Metroidvania games have really been in style for a while now, and their representation on Switch, which was once a bit scarce, has now filled in nicely. Of course, with more competition the bar is raised, and especially when considering the variety of flavors we’ve had on Switch (many pushing the genre in their own new directions) it can be tough to break through with something truly new. Rather than going for innovation, OutBuddies DX opts pretty heavily for familiar and comfortable but that’s a mixed bag. Aside from that making it a tougher road for the game to firmly establish its own style and personality, it unfortunately then further opens the food to comparisons with the likes of the Metroid series itself, obviously one of the gold standards for the genre. Perhaps the game’s worse problem, though, is that there’s no getting around the cumbersome nature of the controls. While some games just feel a bit off, in the case of OutBuddies DX they’re notably awkward and can then foul you up when the action amps up, leaving you a bit frustrated to find your traditional muscle memory failing you because the buttons just aren’t mapped very well. The most telling thing to consider here is Metroid itself, a game that managed a lot of variety and versatility with a simple, stock, 2-button NES controller. That the Switch uses a modern controller, complete with many times more buttons, but somehow manages to feel more held back than that classic unfortunately helps to illustrate the shortcomings pretty thoroughly and the overall game experience suffers because of it.