GamerEscape

For me, PAX West 2024 felt like “getting back to the grind” in a lot of ways after things came to a halt in 2020 for gaming conventions. During the lockdown portion of the pandemic, I found myself watching a lot of Twitch and, because of that, eventually diving pretty hard into retro video game collecting.

I would find and re-purchase games I had growing up, or games I had fond memories of from playing at a friends house. A lot of these games, as it turns out, were beat-em-ups featuring IPs ranging from Batman, The Avengers, and yes, Power Rangers. So when I found out that Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Rita’s Rewind was going to be playable on the show floor this year, I made sure to set some time aside so that I could check it out.

The game’s story is fairly straight forward, and even has ties to more recent Power Rangers media. Robo-Rita, who was introduced in the Netflix special Once and Always, goes back in time, armed with the knowledge of past events, to work with a younger Rita Repulsa in an attempt to stop the Rangers once and for all.

Combat was straight forward, with single buttons presses to attack, jump, dodge, or use a special attack. As players defeat their opponents, they’ll fill up their special meter. Once executed, the Ranger’s specific dinosaur logo flashes on the screen along with a screen-wide attack. The attacks, while all themed to each character, have the overall same effect on the enemies populating the screen space.

As we guided the Rangers through the demo, we came across a small handful of different enemies. Naturally, the Putties were the first enemies encountered during our playthrough, but later on we were treated to the Tengu Warriors! There are also destructible objects in the environment such as crates or barrels which can reward you with power ups, and even collectables.

At the end of the demo, our group faced off against Rita’s right-hand man, Goldar. In typical Power Rangers form, after he was defeated, he began to grow in size! Dan Amrich from Digital Eclipse was at the walk-up demo, chatting with con-goers and offering bits of info about the game and its development. After watching Goldar grow, Dan made to sure mention that yes, there will be a Megazord battle. The team has been going through a few different iterations of the gameplay, but it sounds like they finally found a way where they can get all five players into a giant robot that only has two fists to attack and make it fun. Personally, I can’t wait to see what they’ve come up with.

Lastly, Amrich mentioned that once players complete the main campaign, which will take around two hours or so, they’ll be able to unlock Tommy as the Green Ranger.

Overall I enjoyed my time with the game. It feels like a solid beat-em-up and really took me back to my younger years when I would sit with friends and play through these kind of games on a Sega Genesis or Super Nintendo. The little bits of beat-em-up nostalgia I hoped this title would give me, were definitely felt. Itch successfully scratched, if you will. The hard part now, will be waiting for the game to actually release.

Mighty Morphin Power Rangers: Rita’s Rewind launchers later this year for Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Xbox One, Xbox Series, and Steam

Images courtesy of Digital Eclipse.