Interesting game. NGL I've always been interested in this game solely on just how nice the box art looked and had no idea what the actual game was about or how it played, so I'm happy to actually have seen what's behind that beautiful cover.
It's an FPS type thing where you use the wii pointer to aim and blast these little sprite-y dudes called elebits in order to capture em. Levels are set on a timer where there's a point quota that ya gotta meet and different elebits are worth different amounts of points. The main gimmick though, is that the elebits are hiding in various places and your gun happens to double as a phys/gravity gun that can freely lift and move all sorts of things. There are also specific elebits that level up your gun and allow you to manipulate heavier and heavier things, and every level pretty much ends up looking like a tornado went through it. There's a very visceral energy to playing this, just saying "fuck this tree" or whatever as you launch it into the stratosphere, or just ripping drawers out of desks and smashing through full closets looking for more mfers to blast. That being said though, this is a launch-window wii game that tries to deal with hundreds of dynamic physics items onscreen at once, and that much processing brings the wii down to its kniis as it struggles to keep any semblance of a smooth framerate going. The chunky FPS plus the fact that the sensitive pointer controls move the camera all around from all the shooting makes the game certainly a bit dizzying to play in long bursts. The later half of playing levels can also be a bit difficult to move around in thanks to all the shit that's thrown on the floor and the levels where you have to worry about not making noise/breaking certain things certainly add variety but feel antithetical to the games primal "fuck everything in this room up" vibe that the gameplay goes for. If anything, I wish this concept would be done again on modern hardware, especially in VR, as doofy make-a-mess-with-physics games are always popular there and the hardware can actually power it this time. Too bad konami isn't interested in doing anything cool anymore...
It's just some dumb mindless fun. If I had this game back in the day as a kid I probably would have enjoyed just throwing everything around, framerate be damned. Certainly worth a play, though you'd probably get a better experience playing this on an emulator or something where the game would run smoother and have widescreen. The OST is done by konami's A-team, with Bemani and Castlevania people working on it and it owns. There are even plenty of fun konami references strewn about, like how the arcades have real modeled bemani arcade machines (but no DDR cabs :C) and the creepy bunny thing from silent hill as the mascot of the amusement park levels (which I haven't played any silent hill games, but isn't that like not a good character to be a kids mascot?). The in-game visuals are pretty just existent for a wii game, but the key art and cutscene art is absolutely wonderfully drawn with an excellent dream-like use of color and lighting, like I said before the artwork was literally what drew me to the game in the first place. With how wholesome and pleasant that artwork looks, I sure bet the main artist went on to become famous for other absolutely pleasant and wholesome things!
It's an FPS type thing where you use the wii pointer to aim and blast these little sprite-y dudes called elebits in order to capture em. Levels are set on a timer where there's a point quota that ya gotta meet and different elebits are worth different amounts of points. The main gimmick though, is that the elebits are hiding in various places and your gun happens to double as a phys/gravity gun that can freely lift and move all sorts of things. There are also specific elebits that level up your gun and allow you to manipulate heavier and heavier things, and every level pretty much ends up looking like a tornado went through it. There's a very visceral energy to playing this, just saying "fuck this tree" or whatever as you launch it into the stratosphere, or just ripping drawers out of desks and smashing through full closets looking for more mfers to blast. That being said though, this is a launch-window wii game that tries to deal with hundreds of dynamic physics items onscreen at once, and that much processing brings the wii down to its kniis as it struggles to keep any semblance of a smooth framerate going. The chunky FPS plus the fact that the sensitive pointer controls move the camera all around from all the shooting makes the game certainly a bit dizzying to play in long bursts. The later half of playing levels can also be a bit difficult to move around in thanks to all the shit that's thrown on the floor and the levels where you have to worry about not making noise/breaking certain things certainly add variety but feel antithetical to the games primal "fuck everything in this room up" vibe that the gameplay goes for. If anything, I wish this concept would be done again on modern hardware, especially in VR, as doofy make-a-mess-with-physics games are always popular there and the hardware can actually power it this time. Too bad konami isn't interested in doing anything cool anymore...
It's just some dumb mindless fun. If I had this game back in the day as a kid I probably would have enjoyed just throwing everything around, framerate be damned. Certainly worth a play, though you'd probably get a better experience playing this on an emulator or something where the game would run smoother and have widescreen. The OST is done by konami's A-team, with Bemani and Castlevania people working on it and it owns. There are even plenty of fun konami references strewn about, like how the arcades have real modeled bemani arcade machines (but no DDR cabs :C) and the creepy bunny thing from silent hill as the mascot of the amusement park levels (which I haven't played any silent hill games, but isn't that like not a good character to be a kids mascot?). The in-game visuals are pretty just existent for a wii game, but the key art and cutscene art is absolutely wonderfully drawn with an excellent dream-like use of color and lighting, like I said before the artwork was literally what drew me to the game in the first place. With how wholesome and pleasant that artwork looks, I sure bet the main artist went on to become famous for other absolutely pleasant and wholesome things!
electrode
2 months ago