![]() Monster Tale has all the earmarks of a younger kids' game with its cutesy style and little girl protagonist. Last of all is the game's sometimes uneven difficulty. I just got frustrated and gave up, then jumped over to try unlocking a different form instead and earned it in about five minutes. I spent hours working on opening up one specific new form, following the game's clues for how to do so as best as I could - but I never got it. Others, though, take hours of grinding to access. Some of them are simple to unlock, giving you more choices for how Chomp will look and behave. Another issue, though, surrounds those evolutions. The extra trips across the landscape end up lengthening the quest artificially, though at least you get more time to train Chomp and perhaps unlock a few more of his different evolutions than you otherwise would have with a more straightforward flow. Why does beating a bad guy in this small chamber unlock a completely unrelated door on the other side of the world? That sort of thing. It's tiresome and tedious, feeling like the developers didn't do enough to sell the "why" of it all. So you do that, grab something else or trigger a brief cut scene, and then it tells you to again pick yourself up and schlep all the way back to where you just came from. You'll walk all the way to one side of the map, pick up some collectible, then the game will tell you to walk all the way back to the other side. Here in Monster Tale, though, it often just feels arbitrary. Having to revisit the same sections of the same world multiple times is a key part of games like this, with Nintendo's Metroids and Konami's 2D Castlevanias outlining how to make retreading the same territory feel fun and flow well. There are a handful of issues in Ellie's adventures that keep the Tale from becoming a true masterpiece. Even with all those positive points, though, not all is smiles and lollipops in this whimsical world of monsters. With all these many ties back to gameplay elements of your favorites of yesteryear, Monster Tale feels both nostalgic and new - it also looks fantastic, with the crispest, most precise 2D spritework a Nintendo handheld has seen outside of the Shantae series. Though her wall-jumping is most similar to Mega Man X. Rolling up in a ball to squeeze through tight spaces, charging up her magical bracelet to launch laser shots, earning the power to wall-jump to ascend sheer vertical surfaces - it's easy to see the inspiration here. Chomp gains experience points to grow, but not Ellie - she finds new powers by exploring the environment. Ellie even advances in ability herself just like Nintendo's bounty hunter. Happening both concurrently but also separately from Chomp's growth on the lower screen are Ellie's antics up above, and there it's a platforming adventure straight out of Samus Aran's signature series. And then we've got some Metroid going on. They're even elementally typed, tapping briefly into the "Water beats Fire" Rock/Paper/Scissors mechanic that has helped make Pikachu's series so popular. It's a blast! A pinch of Pokemon then comes into play, as little monster Chomp can evolve into dozens of larger, more powerful forms that each learn new attacks and support techniques. But Chomp's development is more akin to a pet sim game, as the whole lower screen on the DS is given over to a special area where you can customize his growth with specific items like food, books, and exercise equipment. Here you're in control of a young blue-haired heroine named Ellie and her companion creature Chomp, who similarly hovers over your shoulder and auto-attacks foes for you. ![]() Monster Tale takes that same concept and pushes it one step further. They'd even level up in strength over time, becoming more powerful and gaining more advanced abilities. You had the option to summon little hovering bats, demons, or other mini monster friends in that old Castlevania and they'd help you out in battle by automatically attacking enemies around you. Rather, it's because its core mechanic reminds me of Alucard's familiars. Let's track the connections to the classics as we make our way through this review, shall we? First up has to be Castlevania: Symphony of the Night - but not just because Monster Tale boasts a fully interconnected and re-traversable world like that game did.
0 Comments
Leave a Reply. |
Details
AuthorWrite something about yourself. No need to be fancy, just an overview. ArchivesCategories |