Head Rush and Nitro Head Rush - Skylander Review

Head Rush and Nitro Head Rush – Skylander Review

Head Rush is a new Earth Trap Master making her debut in Skylanders Trap Team. Head Rush was raised in a small village that was controlled by the spell of a powerful Harvest Sphinx. The Sphinx frightened villagers into plowing the vast fields of golden grass for his own benefit. None of the villagers were brave enough to confront the Sphinx, but Head Rush believed that if she could somehow inspire her people to stand together that they could fight back. She charged through the village using her mighty yodel to wake the villagers from their spell. With the village behind her, she was able to lead the charge to drive the Sphinx from the village for good. For her leadership and bravery she was made a member of the Trap Team where she now uses her Traptanium horns to take charge of evil!

Head Rush is another of the few humanoid characters in Skylands. She is a large and powerful looking figure. Her Traptanium Horns are huge and really look like they will deal some damage. They also help to make her look like a viking. Her six red braided ponytails and massive chest armor also add to her viking look. Of course she also yodels, and what viking can’t yodel? The only other assumption you can make from looking at her figure is that she might be kind of slow. Her larger size in combination with her gigantic horns don’t really give off a sense of speed. She also has a special painted variant called Nitro Head Rush. Nitro Head Rush is in the same pose, but has brown hair instead of red hair, and she wears gold armor and boots instead of brown. She also has the iconic white and gold checkerboard coloring, though only on her gloves. Neither figure really stands out as good looking.

Head Rush’s main weapon is indeed her Traptanium Horns. Pressing the Attack 1 button will have Head Rush use a head bash on enemies in front of her. If you hold the Attack 1 button down, she will charge forward fast with her head down just like a bull. She is otherwise pretty slow so you will probably find yourself using this attack just to move quickly through the levels. Her secondary attack is called Stomp. By pressing Attack 2 she will stomp the ground so hard that anything nearby takes damage. The area of effect of this attack isn’t very large but it’s definitely satisfying to stomp on Chompies and squish them like bugs. There is a cheap upgrade called Mega Stomp that adds a combo to this attack. Pressing the Attack 2 button three times in a row will result in two quick stomps and a final jumping double footed stomp that delivers some heavy damage. The Stomping On Air upgrade is similar where you can just do a double footed stomp by jumping in the air and pressing Attack 2 while in the air. Unfortunately this only does about half of the damage of the final combo jump stomp, making it pretty pointless to use. It’s easier and more powerful to use the combo. Her upgraded third attack is called Yodel. Pressing Attack 3 will perform a powerful yodel attack damaging all enemies within earshot. It turns out to just be a low distance range attack that kind of flares out as it travels. It does decent damage though, so it shouldn’t be ignored. The downside is that Head Rush cannot move while performing the attack which can leave her vulnerable. The last basic upgrade is called Charge Control. This adds a turn to the charge attack, which will cause extra damage when she turns. It’s basically a 180 degree change of direction which lets you charge through an enemy, turn, damage anyone near the turn, and then charge through the enemy for a second time. Each time Head Rush does the 180 degree turn the turn will damage nearby enemies.

When it comes to choosing an upgrade path you’ll find that both paths are not very exciting. However, both paths do add considerable damage to a couple of her attacks. The Lungs of Steel path upgrades her Yodel attacks. The first upgrade called High Note will add extra damage to the Yodel attack. The second attack is called Modulate Yodel and it adds MORE damage to the Yodel attack. It also allows you to control the pitch, which while interesting, is ultimately unnecessary and even annoying. The last upgrade is called Forget Breaking Glass and it makes the Yodel attack so loud that it destroys the ground beneath you. The longer you hold it down, you’ll notice the cracks in the ground get larger. There will also be rocks that start to fall from the sky. The Yodel doesn’t to a lot of damage, but it will start to accumulate the damage very very fast the longer you hold the button down. In the end all three upgrades are rather boring since they just add more power to the attack. The Stomp Harder path is almost the same. The A Stomp to Remember upgrade adds more damage to the Stomp attack. The Omega Stomp also does extra damage but also destroys the ground beneath you. I’m not sure what it means by “destroys the ground beneath you”, since she always destroys the ground beneath her when she stomps. And finally the Power Steering upgrade adds more damage to each successive turn made while performing a charge. It appears that the damage will go up a maximum of five times before it hits peak damage. We didn’t use that upgrade much but if you turn and turn while in the middle of a group of enemies, it will start to deliver some big damage. Even the Soul Gem ability is rather boring. It’s called Horns Aplenty, and it allows the Traptanium Horns to do ultimate damage. Besides adding more damage to the charge and horn attacks, it also physically changes the look of the horns. They become very jagged and sharp looking. Apparently the jaggedness is the key to adding more damage.

Overall Head Rush is just not a very exciting Trap Master. She is slow and lumbering and while she’s semi-powerful, she’s only going to damage those who are very close to her. Both upgrade paths are equally useful, but all they really do is add more power to her already pretty boring attacks. Even her Soul Gem does nothing more but add more damage. There is some novelty in stomping through your enemies, but this will get old fast. As far as Earth Trap Masters go, you only have two choices and neither one is very exciting. You would probably be better off using Wallop, just for his ability to throw his hammers. As far as all Skylanders go, there many better choices than Head Rush and we just can’t recommend her.

SkylanderNutts gives Head Rush and Nitro Head Rush…