As I mentioned earlier, I’ve been playing a few games with my roommate. I don’t want to get too deep into this soon—I’d rather explain this in a shorter piece—but my (actually soon-to-be) roommate and I have almost completely different priorities in gaming: I like challenges , and I also sometimes like reading visual novels, and also trying some games competitively. Meanwhile, she leans towards casual gaming, preferring phone games, ARAMs on League with friends, and Genshin Impact.
There’s still a relatively small amount of games where our interests intersect—in this case, she’s drawn to the IP, since she liked SpongeBob a lot when she was a kid, and she will have her take included in this review.
In my case, I just saw a 3D platformer that I played as a kid, which I remembered with “eh. It was all right”.
How “all right” was it, though?
Rehydrating a Cult Classic
Much like Crash Bandicoot and Spyro: the Dragon remasters (the latter to which my roomie is a fan of), SpongeBob: Battle for Bikini Bottom Rehydrated is effectively the same game as the 2003 Gamecube-exclusive game, with a fresh coat of paint. If you want to see a direct comparison, this video highlights the differences between the original and Rehydrated:
Like its predecessors, Rehydrated does more than just resell the same game. The graphical overhaul is largely positive, with a brighter aesthetic making characters and backgrounds easier on the eyes. Some textures and ambience from the original hold up surprisingly well, however, making me wish a Halo: Anniversary-style toggle for switching graphics.
It does a solid job of preserving the original and enhancing, also adding a completely new multiplayer mode—which we’ll talk about in a second—and, very importantly for any game I play with my roommate, it contains not only Spanish subtitles but a fully dubbed version of the game as well, with most of the actors from the Latin American dub reprising their roles.
The Spanish dub sounds… a bit off. Some characters sound exactly like in the TV show, but a few of them sound very different for some reason. It’s slightly off-putting, but the dub is otherwise fine.
Playing a Season of SpongeBob
Perhaps Battle for Bikini Bottom’s biggest strength is that it does a great job at capturing the feel of being in a SpongeBob episode. It has a pretty simple plot, with Plankton’s plant to take over Bikini Bottom backfires when he accidentally sets his robot army to “Don’t Obey” mode, causing chaos instead.
This is pretty much the only notable plot beat. Battle for Bikini Bottom uses this setup as a framing device for visiting a lot of popular places seen on the show, with character dialogue feeling in the gaps. It is an okay setup, which lets the developers show a pretty robust knowledge of the SpongeBob “canon”: Kelp Forest, Jellyfish Fields, Rock Bottom and Flying Dutchman’s Graveyard, (among others) all make an appearance. I was never a huge SpongeBob fan, but I can undoubtedly see how someone invested in the show could get excited about seeing full-fledged iconic locations from the cartoon.
Speaking about years…
Soaking in the Slow Gameplay
This is not the only place where Rehydrated will remind you that it simply is a new coat of paint over a decades-old game. This is an early 2000s platformer collectathon, with 4 collectibles—Golden Spatulas, Patrick’s Socks, Shiny Objects, then one more collectible that is in-theme with each level. Still, all of these are just more ways of spreading out the Golden Spatulas: Patrick’s Socks just get you one more Spatula per 10 that you collect, the Shiny Objects are just there to get farmed and then pay tolls on blocked sections of the levels, and the unique collectibles reward you with one Golden Spatula for getting all of them.
Movement is precise, but slow. Like, really slow. The levels are designed to be semi-open, giving you one direct pathway that will take you towards most Spatulas in the level, with some diversions and a ton of obstacles in-between. The maps are large, making backtracking and switching objectives feel sluggish.
The controls are (almost) completely functional, but SpongeBob doesn’t feel fun to move. He gets a couple of bubble-based moves which spice it up his moveset, but his slow pace towards the levels is hard to get by. His bubble powers are okay, giving you genuine options of combating robots instead of just being situational door-openers. I thought one particular move did not control well, though: the torpedo, which I will highlight in the following clip.
While the framing of each level as kind of an episode is fun, and probably pretty good for a licensed game in 2003, but the way it tries to immerse you in the world when you are not talking to someone is annoying—characters will repeat almost the exact same phrases upon seeing a few events, and while charming at first, it gets tired fast. I have not played this game for over 20 years and I felt like I was unblocking a core memory when I heard SpongeBob say “fresh, like a spring breeze!” after picking up an item.
SpongeBob is technically not the only playable character, though.
3 Characters, 1 Playstyle
Perhaps the most outdated design choice in this game is how it handles switching characters. Instead of having it integrated seamlessly or via a button (like Sonic Heroes did around the same time), you need to walk to this specific station where you are allowed to switch to either Sandy or Patrick, and who you can use in what section is already pre-determined.
Patrick and SpongeBob control so similar that the only reason that they were implemented was probably so that the original could market Patrick as a playable character; besides not having bubble moves, Patrick is needed to do certain sections that require lifting objects. It is mildly annoying in the first levels of the game, but by the end it can get pretty egregious how much character switching the game demands of you. This clip showcases the worst example of it during the game.
Sandy is the best one out of the three to control, but she gets the least screen time. She has Texan lasso-powers, allowing her to destroy robots at a distance, hover on the air for better platforming, and even some mid-air platforming by lasso-hopping. She isn’t different enough from SpongeBob to justify the cumbersome switching mechanic, but she at least feels distinct thematically.
While much of the game feels sluggish, there’s one area where it all clicks.
Boss Battles Done Right
There are three big bosses in the game, each being a robot version of the playable characters, and while they fall under the “dodge attack then punch” pattern, they feel much more cohesive than regular levels. They have three phases where you switch between the three playable characters due to in-story justified reasons, and even have the fish reporter from the cartoon commenting on the fights.
If the levels feel like episodes with a lot of filler, the boss fights feel like a mini-episode, featuring humorous scenarios, character interactions, and much-needed fresh dialogue.
The sub-bosses are… okay. There’s only a few of them, and they are short. It’s at the very least cool to fight some of these characters.
The Dutchman is an example of that—he’s a fun character, and it’s cool that we got to fight him, but the fight itself is kind of boring.
A Simple Multiplayer
Last, and definitely least, there’s the multiplayer.
…It’s literally just a horde mode. It’s inoffensive, and if you want to control any of the characters from SpongeBob, there are a few options (I played Gary), but after playing it once I feel like I had enough of it. Here’s a short clip of using playing the last section of it.
Casual Corner: A SpongeBob Fan’s Perspective
My roommate a much shorter take on the game. This is what she had to say:
It was a nice trip for the memory, having the original voice cast was a good touch to the game’s ambience. It’s not a very hard game, but I definitely did not have the skill to get through all the levels from the last third of the game. If you were a kid during the 90s, I feel that you would enjoy this game a lot in a casual night with friends, just for the laughs and memories.
For me, of course, analyzing a game is not about nostalgia, so her view of “a casual night for the laughs and memories” caught me by surprise when she mentioned it. I think that explains why she kept up with it despite Rehydrated increasingly showing its age as it progressed.
Final Thoughts – Who is This For?
Rehydrated faithfully preserves a 2003 game, and its outdated designed shows because of that. While some later levels still hold up, modern platformers offer a smoother experience. Still, for fans of early SpongeBob, it’s a nostalgic revisit worth considering.
