Monster High: Skulltimate Secrets - It's totally clawsome!
- Racula
- 7 minutes ago
- 5 min read
Hello Gamers, Racula here and welcome to another hex-citing XPN Gaming review!
Discover The World of Monster High.
So for those who have never heard of or seen Monster High, then allow me to introduce you to it.
Monster High is an American multimedia-supported fashion doll franchise created by toy designer Garrett Sander and launched by Mattel in 2010. Aimed at children ages 7–14, the franchise features characters inspired by monster movies, sci-fi horror, thriller fiction, cryptids, folklore, myths and popular culture, centering around the adventures of the teenage children of monsters and other mythical creatures, attending a high school of the same name.
Though the fashion dolls are the main focus of the franchise, a 2D-animated web series and 15 animated TV specials/films were released to accompany them, as well as video games. The Monster High franchise quickly became very popular among children and was extremely successful in terms of earnings for Mattel; it was worth $1 billion in its third year of existence with more than $500 million in sales annually. It was at one point the second best-selling doll brand in North America. Two spin-off toy lines were launched as companions to Monster High: Ever After High in 2013 based on fairy tales and fables and Enchantimals in 2017, featuring human-animal hybrids. However, sales started to decline in 2016, prompting Mattel to reboot the franchise with a revamped aesthetic and a new fictional universe. The reboot was a commercial failure, eventually leading to the discontinuation of the franchise in 2018.
Monster High relaunched a second time in 2020 with the release of new dolls representing horror/goth film cults, culminating with the 2021 announcement of an animated TV series and a live-action musical film, both produced by Mattel Television and premiered on Nickelodeon in October 2022.
Now that I've gotten you up to date with Monster High's origins, Let's focus on the game and see what it's all about.
Welcome To Monster High!
Developed by Petoons Studio and published by Outright Games, Monster High: Skulltimate Secrets is the ideal game for your youngsters, or maybe adults if your into Monster High like me.
It's your first day at Monster High, where pretty much all the monsters are welcoming, but something strange is happening at the school. Join up with your Boo Crew; Draculaura, Frankie Stein and Clawdeen Wolf and together, you'll tackle spooktacular challenges and work to restore balance to your school.
Be yourself, be unique, create your own monster character.
That's right, players get to create and customize your very own monster. You can pick from a range of monster races like; Vampire, werewolf, werecat, mummy, sea monster, simulacrum and gorgon. You can also pick a variety of hairdos and outfits, change the colour of your skin, eyes, hair and markings and chose some fun scareccessories, to make your character look unique.
As your run around and explore areas, you will find further items along the way to customize yourself further, or you can swap monster points instead for new looks. I played this game with my daughter, as she loves Monster High, though she is a bit young to play game, I played it on her behalf and had her sat with me. I let her chose her character and how she wanted it to be and look like. She decided she wanted her character to be a pink/purple Werecat, as those are her favourite colours for now.
Solve the Skulltimate Secrets
The storyline is simple and easy to follow and the main and side quests can be managed in your iCoffin, iPhone to you and me. This halloween-inspired phone allows you to check up on goals, change clothes and also select available missions. It's a handy dandy little item to have whilst progressing through the game.
Monster High's short gameplay revolves mainly around collecting skull coins, special runes, vials, emblems and be on the lookout for 6 monster keys. These keys are super important, as they help you unlock an ancient door that hides even more secrets and are also the main goal. Each area will follow pretty much the same route, explore the compact area whilst overcoming obstacles, chasms and any other traps and be on the look out for at least 2 chests and a set amount of skull coins. It's not mandatory to find them all, to complete the level by the way, unless you want to for achievements. You may have activate switches along the way and dash into one or two garbage goblins as well. Once you reach the end of the room, players will notice an orb, once collected you are then transported back and the game continues. This kind of reminds of how Spyro the dragon plays, you have a main area to explore and the levels to find and complete.
Along the way, players will be able to unlock new skills, to help them progress with in the game, such as vampire jump or gorgon dash. So no matter what monster you create and play as, you still get the other monster skills to unlock regardless.
Spooktacular graphics and audio
The varied soundtrack was really upbeat and fun to listen to and I can't fault the voice acting, they sounded exactly like the characters do in the tv series. My daughter really enjoyed seeing each character and their personality come to life when they spoke to her own character, so the cutscenes were never skipped and were enjoyable to watch.
She was so happy about this and said she felt like she was actually running around in Monster High herself.
Final Thoughts
Even though this is a kid-friendly game and should be played with that in mind, as it is fairly short. My daughter absolutely loved Monster High: Skulltimate Secrets, she loved having her very own character, dressing them how she wanted them to and also loved running around the school and interacting with the Boo Crew. She is one very happy little girl. So with that in mind, if your youngsters love the franchise and the current tv series, then I recommend this game for them.
Thank you to everyone who took time out of their day to take a moment to read this review, your support is always appreciated and means a lot to me.
Monster High: Skulltiate Secrets is available on:
XPN Rating 4 out 5
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