The Age of Chaos is upon the Chaltar world! The source of this chaos is rumored to be at the heart of an ancient tower. Join Sadler, Rumi, Kindi, and Fakhyle as they begin a new quest: To learn the secret of the ancient tower and stop the madness spreading over the land. Choose from five different characters as you hack, slash, and bash your way through foreign lands, putrid pyramids, and deadly dungeons while enjoying intense cinema sequences along the way. Will Sadler be able to unlock the secret of the ancient tower and stop the insanity that is spreading throughout the land? Only you can decide that as you guide Sadler through this heart-stopping Action/RPG!
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(Used a romhack to revert difficulty back to the japanese original)
Wicked Phenomenon is a sequel to the 1991 "Exile." And color me impressed, because they somehow managed to make it worse than the first game in nearly every way. It's even shorter (took me nearly 2 hours instead of the first game's 3), even more underdeveloped, more forgettable, and significantly more unpolished. I remember saying "That's it?" when the first game's credits rolled. With this one, I exclaimed the same question, but with much greater exasperation.
The main goal of Wicked Phenomenon is to make use of an opportunity it squandered before. If you've played the first Exile, you may recall that you get all these party members that aren't actually playable, or do a single useful thing in the story, which led me to believe that the game was rushed. Now, you're able to switch between four playable characters (and a 5th one after you make some progress), and each one has some degree of a unique attack move.
Your main character, Sadler, and the 5th playable character has a sword with decent reach. Rumi is a projectile-wielder with long range, Kindi has a short range fist attack that's slow but more powerful, and Fakhyle is a mage that throws slower homing projectiles. Rumi has her moments here and there, but Kindi and Fakhyle are still useless. Kindi's short range attacks are not a worthwhile tradeoff, and Fakhyle's homing projectiles have a mind of their own, rarely targeting that which I wanted and their slowness can cause battles to stall. There is nothing to incentivize you to switch between characters anyway, no moment where you think "Ah-ha, this character will be useful for this part!"
Either way, no amount of characters will save this gameplay, the combat for which I cannot describe in any better way than "It's fucking wretched." The first thing you'll notice is the camera only scrolling if you push against the edge of the screen, rather than keeping your character in the center at all times. This WILL lead to frequent cheap shots, enemies coming out of nowhere and projectiles that you cannot possibly react to, unless you like playing your games by slowly inching forward.
The second thing you'll notice is the questionable enemy hitboxes, with no consistency behind them. Some enemies will deal damage to you even if you're 100% sure that you're not touching them. There are projectiles that you're certain you could duck under, but they'll deal damage to you anyway even as they pass right above you. Special shoutouts to the fire-breathing dragon enemy, with a hitbox that seemingly switched on and off for no discernable reason, and couldn't even be avoided, so it was most often just free damage to myself.
Enemies are also likely to overwhelm you as early as the first or second stage, with erratic movements that require ridiculously fast reflexes. And bear in mind, I'm playing with the difficulty-decreasing romhack, right? And it still fucking sucks! I shudder to think how would this go if I stuck with the regular western version, as Wicked Phenomenon is also known as the game that Working Designs REALLY fucked up, with enemy stats cranked up so high that just about anything is liable to kill you in 3 hits or less. And then you take into account that the game itseIf is just plain broken at times, I can't imagine 90% of people being able to beat the US version, even if 90% people knew about its existence. Everything here feels bad.
I didn't even mention that talking to NPC's sometimes just glitches the fuck out of the game, causing the text box to break and display garbage data as you start pushing the NPC forward in eternity. The only reason this wasn't a major inconvenience is because I had the rewind button, but without it, all I would have to do is restart. It's difficult to say if this is a problem with the romhack or not though, so this point might be left up to subjectivity.
Those were just my gripes with the gameplay, but I'd also like to like to briefly touch on the story. The first Exile's story had promise. Despite being ultimately underdeveloped, the overall idea was that you're interfering in somebody else's war, aiding a mysterious man who you're not sure can be trusted. Will your efforts mean anything, or will they only fuel the flames of war even further? You're never sure if what you're doing is the right thing, and that gives the story enough complexity and thought that you could do something with that.
The sequel in comparison, has nothing even remotely as interesting. It is a black 'n white, stripped down version of what came before. As simple as "Use the power of friendship to stop the bad guy," down to the game itself using the "power of friendship" line word for word. When I was hoping that the sequel would expand on the lore of Exile, it merely made things more basic.
Sadler, the protagonist, is supposed to be an assassin. I have come to the realization that the game does not treat this like a profession. It is a title. A title for a hero. He does not assassinate humans for a price. He assassinates evil monsters from the goodwill of his heart. Perhaps this is all he ever was, and if that's really true, then perhaps I assumed too much when I thought Exile had promise. I was hoping for a world in which nothing is right or wrong, but Wicked Phenomenon chose the boring route in order to tell yet another story of a hero prevailing. It challenges nothing. It makes you think nothing. And then the franchise never got another entry after this one. What I described in the review, is the most likely reason why.
