Rabbids Rumble

Rabbids Rumble is a 2012 game developed and published by Ubisoft for the Nintendo 3DS, part of the Raving Rabbids franchise, the manic, screaming bunny-like creatures that spun off from the Rayman series into their own hugely popular line of party games. Departing from the franchise's usual mini-game collections, Rabbids Rumble adopts a creature-battling structure clearly inspired by Pokemon: players capture, collect and train their own teams of Rabbids and pit them against rival Rabbids in turn-based battles. Using the 3DS's camera and augmented-reality features, players could 'scan' and capture Rabbids in the real world, then build and customise their roster for combat. The result combined the franchise's trademark absurd, slapstick humour with light collection and battling mechanics aimed at younger players. Critical reception was lukewarm; reviewers found it a serviceable but shallow and repetitive take on the creature-battler formula, lacking the depth of its obvious inspiration while retaining the Rabbids' comedic charm. Rabbids Rumble stands as one of the many spin-offs that capitalised on the Raving Rabbids' popularity during their peak, experimenting with new genres beyond the party games that made them famous, and is a minor entry aimed primarily at children and franchise fans. It was one of several genre experiments the Rabbids underwent at the height of their popularity before later Mario crossovers.