Smash It Wild: Tactical Volleyball Roguelike (Xbox) – Review

The premise of Smash It Wild is so wild you might not believe it actually exists. It's a tactical, turn‑based volleyball‑dodgeball roguelike starring teams of anthropomorphic animals. It shouldn’t work. It should collapse under the weight of its own genre mashup. But instead, it becomes something stranger and more compelling, a sports‑tactics hybrid that rewards planning, experimentation, and the joy of watching a perfectly engineered play detonate across the court. On Xbox, it lands as a colourful, chaotic, and surprisingly thoughtful experience, one that constantly nudges you to try “just one more run” even when you know the next opponent might flatten you.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ygAC-B3kspo

The roguelike structure is where Smash It Wild finds its heartbeat. Each run is a tournament week, complete with training days, rest days, shops, and upgrade opportunities. You start with a single team, but as you progress you unlock new squads with wildly different playstyles like icy control specialists, totem‑placing tacticians, high‑mobility tricksters, and more.

Runs escalate quickly. Early matches feel manageable, even breezy, but the deeper cups introduce opponents with brutal stats, clever abilities, and punishing stamina management. You’re constantly balancing short‑term survival with long‑term growth: do you spend gold on immediate stat boosts, or save it for a relic that might completely reshape your strategy? Do you specialise your team around one devastating combo, or spread your upgrades to stay flexible?

The game’s progression outside of runs is slower, offering permanent upgrades and new relics, but not at a pace that trivialises the challenge. You still need to think, adapt, and occasionally accept that the RNG gods simply woke up in a mood. That’s the genre and Smash It Wild embraces it fully.

The animal teams aren’t just cosmetic. Each one has its own identity, strengths, and tactical quirks. Some specialise in area control, others in raw damage, others in mobility or disruption. Building a team that synergises not just in abilities, but in how they cover the court becomes the core pleasure of the game.

You start to see the board differently. You learn how to bait opponents into stamina‑draining movements. You learn which abilities chain together into devastating multi‑hit turns. You learn how to create a situation where the enemy simply cannot reach the tile you’re about to spike into. And when it all comes together, the payoff is electric.

The biggest limitation is longevity. Once you’ve cleared the available cups with each team, the game doesn’t offer much beyond chasing better runs. There’s no multiplayer, no versus mode, and no alternative modes to stretch the systems further. For a game built around a sport, even an unconventional one, the absence of any head‑to‑head option feels like a missed opportunity.

The difficulty curve can also spike sharply, especially when transitioning into the tougher cups. It’s not unfair, but it does demand grinding upgrades and learning the deeper mechanics, it's definitely something genre fans will enjoy, but newcomers may find daunting.

Pros

• Deep, clever tactical gameplay with meaningful decision‑making

• Distinct teams with unique abilities and satisfying synergies

• Strong roguelike loop with impactful upgrades and experimentation

• Charming art style and expressive animations

• Runs feel varied thanks to abilities, relics, and team builds

Cons

• Steep difficulty spikes in later cups

• Tutorial doesn’t fully explain the game’s depth

• No multiplayer or versus mode

• Progression outside runs can feel slow

• Occasional UI clutter or minor visual hiccups

Smash It Wild is a bold, eccentric hybrid of a tactics game disguised as a sports title, a roguelike that rewards both planning and improvisation, and a colourful animal brawler that hides surprising strategic depth beneath its playful exterior. On Xbox, it’s smooth, stylish, and endlessly replayable, especially if you enjoy systems that reveal themselves slowly over time.

It’s not perfect. The difficulty curve can be harsh, the tutorial is too slight, and the lack of multiplayer leaves a noticeable gap. But when you’re deep in a run, juggling stamina bars, setting traps, and lining up the perfect spike, none of that matters. The game shines brightest in those moments where everything clicks and where your team moves like a machine and the court becomes a battlefield of your own making.

XPN Rating: 4 out of 5 (GOLD)

Smash it Wild is available now!