When comparing Shovel Knight vs Broforce, the Slant community recommends Broforce for most people. In the question“What are the best split-screen PS4 games?” Broforce is ranked 10th while Shovel Knight is ranked 26th. The most important reason people chose Broforce is:
Destructible environments, large explosions, dirt and blood flying everywhere, scaling a wall with just your knife, shooting rockets larger than the body of a man, and many more over-the-top gameplay elements. Broforce is just a blast to play.
Specs
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Pros
Pro Feels great to play
Shovel Knight has very colorful pixelated graphics, a decent chiptune soundtrack, excellent 8-bit sound effects, and the controls feel really fluid and responsive. So whether you’re just running through a castle, shoveling away at gems in a tunnel, or even jumping on a dragon’s head, Shovel Knight is a blast to play.
Pro Great for couch co-op
Because Shovel Knight can be pretty hard at times, bringing a friend along can help out a lot. The two of you can work together to take down enemies and communicate the best ways to handle jumps and special skills. Plus, if one of you is more experienced with the game, that player can help the newcomer along and teach them the ropes instead of leaving them to figure out everything on their own, possibly to the point of frustration. Playing this game with another person is a fun way to bring back the feeling of couch co-op on the older retro systems.
Pro A unique experience
Shovel Knight has 2D pixel art, a simple gameplay, and a retro feel. It stands out in an era dominated by 3D titles with super detailed graphics and convoluted gameplay because of its influences from classics like Zelda, Castlevania, Duck Tales, and even Super Mario Bros. It’s not just trying to cash in on the nostalgia of older players because it’s a game that can be enjoyed by anyone thanks to its polish.
Pro Pretty fun risk versus reward system
In each stage, there are multiple checkpoints you can revive at if you die. The twist is that you can destroy the checkpoints for extra treasure. Doing this also means you’ll have to start from the beginning of the stage if you die. It’s a pretty cool way to increase difficulty and add tension to a playthrough, especially because it’s never forced on you.
Pro Extremely fun gameplay
Destructible environments, large explosions, dirt and blood flying everywhere, scaling a wall with just your knife, shooting rockets larger than the body of a man, and many more over-the-top gameplay elements. Broforce is just a blast to play.
Pro Excellent at co-op
Four players can join a single game both locally and online. It just feels really awesome spreading mayhem and destruction with three of your friends as blood, guts, and explosions surround you from all sides.
Pro Varied characters keep the gameplay fresh
There are more than 20 different unlockable characters to try out. This keeps otherwise really simple gameplay from going stale as fast by allowing you to enjoy a variety of playstyles.
Pro Great references to the 80s action movies
Much like an 80s action movie, the violence, destruction, and plot are all overly exaggerated. The playable characters are the members of an underfunded, under equipped military organization that somehow outguns everyone else. Their bullets seem to have the magical property to explode everything they come in contact with. There's also an insane amount of explosions and blood everywhere. Even their names are references such as Brobocop (Robocop), Bro Lee (Bruce Lee), or Brominator (Terminator).
Cons
Con Can be frustrating
While Shovel Knight captures a lot of SNES era’s good parts, it also brings back some of the bad parts. It's mostly the hidden enemies that attack you as soon as you approach their hiding spots, causing you to take needless damage or even die. This adds a really tedious trial and error aspect that forces you to memorize all enemy placements just so you can beat a stage. In addition to dealing with the enemies, the timing of jumps or using special skills at the right moment adds to the frustration. Press the button too early or too late and you'll end up back at the start of a platforming section or worse, dead.
Con Can be pretty difficult
You can be killed by just one bullet, which creates a trial and error type of gameplay where you have to perfectly memorize all enemy locations and/or movement patterns. This gets multiplied by a hundred during boss battles, so after dying a lot of times you might start feeling frustrated.
Con Dying in co-op can feel a lot more punishing than it should be
If you run out of lives in co-op, you'll be forced wait until your teammates revive you by freeing a prisoner or until the level ends. If you're not very good at the game, this might happen a lot more often, which just turns into you watching others play the game and not playing yourself.
Con Poor character balancing
Some characters are obviously better than the others, or are highly situational. For example, the shotgun wielding character has really low range, so sometimes it's really hard to take out the enemies before they rip you to shreds from afar.