Legend of White Whale by Scott
Cawthon (Animdude) reviewed by Maladroit Him (Brandon Abley) Medium: Multimedia Fusion |
Note - This is another hi-res game, so be sure
to click Impression
Wow. This game is definitely contending for that spot in my heart where I identify my favorite Indie Game. It's absolutely amazing. It's nearly perfect. You've probably figured out from the above screenshot that, visually, this is a very strange game. It's bright, colorful, and uses pre-rendered graphics that remind me a lot of Donkey Kong Country and Super Mario RPG. The maps are very detailed, and the engine AnimDude is using allows him to pile up sprites in ways that make the maps look very, very deep. The color depth is extremely high, and everything looks fantastic. This game is, first and foremost, a graphical one -- and it does not disappoint in that department by any means.
Of course, there is always more to a game that its graphics. In many ways, this game disappoints as much as it pleases in this department. It certainly plays like something that was developed from beginning to end; the beginning of the game was designed first, and the end of the game was designed last. This certainly seems like the logical approach. But when a game is designed that way, there are certain inconsistencies that can be either good or bad, depending on which particular inconsistency is looked at. For example, the first few screens are absolutely awe-inspiring. The mushroom village is so richly detailed that it hurts. But as you progress further through the game, the areas become less creative and more "tiled" - while the sprites aren't stacked up in tiles per se, they certainly are stacked up, and sometimes the borders can look a bit awkward. Compare the above screenshot with the below one, for example.
*HOWEVER*: Get the sinful notion out of your head that this game at any point looks bad, since that simply is not true. Every single moment of this game is smoothly animated, colorful, creatively inspired, and exceptionally well-rendered. It is true, though, that the beginning of the game looks a lot better than the middle and the end of the game. The only exception to this rule is the final area. The final area in the game is perhaps the most atsmospheric and attractive.
The battles in this game are . . . avant garde. For starters, the monster designs are universally zany and the game's central characters are mushrooms with very large and very deadly hands. The battlers tend to fly around a lot as they attack and there are a lot of explosions. At first, the battles seem like little more than stripped-down RPG battles that are far too easy and far too typical. Early on in the game, enemies have a ton of hitpoints and aren't in any way much of a threat to your well-being. And, since you only ever fight one enemy at a time (3 and 1 is unfair, isn't it?), they are also very boring to fight. But as the game progresses, the fights get progessively more strategic and difficult. And once you have enough money to afford a big pile of items, and when the enemies become challenging enough to make then necessary, things get really interesting.
In Legend of White Whale, you have a total number of 8commands: attack, charge, run, special, item, sunshine, charm, and angry!. The catch is that each character can only use three of them. Chup has stronger attacks, and can charge then up, and can run. Frup can use items and special attacks, but he is half as fast as the other two. And Priss can heal your party and occasionally use a charm attack to steal the enemy's turn. This makes a very limited system suddenly very interesting. Sure, you can stock up on items, but you can't use them if Frup dies. And while Frup can heal the party much more effectively than Priss, items are expensive, and Priss' Sunshine attack is free. And even though Chup's attacks are weaker than Frup's Special moves, his charge only takes up a third of a turn, so if you work it right, he can do a lot more damage overall. Later in the game these relationships become key, as you try to balance out damage and healing in a way that will allow you to win. It's a great deal of fun. Also, each character has Angry! maneuvers stolen right out of Final Fantasy 7. While note entirely original, they added the final touch of depth that the battles needed to keep from boring me out of my skull early on. The only really bad things I have to say about this games battles are 1) the beginning of the game is really annoying and 2) there is only one battle backdrop, regardless of which map one is on. I must add this: the final boss battle had me literally on the edge of my leather-upholsted computer chair. Amazing. One of the best final battles, ever. There a few puzzles too, but very little beyond the find-the-switch-this-is-only-slightly-more-interesting-than-simply-walking-in-a-straight-line-through-the-area sort. They weren't remarkable at all, but they weren't boring or frustrating at all. The entirety of Legend of White Whale was surprisingly well-balanced and and smoothly paced throughout. Since that is an area where many Indie Games fall flat (due to lack of dedicated playtesting resources), it's certainly worth mentioning. Unfortunately, the story really falls short. There are no cutscenes whatsoever, aside from the beginning and end of the game, where you get text scrolling across the screen. There's a little bit of dialogue, but it's not particularly interesting in any sense of the word and there are a lot of typos. It also pops up pretty randomly and I often accidentally skipped past it all. The game is bruisingly linear, with a few secret things on the side. But even though there is little variety, and there's really no story development to speak of, it's still fun. Loads of fun. Legend of White Whale is so damn charming and gorgeous that the player will probably find himself completely ignoring the game's shortfalls. The presentation of the story and lack of secrets are often telltale signs of sloppiness and laziness, but in this case, there is absolutely no way someone could argue this was a sloppy or lazy game in any regard. Technical Graphics
