So I wanted to check out PN03 mainly out of curiosity. I didn't expect to find some hidden gem or whatever, I just wanted to poke around and see what went wrong. I did end up learning that, but it actually turned out to be a pretty decent game!
So, PN03 is extremely simple. You run and you shoot, and not both at once (people got mad at this at the time, but it works, honestly given that Mikami would go on to help with RE4 I wouldn't be surprised if that's where that came from). The emphasis is on the defensive side, Vanessa aims on her own, your task is to dodge around attacks. You have a dodge roll (more of a twirl really), a jump and tank controls to do so, and the result is surprisingly swift most of the time. Vanessa is dancing and moving to the beat (kinda, not all songs sync to it) all the time and well-executed fights end up looking like a ballet of weaving through enemy attacks. You also have invincible super moves executed with fighting game-style motion inputs which depend on the suits, more about that in a bit.
What really ties the game together is the scoring system, in all of its simplicity. When you kill an enemy, a timer pops up. Kill another enemy, the timer renews and you start a combo. When the combo ends, multiply points by its value. Simple stuff, but pretty addictive, especially because score = currency so you're definitely gonna want to focus on it. It turns what would have been a slow, defensive game into a rapid-fire series of small choices in every fight. Frankly anything even lightly grazed by Hideki Kamiya might just be destined to have a great combat loop, because when it comes to core gameplay loop, PN03's really great. However, this game was rushed like hell- It was developed in seven months and quite literally every corner had to be cut to push it out that fast. It's a miracle that what works works, but there's a lot that doesn't, so here's a bunch of thoughts (most negative):
-I think Vanessa is supposed to be a Dante-style wise-cracking too cool for school badass mixed with a femme fatale, but she never really gets to show off in cutscenes and only has two voiced scenes, so unfortunately her character doesn't really carry across too well.
-Enemies are really simple (both in design and function) and kinda erratic, which kinda ruins the flow sometimes.
-Almost all of the dialogue is carried across radio conversations, styled like MGS codecs except without VA, just text. It's all really bland too, it'd honestly have been better to just make it a completely mute game and shoot for a more abstract style. There's exactly one actual story beat, and it's a "my arm was my wife"-tier ending twist.
-All of the game takes place in pristine white sci-fi corridors, with the exception of one mission and a couple rooms that are on the outside of a desolate planet. It's very repetitive, but mixed with the OST it manages to gain a weird, oniric feel at the best of times. I kinda dig it, though more variation would have been nice.
-Music is REALLY good.
-Plenty of enemies have charged OHKO attacks and that is really annoying to deal with.
-There's a continue system. I wish it wasn't there.
-While I praised the scoring system, things are way too expensive. Throughout my playthrough I could only buy one of the many armors offered to me, and I had to grind to upgrade it into actually being better than the default one (which I had also maxed out).
EDIT: Apparently store prices were a lot lower in the JP version which... sounds better. You're not really missing out on the story at all so maybe just play that.
-Special moves are also tied to armor, which means that through one playthrough you'll get to see 3 or 4 at best, which is a shame since there's a dozen or so.
-The game is way more fun with autofire but to get that you need to buy the few armors that have it and purchase it as an upgrade for them.
-Bosses suck. Not a single one is good and the final boss is both spongey and trial and error.
So despite all that, the fact that I rate PN03 as an overall pretty good action game should really emphasize just how good that core gameplay is. I recommend playing it on Easy, I played on Normal and that was really punishing (save states may have been used sparingly in place of continues), unfair at times. But I do recommend it, which surprised me. It's only some three hours long, extremely linear and overall quite fun. It's also just interesting as a piece of history, especially with how both Vanquish and Bayonetta would pick up on some of its ideas, and pull them off better than it did.
So, PN03 is extremely simple. You run and you shoot, and not both at once (people got mad at this at the time, but it works, honestly given that Mikami would go on to help with RE4 I wouldn't be surprised if that's where that came from). The emphasis is on the defensive side, Vanessa aims on her own, your task is to dodge around attacks. You have a dodge roll (more of a twirl really), a jump and tank controls to do so, and the result is surprisingly swift most of the time. Vanessa is dancing and moving to the beat (kinda, not all songs sync to it) all the time and well-executed fights end up looking like a ballet of weaving through enemy attacks. You also have invincible super moves executed with fighting game-style motion inputs which depend on the suits, more about that in a bit.
What really ties the game together is the scoring system, in all of its simplicity. When you kill an enemy, a timer pops up. Kill another enemy, the timer renews and you start a combo. When the combo ends, multiply points by its value. Simple stuff, but pretty addictive, especially because score = currency so you're definitely gonna want to focus on it. It turns what would have been a slow, defensive game into a rapid-fire series of small choices in every fight. Frankly anything even lightly grazed by Hideki Kamiya might just be destined to have a great combat loop, because when it comes to core gameplay loop, PN03's really great. However, this game was rushed like hell- It was developed in seven months and quite literally every corner had to be cut to push it out that fast. It's a miracle that what works works, but there's a lot that doesn't, so here's a bunch of thoughts (most negative):
-I think Vanessa is supposed to be a Dante-style wise-cracking too cool for school badass mixed with a femme fatale, but she never really gets to show off in cutscenes and only has two voiced scenes, so unfortunately her character doesn't really carry across too well.
-Enemies are really simple (both in design and function) and kinda erratic, which kinda ruins the flow sometimes.
-Almost all of the dialogue is carried across radio conversations, styled like MGS codecs except without VA, just text. It's all really bland too, it'd honestly have been better to just make it a completely mute game and shoot for a more abstract style. There's exactly one actual story beat, and it's a "my arm was my wife"-tier ending twist.
-All of the game takes place in pristine white sci-fi corridors, with the exception of one mission and a couple rooms that are on the outside of a desolate planet. It's very repetitive, but mixed with the OST it manages to gain a weird, oniric feel at the best of times. I kinda dig it, though more variation would have been nice.
-Music is REALLY good.
-Plenty of enemies have charged OHKO attacks and that is really annoying to deal with.
-There's a continue system. I wish it wasn't there.
-While I praised the scoring system, things are way too expensive. Throughout my playthrough I could only buy one of the many armors offered to me, and I had to grind to upgrade it into actually being better than the default one (which I had also maxed out).
EDIT: Apparently store prices were a lot lower in the JP version which... sounds better. You're not really missing out on the story at all so maybe just play that.
-Special moves are also tied to armor, which means that through one playthrough you'll get to see 3 or 4 at best, which is a shame since there's a dozen or so.
-The game is way more fun with autofire but to get that you need to buy the few armors that have it and purchase it as an upgrade for them.
-Bosses suck. Not a single one is good and the final boss is both spongey and trial and error.
So despite all that, the fact that I rate PN03 as an overall pretty good action game should really emphasize just how good that core gameplay is. I recommend playing it on Easy, I played on Normal and that was really punishing (save states may have been used sparingly in place of continues), unfair at times. But I do recommend it, which surprised me. It's only some three hours long, extremely linear and overall quite fun. It's also just interesting as a piece of history, especially with how both Vanquish and Bayonetta would pick up on some of its ideas, and pull them off better than it did.