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Rhythm Heaven Groove brings Nintendo’s rhythm-game series back with a wide selection of musical challenges for Switch. The hands-on preview features more than 80 solo minigames, over 30 multiplayer games, and an unlockable rhythm-based RPG mode called Beatspell. Its varied activities are designed around listening closely and responding at just the right moment, making timing the key skill throughout.
Rhythm Heaven Groove’s solo minigames and remixes
The single-player collection gives each challenge its own mechanics and music while keeping rhythm at the center. In Hoop Trundling, players follow the movements of a line of characters and jump through hoops in time. Brolly Good Show asks them to open and close an umbrella in sync with others, while Disc Dog requires a jump to catch a frisbee seven beats after it is thrown.
Feeding The Beast rounds out the first collection with a dinosaur-like creature that eats plants to the beat. These different tasks offer a useful change of pace: when a sequence feels difficult, focus on the musical pattern rather than trying to react to every visual detail at once.
Completing every game in a collection unlocks a Remix, which blends its minigames into a single song. The changing activities make it important to stay alert as the music continues. Remixes also provide a practical way to test how well you have learned each game’s timing and cues.
Ratings, medals and tougher challenges
Each minigame ends with an assessment of your performance. An “Amazing” rating earns a medal, giving players a clear goal beyond simply finishing a challenge. The preview’s third collection included Slice N Dice, where a woman chops vegetables, and Hop, Stop N Roll, in which a lucky cat figure hops and rolls alongside other cats. Both felt more demanding than the games in the first collection.
If you are aiming for medals, pay attention to the beat and the timing of each action; a small delay can affect the final result. The increased difficulty in later collections also gives experienced players more room to refine their rhythm.
Multiplayer games for cooperative and competitive play
The preview included two multiplayer games played by four people. Cake Wait is competitive: everyone presses a button as close as possible to the moment a countdown reaches zero. The clock disappears as the seconds pass, so players must rely on their sense of timing rather than watch a full countdown.
Ninja Bodyguard takes a cooperative approach, with the group protecting a carriage from archers. It adds teamwork to the rhythm-based action. For a group session, these two formats offer different kinds of interaction—one focused on individual precision and the other on working together.
Beatspell adds a rhythm-based RPG mode
Beatspell is an unlockable RPG-style mode that becomes available as players earn a certain number of medals. The preview covered its first two chapters. During encounters, players tap commands as the beat moves around a diamond-shaped chart, with different inputs producing different spells.
For example, pressing B at one corner and then A at the next casts a flame spell against an enemy. Adding a down direction on the D-pad on the half-beat between those inputs changes the action to Cure, which restores the player. This system combines rhythmic timing with command choices, so learning the beat is essential to using the spells as intended.
What to expect from Rhythm Heaven Groove
With its large range of solo challenges, multiplayer options, collection-ending Remixes and Beatspell mode, Rhythm Heaven Groove builds on the series’ familiar focus on rhythm while offering several ways to play. The preview’s later minigames were more challenging, while the multiplayer modes added either competition or cooperation. For players considering the game, the main thing to know is that listening carefully and practicing each pattern are central to making progress. Rhythm Heaven Groove’s mix of minigames and its unlockable RPG mode gives the Switch entry a broad set of rhythm-based activities to explore.
