Gripper Critic Reviews

Whilst occassionally suffering from the “being unfair doesn’t make it a challenge” issue, Gripper is nonetheless a fun ride. A gripping take on the boss rush style of game, pair this with a controller and headphones for a throttlin’ good time.

Gripper combines adrenaline-pumping race sections with top-down boss fights. The high difficulty provides a challenge, though the gameplay sometimes works against itself to make it a little too difficult. The impressive soundtrack stands out, however this title is unlikely to have you coming back to after your umpteenth deathstroke.

With a slick aesthetic, some great synthwave tunes, and intense cybercycling through dilapidated space tubes, Gripper gets a lot right and we enjoyed those parts of it. We can forgive repetitive voice acting, but the other half of the game — the arena boss battles — is egregiously frustrating. The main gripping mechanic fails to work far too often with so much happening on screen, leading to a difficulty level that requires grudging patience rather than player skill. Thus, by the end of the game, our patience for this sci-fi mashup of genres had run out.

Gripper is a boss rush inspired by Furi but different in its core gameplay. Here you are riding a bike to defeat your enemies, using a winch to destroy them. If the gameplay can be satisfying sometime it can be very frustrating lacking some tweaks here and there, especially on the Switch, to help the player reading the action and knowing what must be done to win the fight.