CW: There is a minor "spoiler" about a translation error, but otherwise, there are no spoilers in this review.
I am a lover and hater of RPGs. Some of my favorite games are RPGs. And, some of my least favorite games are RPGs.
Franken, then, is a satire of something I both love and despise, and all of its critiques are ones I agree with. What's the problem with turn-based combat? It's rudimentary. What's the problem with progression? It's confusing. What's the problem with characters? They're plain and so archetypal that they could bend their back to make a semicircle and feel no pain. How does Franken go about critiquing these problems of RPGs, though? By being the most rudimentary, confusing RPG that has the plainest and most archetypal characters.
Franken's name really says it all. The game is frank and curt; no aspect of an RPG is sacred. Its humor is sharp and relies on character development and sudden tonal or situational whiplash; the jokes may not always be pertinent to the critique of a stereotypical RPG, yet I still enjoyed all of them.
However, how much of the game is intentional critique? How much constitute mistakes? I try not to rely on this distinction as the process of creation often incurs happy accidents which benefit the overall message. Franken's art straddles a line between critique and error with such a haphazard attitude that I'm not sure what to think. The game genuinely hurt my eyes to look at as the camera follows the character at the sprite's center, a point which changes during the up/down walking animation, so that it looks as though the world vibrates before your very eyes. Is that a critique? Is that a problem others experience in RPGs? That their eyes hurt looking at them? I, for one, have not encountered that problem even in prototypical RPGs. Playing Final Fantasy 1, I don't remember needing to take breaks when walking around the world map for more than a few minutes. I'm not so sure RPGs are games which hurt my eyes to look at more than Franken does, so how important is that critique? Or, is it even one at all?
I do not mean to say that Franken's art style is visually displeasing. Splendidland has a thorough understanding of NES sprite art, mimicking every aspect of their design, from the classic two-frame cycle to characters' body proportions. The sprite work is genuinely jaw-dropping. From the perspective of someone who has tried (and failed horribly) to make about 5 sprite-based games of my own that mimic NES or SNES artwork, Splendidland's artistic mimicry is so close to the original format that some may not notice the similarities.
I am also mixed on some of the game's dialogue, housing a few typos here and there, with one of them occurring with the beacon boys. The two characters have the same line in Morse code that reads, "over tsere." There is a missing "*" in the line which would change the "s" to an "h." Right now, there are three dots when there should be 4 if my assumption about this being a typo is correct. Enemies' attacks also replicate a common direct translation tactic, wherein the dialogue says "enemy's attack" instead of "enemy attacks." I assumed that this decision was a part of the critique as it is a result of directly translating from Japanese, a language that often defaults to nouns in a sentence more often than English does. The Japanese equivalent would read, 「敵の攻撃」("teki no kougeki" for those who don't know Japanese), directly meaning "enemy's attack." My question is, what is the purpose behind the critique of an RPG's translation? Is it lambasting the underpaid, overworked translators who would translate prototypical RPGs in the 1980s and 1990s? Is it instead lambasting only the dialogue by mimicking its awkwardness? Is it trying to lambast the structure of the Japanese language? I am not certain, and that ambiguity is not comfortable when a language's grammar construction or workers in poor conditions are the potential punchline to a joke.
For being a short yet concise satire, I think some of the minor intricacies of this game deserve more thought. The details matter in a game this brief because the details are what define the game, too. Details in sprite work are gorgeous and praiseworthy for their mimicry. Details in the comedy and placement of characters is praiseworthy. Details in even the musical choices and bestiary are hilarious and so integral to the experience. Please, please play Franken for its details and its intricacies, because they are what makes Franken such an honest critique of genre I hate and a genre I love.
I am a lover and hater of RPGs. Some of my favorite games are RPGs. And, some of my least favorite games are RPGs.
Franken, then, is a satire of something I both love and despise, and all of its critiques are ones I agree with. What's the problem with turn-based combat? It's rudimentary. What's the problem with progression? It's confusing. What's the problem with characters? They're plain and so archetypal that they could bend their back to make a semicircle and feel no pain. How does Franken go about critiquing these problems of RPGs, though? By being the most rudimentary, confusing RPG that has the plainest and most archetypal characters.
Franken's name really says it all. The game is frank and curt; no aspect of an RPG is sacred. Its humor is sharp and relies on character development and sudden tonal or situational whiplash; the jokes may not always be pertinent to the critique of a stereotypical RPG, yet I still enjoyed all of them.
However, how much of the game is intentional critique? How much constitute mistakes? I try not to rely on this distinction as the process of creation often incurs happy accidents which benefit the overall message. Franken's art straddles a line between critique and error with such a haphazard attitude that I'm not sure what to think. The game genuinely hurt my eyes to look at as the camera follows the character at the sprite's center, a point which changes during the up/down walking animation, so that it looks as though the world vibrates before your very eyes. Is that a critique? Is that a problem others experience in RPGs? That their eyes hurt looking at them? I, for one, have not encountered that problem even in prototypical RPGs. Playing Final Fantasy 1, I don't remember needing to take breaks when walking around the world map for more than a few minutes. I'm not so sure RPGs are games which hurt my eyes to look at more than Franken does, so how important is that critique? Or, is it even one at all?
I do not mean to say that Franken's art style is visually displeasing. Splendidland has a thorough understanding of NES sprite art, mimicking every aspect of their design, from the classic two-frame cycle to characters' body proportions. The sprite work is genuinely jaw-dropping. From the perspective of someone who has tried (and failed horribly) to make about 5 sprite-based games of my own that mimic NES or SNES artwork, Splendidland's artistic mimicry is so close to the original format that some may not notice the similarities.
I am also mixed on some of the game's dialogue, housing a few typos here and there, with one of them occurring with the beacon boys. The two characters have the same line in Morse code that reads, "over tsere." There is a missing "*" in the line which would change the "s" to an "h." Right now, there are three dots when there should be 4 if my assumption about this being a typo is correct. Enemies' attacks also replicate a common direct translation tactic, wherein the dialogue says "enemy's attack" instead of "enemy attacks." I assumed that this decision was a part of the critique as it is a result of directly translating from Japanese, a language that often defaults to nouns in a sentence more often than English does. The Japanese equivalent would read, 「敵の攻撃」("teki no kougeki" for those who don't know Japanese), directly meaning "enemy's attack." My question is, what is the purpose behind the critique of an RPG's translation? Is it lambasting the underpaid, overworked translators who would translate prototypical RPGs in the 1980s and 1990s? Is it instead lambasting only the dialogue by mimicking its awkwardness? Is it trying to lambast the structure of the Japanese language? I am not certain, and that ambiguity is not comfortable when a language's grammar construction or workers in poor conditions are the potential punchline to a joke.
For being a short yet concise satire, I think some of the minor intricacies of this game deserve more thought. The details matter in a game this brief because the details are what define the game, too. Details in sprite work are gorgeous and praiseworthy for their mimicry. Details in the comedy and placement of characters is praiseworthy. Details in even the musical choices and bestiary are hilarious and so integral to the experience. Please, please play Franken for its details and its intricacies, because they are what makes Franken such an honest critique of genre I hate and a genre I love.