Stumble Guys now lets you go down a waterslide dressed as a banana on Xbox | Hands-on preview

As somebody who loves both 3D platformers and battle royal games, the idea of these two genres combining always gets me excited. When the first (that I’m aware of) crossover of these genre giants happened with Fall Guys I was excited, and although it was a little lacking in content when it first released, I loved that silly game. I haven’t come across many other platforming battle royals since then though, so was excited to try out the similar sounding Stumble Guys now it’s making the move to Xbox.

On first look you will immediately notice how inspired by similar titles this game is, and there’s no escaping it. But because of that, the concept is pretty easy to grasp. Groups of 32 players all try to race their way through wacky and colourful obstacle courses. Over the course of three rounds players will be eliminated until one reigns supreme and takes the crown.

All the familiar platforming obstacles are here to run past and jump over: seesaws, spinning bars, cubes that rotate, you name it, and Stumble Guys has it. Controlling your character is simple enough too, and feels fine. You have the ability to do a little dive to get more distance as well, which is handy in a pinch.

Not all stages are strictly obstacle courses either. Some involve surviving from falling through familiar looking hexagon shaped tiles, while others pit two teams against each other in a game of janky physics-based football with the losing team eliminated. It might not be wholly original, but the variety will certainly be appreciated.

Stumble Guys already has a sizable player-base on PC and Mobile, and because of this there are already a whole host of crossovers in the game, from skins and emotes, to entire stages dedicated to MrBeast, NERF, and Hot Wheels. The fact that there are racing sections and an entire FPS battle in Stumble Guys because of this is pretty impressive, and given the audience it already has, it seems to be working a treat.

Because Stumble Guys has spent a decent amount of time growing over on PC, there are some nice features available at launch on Xbox because of it. The fact you can create your own private lobby and invite 31 friends to play with you is really cool, and for hosting tournaments or playing with entire Discord servers it’s beyond handy.

If you get really into Stumble Guys there’s also all the Free to Play currencies and battle passes to invest in if you want to be able to dress up as a murderous cereal boss or do a cool dance to taunt your opponents. Of course it’s down to you if you want to engage in that stuff, but it’s there if you want it.

I can’t pretend that I think Stumble Guys is a game I’ll be playing for years to come (because I don’t have a time machine, and there never seems to be a quiet moment these days), but it clearly has an audience and there’s no reason to avoid it since trying it will cost you nothing. The download is even small, and the matches start so fast that your time is really respected.

While not the most original game in the world, Stumble Guys clearly has found its target audience and is ready to start taking over the console space starting with the Xbox launch. If going down a waterslide dressed as a banana sounds like a good time to you, then you might as well give it a cheeky download and see if you like it.

Stumble Guys is out now for PC, and launches on January 23rd for Xbox players.