Ironically, the Working Designs cover art for this game may have been the most interesting part of it.
Wicked Phenomenon is a sequel to the 1991 "Exile." And color me impressed, because they somehow managed to make it worse than the first game in nearly every way. It's even shorter (took me nearly 2 hours instead of the first game's 3), even more underdeveloped, more forgettable, and significantly more unpolished. I remember saying "That's it?" when the first game's credits rolled. With this one, I exclaimed the same question, but with much greater exasperation.
The main goal of Wicked Phenomenon is to make use of an opportunity it squandered before. If you've played the first Exile, you may recall that you get all these party members that aren't actually playable, or do a single useful thing in the story, which led me to believe that the game was rushed. Now, you're able to switch between four playable characters (and a 5th one after you make some progress), and each one has some degree of a unique attack move.
Your main character, Sadler, and the 5th playable character has a sword with decent reach. Rumi is a projectile-wielder with long range, Kindi has a short range fist attack that's slow but more powerful, and Fakhyle is a mage that throws slower homing projectiles. Rumi has her moments here and there, but Kindi and Fakhyle are still useless. Kindi's short range attacks are not a worthwhile tradeoff, and Fakhyle's homing projectiles have a mind of their own, rarely targeting that which I wanted and their slowness can cause battles to stall. There is nothing to incentivize you to switch between characters anyway, no moment where you think "Ah-ha, this character will be useful for this part!"
Either way, no amount of characters will save this gameplay, the combat for which I cannot describe in any better way than "It's fucking wretched." The first thing you'll notice is the camera only scrolling if you push against the edge of the screen, rather than keeping your character in the center at all times. This WILL lead to frequent cheap shots, enemies coming out of nowhere and projectiles that you cannot possibly react to, unless you like playing your games by slowly inching forward.
The second thing you'll notice is the questionable enemy hitboxes, with no consistency behind them. Some enemies will deal damage to you even if you're 100% sure that you're not touching them. There are projectiles that you're certain you could duck under, but they'll deal damage to you anyway even as they pass right above you. Special shoutouts to the fire-breathing dragon enemy, with a hitbox that seemingly switched on and off for no discernable reason, and couldn't even be avoided, so it was most often just free damage to myself.
Enemies are also likely to overwhelm you as early as the first or second stage, with erratic movements that require ridiculously fast reflexes. And bear in mind, I'm playing with the difficulty-decreasing romhack, right? And it still fucking sucks! I shudder to think how would this go if I stuck with the regular western version, as Wicked Phenomenon is also known as the game that Working Designs REALLY fucked up, with enemy stats cranked up so high that just about anything is liable to kill you in 3 hits or less. And then you take into account that the game itseIf is just plain broken at times, I can't imagine 90% of people being able to beat the US version, even if 90% people knew about its existence. Everything here feels bad.
I didn't even mention that talking to NPC's sometimes just glitches the fuck out of the game, causing the text box to break and display garbage data as you start pushing the NPC forward in eternity. The only reason this wasn't a major inconvenience is because I had the rewind button, but without it, all I would have to do is restart. It's difficult to say if this is a problem with the romhack or not though, so this point might be left up to subjectivity.
Those were just my gripes with the gameplay, but I'd also like to like to briefly touch on the story. The first Exile's story had promise. Despite being ultimately underdeveloped, the overall idea was that you're interfering in somebody else's war, aiding a mysterious man who you're not sure can be trusted. Will your efforts mean anything, or will they only fuel the flames of war even further? You're never sure if what you're doing is the right thing, and that gives the story enough complexity and thought that you could do something with that.
The sequel in comparison, has nothing even remotely as interesting. It is a black 'n white, stripped down version of what came before. As simple as "Use the power of friendship to stop the bad guy," down to the game itself using the "power of friendship" line word for word. When I was hoping that the sequel would expand on the lore of Exile, it merely made things more basic.
Sadler, the protagonist, is supposed to be an assassin. I have come to the realization that the game does not treat this like a profession. It is a title. A title for a hero. He does not assassinate humans for a price. He assassinates evil monsters from the goodwill of his heart. Perhaps this is all he ever was, and if that's really true, then perhaps I assumed too much when I thought Exile had promise. I was hoping for a world in which nothing is right or wrong, but Wicked Phenomenon chose the boring route in order to tell yet another story of a hero prevailing. It challenges nothing. It makes you think nothing. And then the franchise never got another entry after this one. What I described in the review, is the most likely reason why.
Ironically, the Working Designs cover art for this game may have been the most interesting part of it.
holy shit working designs