joshkdmw
03-26-2007, 01:36 AM
Title: Custom Robo: Arena
Platform: Nintendo DS
Genre: RPG/Fighter
Publisher: Nintendo
Developer: Noise studios
Reviewed by: Josh Joshkdmw Miller-Watt
While the Custom Robo series has been more proliferate in Japan, North America was introduced to the series in 2004, with Custom Robo, for the Gamecube. The game didn’t sell particularly well, but did attain a small cult following. Now, three years after its release, the sequel: Custom Robo: Arena has finally hit the DS, and improved upon the formula of it’s predecessor.
The Premise:
It’s in the not-too-distant future, and thanks to scientific and engineering creativity, mankind has managed to create small, humanoid robots, capable of either being controlled by a human commander, or operated by AI. The Robos had been created originally to aid man in ways such as exploring in space, and undertaking tasks that a human couldn’t do. But naturally, people began to have the Robos fight one another. It wasn’t long before special combat parts were made, and the world’s new favorite pastime was created. The Robos – though small – are superior to humans in speed, strength, and endurance. Naturally, this led to Robo-related crimes, and the police began to use them to enforce the law. But this is not where the story begins.
In the game, you play a young boy who has just moved to a new town, and is celebrating a birthday. You are given a Robo by your parents as a present, as they know you’ve always wanted one, in hopes that you could be the Custom Robo Champ, and one day join the International Police Corps. Naturally, your character is a phenom at the sport, and you are soon drafted into your school’s Custom Robo Club to help with an upcoming tournament. I could go on, but the story is fairly simple RPG fare. It was particularly irritating in a few different ways. For one, this game was made with young children in mind – at least, the story was. Your character finds himself returning home every night, just to sit at dinner with the family and tell om and dad how your day went. Not only this, but the Female lead – whom you spend most scenes with – never becomes romantically intertwined with the Male lead. While this avoidance of cliché was refreshing in it’s own way, it seemed like the developers were actively trying to avoid any sort of adult activity from your character.
The Graphics:
The graphics are vastly different, depending on what you’re doing. While walking from place to place in the game world, you are presented with a top-down, Isometric view, with sprites very reminiscent of Pokemon. I would have had no particular problem with this, but the sprites themselves seemed lacking in effort. The walking animation was four frames, which makes for a monotonous feel. Other parts of the gameworld’s view, however, were nice. Door-opening animations and character Idle animations seemed well done, and smooth. Also, when a key character talks, you are presented with a full-body view of them, complete with blinking eyes, and moving mouths. This lended some much-needed depth to the hackneyed, overplayed cast of the game. There are 3 very short anime cutscenes, which are done decently, but the third is a repeat of the first, so it’s only two, technically.
The graphics for battles are in a whole other league entirely. It is painfully obvious where the Developer’s priorities were when making the game. I think it was the proper path, too. I can forgive crappy overworld animation, if we get some good stuff during the battles – which are, and always have been – the core of the series.
The battles are rendered in full 3D, with as smooth a look as any of the best DS games. Not only that, but the battles run at a beautifully smooth frame rate at all times, which really helps to pull you in. Each Robo part is given not only it’s own distinctive look, but The bullets and explosions are also unique. It could very wel be the most impressive utilization of DS technology we’ve seen, and is at the very least FFIII’s Equal. So, we’ve established that it looks pretty. But does it play?
Gameplay:
Out-of battle, the controls basically equate to walking, and pressing the action and cancel button, respectively. There are no plusses, and no minuses to how this works, save one: the collision detection was good. I never bumped into a corner and had it render me immobile.
The in battle controls can be summed up in one word: TIGHT. The robos are responsive to your commands, and you’ll never have to be frustrated at your Robo’s response time. That is, unless you use a particularly slow Robo. But that’s your own fault. Each battle you win garners you money to buy new Robo Parts, Diorama sets, and different Holosseums for versus play.
There are literally thousands of different combinations you can create to make a Custom Robo that fits your style. No one style is better than al others. In fact, at some points in the game, you may be forced to change your Robo to a different model before you’re able to beat your most recent foe. Wanna get up close and personal? There’s a Robo for that. Wanna be so far away that your opponent’s not even sure you’re there? There’s a Robo for that. Want to smash your opponent into a sticky paste? There are MANY Robos for that. I would divulge my own set, but then you’d be able to devise a Robo t defeat me, and I can’t have that. I have a spotless record on the Wi-Fi matches so far – 6 wins, zero losses – and don’t plan on losing it any time soon.
