillset, it didn’t hinder my progress in any way either – Trifox isn’t really a tough game, so you’ll never feel like you need to be too strategic with your skillset. There was no ability that felt especially unique to the game either, and whilst there are LOTS of things you can do, you’d have seen them all across multiple other 3D platformers over the years.

I feel like I’m being a little harsh on Trifox because I really did enjoy my time with the game. The gameplay itself is enjoyable, the world is lovely to explore with its vibrant landscapes and creative sights, whilst the varied abilities do offer plenty of cool options for players. It just has a few missteps that prevent it from striving towards platforming greatness, whilst there’s nothing here that feels too innovative outside of swapping abilities. When you think that titles like Ratchet and Clank have ramped that up ten-fold with wild weapons with outrageous abilities in the past though (and with more flexibility to swap between them for the player), it does make Trifox feel a bit more tame.

Developer: Glowfish Interactive
Publisher: Big Sugar
Platform(s): PC (Reviewed), Xbox Series X|S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch
Website: https://www.trifox-game.com/