As a story/experience/whatever word you wanna use, it's alright! I played this in preparation for Solatorobo, which from the minor glimpses I've seen at it is probably more my speed, but this is okay. The writing can get a little tacky but it can occasionally get a little heartfelt too. Waffle has the same VA as Luke from the Professor Layton games which is kinda funny. It's certainly nothing special, not even close, but it's fine and would do the job in anything with a more engaging gameplay loop.
But as a game? This is legitimately one of the worst 3rd person platformers/shooters I've ever played lmao. It's like the Tails/Eggman stages from Sonic Adventure 2 but worse, somehow. Basically everything that could go wrong did. Lethargic movement, with no way to go any faster than a speedwalk. No analog movement either, you have to use a D-Pad. No way to adjust the camera except for moving it up and down. Even on easy difficulty (which I switched to about 2/3s through the game out of frustration), basically every enemy is a bullet sponge taking upwards of 20-30 slow hits to go down, and in boss fights getting hit yourself often locks you into getting hit again, and again. Sometimes single attacks will just knock out 80% of your health in one hit.
These numerous gameplay blunders make sense in the 90s, when the number of "good 3d platformers" could probably be counted on one hand, but that doesn't make it any less irritating to play nowadays. Absolutely no clue how someone could make it through this without savescumming through an emulator (ESPECIALLY some of those platforming sections, doing precise movements, with a camera that moves however it wants, with only d-pad movement, is just... horrible).
All in all, I kind of disliked playing this a fair bit? The characters are alright and the story is neat and the music is cool but wow is the gameplay crusty as all hell. I'm still planning on playing Solatorobo since that looked cooler than this anyways, though. Hopefully that isn't as bad!
But as a game? This is legitimately one of the worst 3rd person platformers/shooters I've ever played lmao. It's like the Tails/Eggman stages from Sonic Adventure 2 but worse, somehow. Basically everything that could go wrong did. Lethargic movement, with no way to go any faster than a speedwalk. No analog movement either, you have to use a D-Pad. No way to adjust the camera except for moving it up and down. Even on easy difficulty (which I switched to about 2/3s through the game out of frustration), basically every enemy is a bullet sponge taking upwards of 20-30 slow hits to go down, and in boss fights getting hit yourself often locks you into getting hit again, and again. Sometimes single attacks will just knock out 80% of your health in one hit.
These numerous gameplay blunders make sense in the 90s, when the number of "good 3d platformers" could probably be counted on one hand, but that doesn't make it any less irritating to play nowadays. Absolutely no clue how someone could make it through this without savescumming through an emulator (ESPECIALLY some of those platforming sections, doing precise movements, with a camera that moves however it wants, with only d-pad movement, is just... horrible).
All in all, I kind of disliked playing this a fair bit? The characters are alright and the story is neat and the music is cool but wow is the gameplay crusty as all hell. I'm still planning on playing Solatorobo since that looked cooler than this anyways, though. Hopefully that isn't as bad!