Not only this, but you may customize the appearance of your robo. There are many Dioramas available, and your Robo is fully posable, to customize your presentation. This offers no in-game benefit, but when you afce an opponent, they are presented with your Diorama. It’s a neat gimmick to display your personality, and helps to give a face to who you really are, instead of some nameless competitor. The sheer Variety is astounding, too. Two extreme examples were: a streamlined Robo riding on a star through space, and a portly-looking Robo lounging on a tanning chair on a small tropical Isle, complete with cocktail and beautiful woman.
The battlefields you can play on can be purchased in-game, and the terrain greatly affects the outcome of the game. Everything from Acid pits, Magma pillars, calm forest and conveyor belt-festooned factory is available, and all at very cheap prices. After you beat the Story mode, - just like it’s predecessor – CR:A offers an epilogue storyline, which consists of a tournament. This is nice, as you can get all those parts you failed to unlock.
While I never had a chance to play someone else in Multi 2-card play, I was able to play several Single-Card download matches, and Wi-Fi matches. The single-card download play offers much fewer parts than you would get with 2 cards, but there is still enough to make a Robo with distinct style and flair. However, on Single-card download play, I sometimes experienced slight hiccups in gameplay. These pass quickly, though, and don’t affect the overall match too badly. The Wi-Fi matches Run smoothly, but I sometimes noticed a slight delay from when your bullet hits the opponent and when they take damage. However, this affected none of my matches adversely, and didn’t really hinder my overall enjoyment.
Sound:
In both Overworld and battle, the sound effects are crisp, and genuinely well-done. The soundtrack for the whole game was rockin’ guitar, which could sometimes grate. Only once did the music ever change to something appropriate for the current scenario, and that was the end theme. More musical variety would have been well appreciated. The lack of voice acting was a real shame, too.
Touch screen Incorporation:
Thankfully, this was relatively well. You can use the stylus to navigate menus, but it’s not necessary. There are a few parts where you must press some buttons on your Robo, to activate it. This happens only twice, however, and is soon over with. There was also the concept of ‘cleaning’ your Robo. After continuous battles, your Robo accumulates dirt, and it’s performance is affected. When this happens, you must clean the robo. This is done by stroking the stylus over the dirty parts until clean. While this seemed like a neat concept at the beginning of the game, it quickly becomes a pain in the ass to have to go to the menu and waste 2 minutes on it in-between a series of battles. Less frequency of dirt would have made this much more bearable. During the actual battles, you can touch the touch screen to make your Robo increase in power for a short while. It’s very quick and easy to tap it with your thumb, and so was very appropriate. However, after this wears off, your robo becomes dirty – without fail- and so I found myself avoiding it for the sake of proper flow within the game. However, several times where I needed that extra push, it came in handy.
The Good:
The game has excellent pick-up-and-play qualities, but is also kind to long-term sessions – and I would know, as I beat this game in three days to ensure a speedily delivered review. The Wi-Fi connectibility will greatly increase the life of this game over it’s predecessor. Get in early on the Wi-Fi, though, because those who play it from the beginning will have ridiculously good parts and tactics, and you don’t want to get creamed every time you log on. The story mode isn’t great, but that’s just a premise to get to the creamy center – the battles.
The Bad:
The soundtrack can be very irksome at times. The Plot of Story is riddled with overdone characters and predictable elements. It’s very easy to tell what will happen. I guarantee that within the first few hours, you know the final enemy. The family wholesomeness is laid on a little thick at times, and a lot of the characters lacked any depth beyond their character sketches. Even a dozen or so voice Macros would have helped enormously in this regard.
The Verdict:
For fans of the series, this game is a must buy. It’s a refreshing return to a time once past of Custom Robo glory. It’s also a good place for newcomers to join in – ndeed, the title will be kinder to newcomers than it’s gamecube predecessor. It’s a solid addition to your collection of you like online gaming, too, as I’m sure there is bound to be not only many players in North America, but the game is much more popular in Japan, and you’ll never be wanting for some Wi-Fi goodness, if you really want it.
http://www.evilavatar.com/images/icons/e4.jpg
4 out of 5 Evil Eyes.
