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Japan
Tokushima
Most language free systems aren't this clear, or easy to learn! Awesome!
I'm back, and ER is STILL #1 in my book!
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I don't really follow video games anymore. I don't do the websites or the mags or even go to the local store really. The reason being that I live in Japan and I've gotten wrapped up in other things. But, I did browse around the US Amazon and, lo, it threw this game at me as a recommendation. Ah! I had to learn more.
Sadly, I don't know that I'll see this game to its conclusion--read on!
Basically:
You are a budding (heh) young monster builder and with your monstrous creation(s) you will right the wrongs of a dastardly mad scientist. Along the way you'll help the whacked-out denizens and collect a whole lot of ingredients to mix it up in the labs.
The campy atmosphere of the game is first rate. It flows nicely from area to area, event to event, mini-quest to mini-quest, and mini-game to mini-game. Good music round out the visuals and variety of play.
The Unusual suspects:
Lots of great characters in this one, with a lot of great voice acting. The game has 5 languages and I would imagine that they're all good.
More than the characters, the atmosphere of the game really speeds along. You are constantly unlocking awards (researching a number of parts, beating a number of monsters, and failing a number of puzzles, just to name a few) and new monster part recipes. The chances of getting lost in the game are nil, especially with the handy I.G.O.R. just a button touch away.
The level of communication in the game is top notch.
One nifty thing is that every monster in the game (yours or otherwise) is always fully visible--custom. This is great on the world map and elsewhere and was a touch that I really liked.
Building a better walking mouse trap:
There are tons of ingredients to collect, but they are well organized. First, there are the three types, mechanical, biological, and alchemical. These are further divided into ingredients that can only be used for certain parts (like cobwebs for heads), but certain ingredients can be used for more than one. Then, there are key ingredients and supporting ingredients--basically, to make a part you take a key ingredient and add a supporting ingredient to it.
Key ingredients will almost always yield a part family, so those led pipes will always yield some sort of arm with a cinderblock at the end. But adding certain secondary ingredients will not only determine the level of the part, but any special abilities it has.
The only part of this process that really annoyed me is that you must go to that certain room in the castle to mix up and animate your monster. You cannot modify on the fly. I mean, sure, thematically, it makes sense, but it was kind of annoying anyway. It would be nice to get down to a town, spot the enemy, and then do a quick field operation.
Getting around town:
Areas are a decent size and all of them are uniquely themed. Enemies are visible and you can dodge them (or stalk them) at your leisure. There are puzzles scattered through out--and a few of them chase you down. All-in-all, I liked my time in each of the areas.
The difficulty scales up a bit unevenly, and here's where the trouble begins. If you customize towards the beginning, you'll find yourself absolutely blowing through battles. That said, when you hit the glass cieling, you'll KNOW--just like roadkill or insects on windshields.
The real reason to hang around towns is to collect ingredients, and mixing it up between battles and the puzzles is pleasant enough to keep me interested.
All-too-mortal combat:
The game uses a rock-scissors-paper scheme, with mechanical beating biological beating alchemical. Each of your parts attacks a certain area of your opponent, and an additional effect may be released if the part is built with certain ingredients (Adding rotten flesh rather than cobwebs to that brain not only makes the same part, but with potentially wildly different sats and different powers, for example).
In general, I stuck with parts that targetted multiple areas, that way I was bound to destroy SOMEthing. I also made sure that I had attacks from all of the sciences (mechanical arm, alchemical arm, and biological legs, for example). The core has your battery, and you definitely want the biggest one. In general, the area you're entering has a theme (going into the swamp, most stuff is biological), but in the main I just built the best monster I could with the parts I could.
Some special abilities include hindering your opponent's ability to restore energy, regeneration, and extra attacks. Not all are possible for every part, but doing some experimenting can yield some really dangerous parts.
Each attack uses up some of the battery, with more powerful attacks using more and less using less. At some point you must recharge, but you get your choice of fully recharing (and standing there like a lightning rod in a thunderstorm) or going for a moderate charge and increasing your ability to dodge (it's no guarantee that you WILL dodge, though).
In general, legs only kick. But arms shoot, hit, and strangle; heads shoot, bite and headbutt. Every part animates well, and there's even a nice victory pose at the end. At the beginning of battle your fighter animates a bit, and I always take this as a hint of what part to use FIRST--works every time.
Puzzled:
The heart of the game is in these puzzles. There are a LOT of them, and they're used for many of the core interactions of the game. You'll encounter them when gathering ingredients. You MUST conquer them to create new monster parts. And, there are nice monotony-breakers that go-outside-the-box, like level-wide races that harken back to simpler, button-mashing times. All-in-all, I rather like the puzzles, especially since most have been very well themed to the game, both visually and mechanically. Imagine a plant sprouting seeds that become plants you must kill, or jetting through the warped innards of a beast, or welding an eternal seam... Good stuff.
Imagine Mario Party--with a point.
That all said, the puzzles actually become the final stumbling block for me, enough to make me want to strangle myself with a stethescope. First, some of the puzzles are obscure, with the directions hardly clarifying what you're supposed to do (So, I'm supposed to wave this magic wand around and collect symbols, OK! ...Wait, what the heck?). Second, the puzzles used to build parts both increase in difficulty (depending on the ingredients used, to create more powerful parts) AND directly affect the quality of the part. You'll KNOW when you must have more powerful parts because every monster of the level you just opened up has them. Unfortunately, some of the games become just IMPOSSIBLE to complete--even at level two, let alone at maximum level. But, let's say that you DO complete the puzzle, but only just barely--well, the part you just made becomes substandard and ALL OF ITS STATS GO DOWN.
This is the wall, the downward spiral, the last hurrah, the death knell: The game demands an impossible standard.
IN CONCLUSION:
This game oozes theme and variety. If you like classic monsters rather than pocket monsters, then it's definitely worth a look. But the impossible to beat puzzles that directly kill your chances of fielding an effective monster just make this one had to keep going with. Even with all the time I put in I couldn't create parts to keep me in the game. So, with a good kick in the butt I'm afraid I leave this one to lie on the operating room table.
EDIT: Added the cover image
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