Funk of Titans Review – PC/Steam

I would have bet serious money that Funk of Titans was ported over from mobile platforms. With its endless-runner style of platforming and two-button interaction and three-star reward system everything smacked of a touchscreen game, but even the devs are bragging about how this is their first console title, so there you go and here we go.

There is about six hours of gameplay crammed into this four-hour game, with the final two hours being reserved for OCD completionists who want every last level token. By design, you can’t get a perfect score on every level on your first pass, so plan on revisiting many previously played levels to achieve that perfect score.

Funk of Titans is quite simplistic in design and controls. You play as Perseus, son of Zeus and likely to star in Undercover Brother 2, on a quest to make sure that Funk dominates all other forms of music. To that end you will be traveling across maps that lead to platforming levels where you jump, bounce, swing, and smash your way to the end, only to repeat on the next level until you make your way to each area’s Titan boss where you must battle them in a QTE combat dance off.

Controls are simple enough since Perseus is already running when he hits the ground. All you need to do is tell him when to jump or swing his weapon. A trail of gold records indicates the optimum path through these relatively short arcade-style levels that last less than two minutes each. You’ll need to collect them all to earn one of the three gold level rewards.   In many ways this turns the game into a side-scrolling Temple Run, but there are some nifty twists thrown in to spice things up.

Along the way you’ll come across numerous guards, some that can be bounced on and some that can’t. Bouncing on a guard will defeat them as will swiping them with your sword, but often you’ll need that bounce arc to gain access to an area or float through some gold records, so there is a bit of on-the-fly strategy involved.   You’ll also want to smash doors and urns; the latter of which may or may not contain hidden gold records. As you get deeper into the game the levels get more complex as does your path through them.

To earn that second gold token, you’ll need to finish the level without taking any damage. Perseus has numerous costumes and helmets he can unlock throughout the course of the game, but regardless of what he is wearing it will only protect him against a single hit. One hit strips him to his underwear and two hits ends the level, but to earn that token you’ll need to finish the level fully clothed.

The final token requires you to find the secret Pegasus pogo stick on each level. Not only is this usually hidden off the main path, sometimes it requires that you are already wielding a special weapon like a flaming sword or a STOP sign – don’t ask. This leads to some of the replaying I mentioned earlier since you won’t know what you need to reach Pegasus until you play the level, and some items (like the STOP sign) can’t even be purchased until much later in the game. Once you collect the pogo stick for each level you get to play this fun mini-game that has you controlling the vertical thrust of Perseus on his Pegasus pogo stick through crazy side-scrolling levels collecting bonus gold records.

Perseus will level-up throughout the game and you can also take him shopping between levels for fun costumes that pay homage to pop-culture icons like Star Wars, Batman, Transformers, Friday the 13th’s Jason, and many more. Perseus also has a set of ongoing challenges that need completing. These milestone goals are relatively simple and should trigger through normal play, although a few may require special effort.

Funk of Titans is loaded with humor from Zeus who looks like Morpheus from the Matrix to Athena who is clearly Aretha Franklin. The end-level boss fights are amusing and have you battling other titans like Medusa in this crazy dance-off competitions that are mostly Simon-style memorization QTE’s.

I enjoyed the graphical style of the game and thankfully they managed to keep things diverse and fresh for the most part, although I certainly looked forward to each new themed area by the end of the previous chapter. For a game based on music I found the soundtrack a bit limited and repetitive. Each area seemed to have a singular theme, so when you are in the RAP zone you hear the same background track for all the levels in that zone.

Even though it’s not a mobile game Funk of Titans is priced like one. At only $7 you are going to get 40 levels of crazy platforming action with some minor combat and exploration tossed in. The game is fast and laughably fun and perfect for the entire family. Now if Zeus would only stop asking me to choose between the red or blue pill…

Screenshot Gallery



Author: Mark Smith
I've been an avid gamer since I stumbled upon ZORK running in my local Radio Shack in 1980. Ten years later I was working for Sierra Online. Since then I've owned nearly every game system and most of the games to go with them. Not sure if 40+ years of gaming qualifies me to write reviews, but I do it anyway.

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