Friday, June 12, 2009

Klonoa: Door to Phantomile - Vision 2-1

Time: Friday 6:05pm
Games Played: Quordy, Klonoa
Drinks Consumed: 1 Sugar Free Rockstar

When I moved in December, my component cable for my PS2 finally bit the dust. It had never been quite right since moving to New York and it finally gave up the ghost. Because I am cheap, I waited until I had a significant amount of things I wanted from monoprice before I ordered a replacement. I finally got it on Monday. Because I am a graphics whore and wouldn't deign to play my PS2 without the best possible graphics, I hadn't played any PlayStation games since I moved (except to test them on an, ugh, composite cable). Klonoa is thus re-breaking in my PS2.

Klonoa was a recent fun club over at Talking Time. It also recently got a re-release for Wii. And it's truly great. Only having played through three levels so far, I can see what makes it so good: the level design.

Klonoa is, at heart, a 2D platformer. You play as some non-descript rodent-like animal that can jump and shoot. Though the game is basically 2D, it is rendered in a 3D engine with levels that rotate and turn as you move through them. Additionally, things come from the foreground and background and you occasionally interact with them.

I'm playing the PlayStation version and am really impressed at the graphics. 3D on the original PlayStation sometimes looks quite ugly, but this game is a treat. Extremely colorful without to many harsh angles or muddied textures. And detailed where necessary.

But it's the level design that really makes this game. There are basically only four things you can do (jump, shoot, throw enemies, and double-jump when you have an enemy) and each level portion is designed best to show how you need to use these to get past. So far it hasn't been too easy, but the penalties for failure also haven't been very extreme so it's almost like puzzling your way on how to advance in each situation. Through in bonus items that take even more to collect and background elements that spring you or blow you upwards and navigating the game is a treat.

1 comment:

N1JER said...

I had forgotten it was Video Game Weekend!! Keep me posted on how you are making out; I'm around all weekend as Emily is parting hardcore up in CT :)