review
InuYasha
Secret of the Cursed Mask
Review by: Alanna Stardust
Company: Bandai
Rated: PG (Violence)
Version: US
System: PlayStation2 (exclusive)
Players: 1
SHORT VIEW
You’ve been mysteriously transported from modern day Japan to
the Feudal Era. There you meet a half demon dog named InuYasha and
his friends. Can you make your way back to your own time period
while uncovering the secrets of the Cursed Mask? Grab your Sacred
Jewel shards and start saying “SIT!”, it’s the newest InuYasha
game.
THE LONG VIEW
THE HOOK: I love the InuYasha series, and when I saw screen shots in various gaming magazines before this game was released, I thought I’d check it out. Plus it’s an RPG, and I LOVE my RPGs.
HOW IT LOOKS AND FEELS: The characters are in super chibi mode, small bodies, big heads. It doesn’t provide much of a realistic feel to it, but then again, it’s the most adorable thing to see InuYasha running around all cutesy like. The backgrounds in areas you explore are in 2-D, drawn with art dedicated to the anime, and isn’t interactive. The artwork is beautiful though, but the game creators seemed kind of lazy when you find out that all the forests connecting the towns are the same for the most part.
Taking part in battle is turned based, giving you plenty of time to plot out your strategies against the enemy. Picking options from the menu is about as interactive as the controlling gets in battle. Outside battle you run around, talking to people or look at items, or open your menu screen. Challenging, isn’t it?
HOW IT SOUNDS: When you first pop your game into your PS2, the InuYasha theme music plays and leads you to believe that the game will feature the series’ original soundtrack. WRONG. I think this game likes to get your hopes up, it is the essence of deceit. However, to counteract that, all the original English voice actors do the voicing for their characters, so fan girls who just can’t get enough of Richard Cox, celebrate.
EXTRAS:
There are dozens of special sequences throughout the game that you
can open up. Depending one which of the 5 InuYasha characters you
spend your time with, you’ll gain stronger bonds with that
character and unlock different events. There are also two sides of
the story to play, as the original male character, or the original
female character. You’ll probably play through the game more than
once to try and collect everything.
CINEMATIC EXPERIENCE: Original animations were created from it’s origins specifically for this game. So the animated cut scenes you’re seeing look like they belong in an episode of the anime series and are the official goods.
BEST PLAYER: For a short point in the game, you get the chance to have Sesshomaru with your original character after being temporarily separated from the rest of your team. This made me squeal in joy, not only is he just plain awesome, he’s VERY strong. Not many attacks from the enemy even leave a scratch on him, and when he’s dealing the blows, they’re rather powerful. It’s a shame you only get him for a limited segment of the game.
CHEAT CODE YOU NEED: Hate to disapoint, but you’re out of luck. You can search far and wide, but not a cheat in sight.
CHEAT
CODE YOU WANT:
OH
MAN! MOMENT: Listening to that whiny original female character. For
all that is good in the world, her voice is like nails down a
chalkboard. Anytime there was a scene where she spoke, my hands
frantically dove for the remote control’s mute button. I would
have played through her story a second time to unlock more stuff,
but then again, I could also sew my head to the carpet with copper
wire. They both have about the same appeal...
GLITCH
ITCH: After running into an enemy, the battle screen once in a
while can take an insane amount of time to load. On more than one
occasion I was tempted to knock on my PlayStation to see if anyone
was home.
FAN SERVICE: Ah Miroku, everybody’s favorite perverted monk. Those hands of his have a mind of their own, leaving the camera to occasionally zoom in on a girl’s rear.
THE 2 VIEW
I
wouldn’t dare recommend this game to anyone who wasn’t a fan of the
InuYasha series. With the lack of explaining many of the series’
plot points and the references to the Sacred Jewel Shards and Naraku,
anyone who doesn’t watch the show would be completely and utterly
lost. However, if you ARE an InuYasha fan, you’ll probably eat this
game up. Tons of character cameos show up, such as Kagura, Kanna,
Kohaku, Rin, Kikyo, and others.
The battling segment itself is what really makes this game unbelievably easy for any somewhat experienced gamer. During battles once you’ve obtained all your party members (which happens about half an hour into game play), you fight with all 6 members on screen at a time (your original character, InuYasha, Kagome, Sango, Miroku, and Shippo). Leveling up is rather easy, and high level/damage moves such as Miroku’s Wind Tunnel, or InuYasha’s Wind Scar are obtained without much effort.
Characters in battle can eventually learn co-op moves that they perform together for high damage attacks. Whether it’s Shippo’s Fox Fire engulfing Kagome’s scared arrow or Miroku copping a feel off Sango to enrage her and throw her Hiraikotsu at twice the force, you’ll want to try and unlock them all.
Various areas in the game will immediately be recognized by fans, be it Naraku’s castle or Kayade’s village. When traveling around from village to village, you’ll often stop to take a break and spend the day with one of the cast members or your choice. This is where the game allows you to interact with the characters you truly want to be around. Want to hang out with Kagome every time you have a day off? You’re free to do so. Want to spend time with each member? Go for it. The game allows you to decide which segments of the story will progress.
The game feels a tad lame in the aspect of characters talking to each other outside unlocked events however. When they speak, a still cut out of that character is enlarged on the screen and their mouth moves as they speak. There’s no effort at all put into taking advantage of the characters freely moving and being SOMEWHAT realistic.
The
game feels rather short, and the final battle is not difficult at
all. A few of the party members can learn healing abilities to heal
all characters at once. To use special moves, your character can
stock 3 crystals, which they obtain when they either make a good
contacting hit with an enemy, or are damaged slightly severely. It
isn’t hard at all for your characters to get these crystals to power
up their attacks, another reason this game isn’t challenging.
Fans of the series will eat this game up. Everyone else will most likely run screaming into the night. It is a game that’s true to its roots as well as its fans, which is good. The game lacks in the difficulty department and in some voice acting spots, which is BAD. Bandai makes a nice attempt; with some tweaking here and there, this game probably could be an amazing one.
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