Platform: Nintendo DS
Genre: RPG/Fighter
Publisher: Nintendo
Developer: Noise studios
Reviewed by: Josh Joshkdmw Miller-Watt
While the Custom Robo series has been more proliferate in Japan, North America was introduced to the series in 2004, with Custom Robo, for the Gamecube. The game didn’t sell particularly well, but did attain a small cult following. Now, three years after its release, the sequel: Custom Robo: Arena has finally hit the DS, and improved upon the formula of it’s predecessor.
The Premise:
It’s in the not-too-distant future, and thanks to scientific and engineering creativity, mankind has managed to create small, humanoid robots, capable of either being controlled by a human commander, or operated by AI. The Robos had been created originally to aid man in ways such as exploring in space, and undertaking tasks that a human couldn’t do. But naturally, people began to have the Robos fight one another. It wasn’t long before special combat parts were made, and the world’s new favorite pastime was created. The Robos – though small – are superior to humans in speed, strength, and endurance. Naturally, this led to Robo-related crimes, and the police began to use them to enforce the law. But this is not where the story begins.
In the game, you play a young boy who has just moved to a new town, and is celebrating a birthday. You are given a Robo by your parents as a present, as they know you’ve always wanted one, in hopes that you could be the Custom Robo Champ, and one day join the International Police Corps. Naturally, your character is a phenom at the sport, and you are soon drafted into your school’s Custom Robo Club to help with an upcoming tournament. I could go on, but the story is fairly simple RPG fare. It was particularly irritating in a few different ways. For one, this game was made with young children in mind – at least, the story was. Your character finds himself returning home every night, just to sit at dinner with the family and tell om and dad how your day went. Not only this, but the Female lead – whom you spend most scenes with – never becomes romantically intertwined with the Male lead. While this avoidance of cliché was refreshing in it’s own way, it seemed like the developers were actively trying to avoid any sort of adult activity from your character.
The Graphics:
The graphics are vastly different, depending on what you’re doing. While walking from place to place in the game world, you are presented with a top-down, Isometric view, with sprites very reminiscent of Pokemon. I would have had no particular problem with this, but the sprites themselves seemed lacking in effort. The walking animation was four frames, which makes for a monotonous feel. Other parts of the gameworld’s view, however, were nice. Door-opening animations and character Idle animations seemed well done, and smooth. Also, when a key character talks, you are presented with a full-body view of them, complete with blinking eyes, and moving mouths. This lended some much-needed depth to the hackneyed, overplayed cast of the game. There are 3 very short anime cutscenes, which are done decently, but the third is a repeat of the first, so it’s only two, technically.
The graphics for battles are in a whole other league entirely. It is painfully obvious where the Developer’s priorities were when making the game. I think it was the proper path, too. I can forgive crappy overworld animation, if we get some good stuff during the battles – which are, and always have been – the core of the series.
The battles are rendered in full 3D, with as smooth a look as any of the best DS games. Not only that, but the battles run at a beautifully smooth frame rate at all times, which really helps to pull you in. Each Robo part is given not only it’s own distinctive look, but The bullets and explosions are also unique. It could very wel be the most impressive utilization of DS technology we’ve seen, and is at the very least FFIII’s Equal. So, we’ve established that it looks pretty. But does it play?
Gameplay:
Out-of battle, the controls basically equate to walking, and pressing the action and cancel button, respectively. There are no plusses, and no minuses to how this works, save one: the collision detection was good. I never bumped into a corner and had it render me immobile.
The in battle controls can be summed up in one word: TIGHT. The robos are responsive to your commands, and you’ll never have to be frustrated at your Robo’s response time. That is, unless you use a particularly slow Robo. But that’s your own fault. Each battle you win garners you money to buy new Robo Parts, Diorama sets, and different Holosseums for versus play.
There are literally thousands of different combinations you can create to make a Custom Robo that fits your style. No one style is better than al others. In fact, at some points in the game, you may be forced to change your Robo to a different model before you’re able to beat your most recent foe. Wanna get up close and personal? There’s a Robo for that. Wanna be so far away that your opponent’s not even sure you’re there? There’s a Robo for that. Want to smash your opponent into a sticky paste? There are MANY Robos for that. I would divulge my own set, but then you’d be able to devise a Robo t defeat me, and I can’t have that. I have a spotless record on the Wi-Fi matches so far – 6 wins, zero losses – and don’t plan on losing it any time soon.