Well, I don't have much to say. A person doesn't just pull graphics like these out of his ass without enormous talent in 3D graphic design and animating. Everything in this game is so well-blended and well-rendered and professional-looking that it would be had to imagine it wasn't a professional work from a couple of years ago. This is a completely separate monster from the sheer artistic mastery of this game. There are a few graphical bugs here and there, such as layer issues with the sprited maps later in the game. But overall, the graphics are some of the most carefully assembled resources I have ever seen. Furthermore, the game gets brownie points for the hard work in the graphics being 100% original, which is, much to my dismay, a rare sight in the world of Indie Gaming. There's only so much one can do with someone else's resources. Code I can only recall a small number of major bugs in the entire game (except from the occasional sprite layer issue), and I'm fairly certain they are issues with Multimedia Fusion and not something AnimDude could have helped. These were all crashing bugs caused by me alt-tabbing in and out of the game constantly to take notes or screenshots, and they aren't something I would expect most players to encounter. But regardless of the small number of bugs, one needs to take into account that AnimDude has programmed an entire game engine that works and is fun. That's pretty impressive, considering the only other person mentioned in the credits was a beta tester. Furthermore, not only is the entire game hard-coded by the author, but the game is also an enormous amount of fun. It reminds me slightly of Gythol Granditti in that regard, which is a game that I respect a great deal more than I like. I'm not that familiar with Multimedia Fusion, so I have no idea just how much work it actually was to code this game, but given the vast array of animations I would be willing to bet it was a great deal. I congratulate the author on a job well done and worked hard on. Furthermore, other than the aforementioned errors that probably aren't AnimDude's fault, I was unable to detect a single bug anywhere throughout this entire game. Amazing. To think that, after putting such a huge amount of work into this game's resources and engine design, the game would be tweaked to the point of being absolutely bug-free, is to me something very impressive. I've played a lot of substantially less ambitious RPG Maker games that have more bugs than this. I would also like to bring up the very unusual approach to saving. Character stats are saved constantly and automatically (basically, the level of experience). However, one needs to step on save points to save one's progress and location. I can't really understand why the game is set up this way; the only explanation I can come to is that the characters' levels of experience are constantly updated in some sort of hard database somewhere in the game file, and that they cannot be reversed. Also a new game can't be started unless the game is downloaded a second time. Weird. Sound The game played MIDIs and sound effects. Not much to say here, other than a complaint that there is only one sound channel. Sometimes the game would sound kind of awkward, because a new sound effect would mute out a sound effect being played previous to it. I thought the MIDIs were catchy, but they weren't composed specifically for the game from what I can tell, and there weren't any sound physics or anything I would talk about. Artistry
This is probably, next to Sunset Over Imdahl, the most artistic Indie Game I've yet played. It's rich colors, wide range of environments, and really quirky atmosphere really make for an excellent overall impression. As far as creativity and aesthetic appeal goes, this game leaves no room for disappointment. The character and monster designs are all very interesting, if not prolific enough. While there are a total of less than 20 different monsters throughout the entire game, there is also a total of less than fifty to sixty battles that occur through the entire game. The player will not tire of seeing the same monsters over and over again, since the same monster is rarely seen more than five times or so. Every single one of these monsters, however, boasts a zany, violent cuteness that I haven't seen since Sovan Jedi's monster packs back in 2000. The characters, too, look at the same time intimidating and harmless. Their smooth contours and enlarged eyes contrast with clenched fists and narrowed brows in way that simply messes with one's emotions. Not only are the graphics well-rendered, but they are also well-used. Animdude boasts a sharp eye for composition, as many of the screenshots above prove. Everything is always arranged on the screen in a way that is balanced, but not symmetrical. In some areas, the camera will switch angles, becoming less isometric and closer to a profile view. These areas are particularly well composed, usually showing windmills slowly turning miles away in the distance or the craggy face of a cliff. Simply put, Legend of White While showcases an excellent photographic sensibility on the part of the author. Everything fits so perfectly in this game. The gameplay, the atmosphere, the music (even though it is not original, unfortunately), and other elements simply belong together. The trite little puzzles and overblown special attacks seem absolutely appropriate for a game starring three fighting fungi. The jazzy MIDI music is just musical enough and just silly enough to set the mood. Legend of White Whale is a title that constantly inches towards feeling like an acid trip, but never loses touch with reality. It is a game that feels good and just a little strange. The only creative area this game has any shortfall in would definitely be the cinematic/literary department. Like I've said, Legend of White Whale has very little dialogue, and the dialogue it has is sort of confusing and random and not particularly well written. The intro, chapter title, and ending scripts are adequately written, but they aren't enough to substitute for a plot. And, of course, there is not a single scripted cutscene, which is truly unfortunate, as it would have provided the author a chance to really shine with his 3D animation. But even though it has no plot, AnimDude's Legend of White Whale still flows and is still paced well. I cared about what I was doing the whole way through the game, because the characters talked just enough to keep me from forgetting that they existed. And though they never did much to make me care for them individually, they did serve successfully to keep me interested in the adventure. AnimDude's world turns out, in the end, to be a pretty interesting place -- he just doesn't give out enough details to let the player really appreciate it. What this game provides is a fun, 4-6 hour adventure that makes the player feel good about life and is usually challenging but never frustrating. Legend of White Whale is well-designed game boasting some incredibly impressive visuals that no Indie Gamer should pass up. Play or Not? Must Play. Reviewer's Notes Play Session one: 10:09 PM 1/19/05 BUG! - "Heroes" is misspelled in the begininng! End Session one: 11:32 PM 1/19/05 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Play Session two: 12:13 AM 1/20105 - Weird, the game saved before crashing. End Session two: 12:57 AM 1/21/05 ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Play Session three: 1:01 PM 1/22/05 BUG - The lower-right teleport by the first lava monster leads
me to some weird, random place. End Session three: 2:44 PM 1/22/05 Total Play Time: About 4:30 hours |
