More and more I find myself wondering if it's all worth fighting for. For a future without Balan Wonderworld... Yeah, it's worth it.
Much like the Shadow the Hedgehog happy meal toy from McDonald's, the genius minds behind this game decided it would be played with a single button, leading to some truly innovative outcomes. Do you like platformers where you lose the ability to jump? Well then they have you covered. Yuji's hubris ultimately led to his own downfall, demanding over 80 unique costumes and abilities associated with them, which of course is hardly feasible unless you want a game filled with gimmicks. Many of the costumes actually overlap and make each other completely redundant, on top of the fact you lose the costume upon being hit.
So what's the deal here anyway? It seems like funny Balan invites people with some kind of inner turmoil into this dream world so they can get some kind of resolution. A farmer who lost all of his yield in a tornado, but finds one surviving crop, giving him hope. A woman who almost drowned getting over her fear of seeing the dolphin she was friends with again. And then of course, turning back time to revive a dead cat so the girl isn't sad anymore? One of these isn't like the others. It seems Balan is actually some kind of godlike entity who can manipulate the laws of reality at will. Or perhaps as everything seems to suggest, the entire game is merely some kind of stage play and none of it is real. Who knows what was being cooked.
The tower of tims deserves a special mention here. Gone are the days of stat raising in the Chao garden, and now we have what is essentially a glorified pachinko machine. Instead of using money, you relinquish something more valuable, and that is your time. It's no exaggeration to say that by participating in this facet of supposed content, the game is actively killing you in real life in a slow and tedious process. All you're really doing is feeding some birds and watching them jump into a clockwork machine which doesn't even work. The developers couldn't even get the tims to traverse this monstrosity and most of the time they end up falling from the top. Riveting.
Who likes quick time events? I LOVE the part of the game where you have to do like 70 of them perfectly, or close the game entirely to try again. The alternative would be to fail, resulting in you needing to go and kill the world boss again, just so you can have another attempt. Everything in this game is trying to inconvenience you. None of it is fun. The most entertaining part was playing with two players and trying to break the game by combining different abilities to skip most of the levels. Yet, in the end I went back and got that coveted 100% completion. Yay.
The verdict is in. The punishment for insider trading should be to get 100% completion in this game, live on stream from prison. Let this man feel the consequences of his actions. Yuji Naka, may you never cook again.
Much like the Shadow the Hedgehog happy meal toy from McDonald's, the genius minds behind this game decided it would be played with a single button, leading to some truly innovative outcomes. Do you like platformers where you lose the ability to jump? Well then they have you covered. Yuji's hubris ultimately led to his own downfall, demanding over 80 unique costumes and abilities associated with them, which of course is hardly feasible unless you want a game filled with gimmicks. Many of the costumes actually overlap and make each other completely redundant, on top of the fact you lose the costume upon being hit.
So what's the deal here anyway? It seems like funny Balan invites people with some kind of inner turmoil into this dream world so they can get some kind of resolution. A farmer who lost all of his yield in a tornado, but finds one surviving crop, giving him hope. A woman who almost drowned getting over her fear of seeing the dolphin she was friends with again. And then of course, turning back time to revive a dead cat so the girl isn't sad anymore? One of these isn't like the others. It seems Balan is actually some kind of godlike entity who can manipulate the laws of reality at will. Or perhaps as everything seems to suggest, the entire game is merely some kind of stage play and none of it is real. Who knows what was being cooked.
The tower of tims deserves a special mention here. Gone are the days of stat raising in the Chao garden, and now we have what is essentially a glorified pachinko machine. Instead of using money, you relinquish something more valuable, and that is your time. It's no exaggeration to say that by participating in this facet of supposed content, the game is actively killing you in real life in a slow and tedious process. All you're really doing is feeding some birds and watching them jump into a clockwork machine which doesn't even work. The developers couldn't even get the tims to traverse this monstrosity and most of the time they end up falling from the top. Riveting.
Who likes quick time events? I LOVE the part of the game where you have to do like 70 of them perfectly, or close the game entirely to try again. The alternative would be to fail, resulting in you needing to go and kill the world boss again, just so you can have another attempt. Everything in this game is trying to inconvenience you. None of it is fun. The most entertaining part was playing with two players and trying to break the game by combining different abilities to skip most of the levels. Yet, in the end I went back and got that coveted 100% completion. Yay.
The verdict is in. The punishment for insider trading should be to get 100% completion in this game, live on stream from prison. Let this man feel the consequences of his actions. Yuji Naka, may you never cook again.