Not only this, but you may customize the appearance of your robo. There are many Dioramas available, and your Robo is fully posable, to customize your presentation. This offers no in-game benefit, but when you afce an opponent, they are presented with your Diorama. It’s a neat gimmick to display your personality, and helps to give a face to who you really are, instead of some nameless competitor. The sheer Variety is astounding, too. Two extreme examples were: a streamlined Robo riding on a star through space, and a portly-looking Robo lounging on a tanning chair on a small tropical Isle, complete with cocktail and beautiful woman.
The battlefields you can play on can be purchased in-game, and the terrain greatly affects the outcome of the game. Everything from Acid pits, Magma pillars, calm forest and conveyor belt-festooned factory is available, and all at very cheap prices. After you beat the Story mode, - just like it’s predecessor – CR:A offers an epilogue storyline, which consists of a tournament. This is nice, as you can get all those parts you failed to unlock.
While I never had a chance to play someone else in Multi 2-card play, I was able to play several Single-Card download matches, and Wi-Fi matches. The single-card download play offers much fewer parts than you would get with 2 cards, but there is still enough to make a Robo with distinct style and flair. However, on Single-card download play, I sometimes experienced slight hiccups in gameplay. These pass quickly, though, and don’t affect the overall match too badly. The Wi-Fi matches Run smoothly, but I sometimes noticed a slight delay from when your bullet hits the opponent and when they take damage. However, this affected none of my matches adversely, and didn’t really hinder my overall enjoyment.
Sound:
In both Overworld and battle, the sound effects are crisp, and genuinely well-done. The soundtrack for the whole game was rockin’ guitar, which could sometimes grate. Only once did the music ever change to something appropriate for the current scenario, and that was the end theme. More musical variety would have been well appreciated. The lack of voice acting was a real shame, too.
Touch screen Incorporation:
Thankfully, this was relatively well. You can use the stylus to navigate menus, but it’s not necessary. There are a few parts where you must press some buttons on your Robo, to activate it. This happens only twice, however, and is soon over with. There was also the concept of ‘cleaning’ your Robo. After continuous battles, your Robo accumulates dirt, and it’s performance is affected. When this happens, you must clean the robo. This is done by stroking the stylus over the dirty parts until clean. While this seemed like a neat concept at the beginning of the game, it quickly becomes a pain in the ass to have to go to the menu and waste 2 minutes on it in-between a series of battles. Less frequency of dirt would have made this much more bearable. During the actual battles, you can touch the touch screen to make your Robo increase in power for a short while. It’s very quick and easy to tap it with your thumb, and so was very appropriate. However, after this wears off, your robo becomes dirty – without fail- and so I found myself avoiding it for the sake of proper flow within the game. However, several times where I needed that extra push, it came in handy.
The Good:
The game has excellent pick-up-and-play qualities, but is also kind to long-term sessions – and I would know, as I beat this game in three days to ensure a speedily delivered review. The Wi-Fi connectibility will greatly increase the life of this game over it’s predecessor. Get in early on the Wi-Fi, though, because those who play it from the beginning will have ridiculously good parts and tactics, and you don’t want to get creamed every time you log on. The story mode isn’t great, but that’s just a premise to get to the creamy center – the battles.
The Bad:
The soundtrack can be very irksome at times. The Plot of Story is riddled with overdone characters and predictable elements. It’s very easy to tell what will happen. I guarantee that within the first few hours, you know the final enemy. The family wholesomeness is laid on a little thick at times, and a lot of the characters lacked any depth beyond their character sketches. Even a dozen or so voice Macros would have helped enormously in this regard.
The Verdict:
For fans of the series, this game is a must buy. It’s a refreshing return to a time once past of Custom Robo glory. It’s also a good place for newcomers to join in – ndeed, the title will be kinder to newcomers than it’s gamecube predecessor. It’s a solid addition to your collection of you like online gaming, too, as I’m sure there is bound to be not only many players in North America, but the game is much more popular in Japan, and you’ll never be wanting for some Wi-Fi goodness, if you really want it.
http://www.evilavatar.com/images/icons/e4.jpg
4 out of 5 Evil Eyes.