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CHOCOBO'S MYSTERIOUS DUNGEON
SCPS 45163-4
Copyright © 1997 Square
Song Playstation, 1 Player
RPG
Available in Japan
¥ 5,800
—by Maria M. Rider
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With the popularity of Squaresoft's most recent RPGs,
FINAL FANTASY 7 and
FINAL FANTASY TACTICS, comes yet another
one to add to the line-up.
CHOCOBO'S MYSTERIOUS DUNGEON takes
place in the FINAL FANTASY world and brings the player
through a myriad of adventures, stunning cinemas, and new
arrangements of the original FINAL FANTASY musical score.
CHOCOBO'S MYSTERIOUS DUNGEON
is a traditional RPG through and through as the player assumes
the role of a cute Super-Deformed chocobo. The player takes
him through dungeon after dungeon to battle the evil monsters
within, gain experience, and win the girl in the end. The
game starts out innocently enough with the main character
carrying his trusty mog friend, Atra, on his back. They meet
up and talk to a chocobo farmer who is plowing in the fields.
As they leave the farmer to his work, the farmer chocobo plows
up a purple crystal shard from the ground. The farmer picks
it up and as it glows purple, so do his eyes.
So starts the game and we find that the kind chocobo
farmer has a dungeon in his house and kicks Atra and the
player into it. There is a little training session and then
after a few words from Atra the player is on his own. The
game itself has a lot of the same types of magical properties
that FINAL FANTASY 7 also shares. The
player must direct the chocobo around the dungeons, fight
monsters, collect potions, magic books, and other such items
to get to the goals of each dungeon. On each level of a
particular dungeon there are monsters and traps to bar the
player's progress.
The chocobo lives in a nice small village which
grows with the player's progress in the game. The game
itself has a lot of playability, but can get repetitious
after a while; and so can the BGMs. There are three dungeons,
the first containing thirty levels of increasing difficulty
in monsters and traps. The second dungeon has sixty levels
and the third dungeon has an unknown number of levels. (At
least by this reviewer who has only gotten up to level 77.)
The traps are hidden and can be revealed in two ways: either
stepping on them and setting them off or carefully touching
the space in front of the chocobo with its claw and escaping
damage. In later levels, there are mechanical boxes that
the player can activate with a lightning spell and it will
reveal all the traps on the level. This comes in handy since
the traps get more deadly as the game progresses; especially
those spike traps.
The game uses the usual Attack Time Bar system that
has been incorporated into past
FINAL FANTASY RPGs. The player attacks
other monsters by kicking them with his claw—the longer
the bar the stronger the attack. The player can pick up
potions, magic books, summon stones, and gems; but there are
also claw weapons, saddle armor, and magic necklaces with
various effects. The game also has other items such as nuts,
which can be used on weapons and armor or to build up lost
stamina from running away from nasty monsters on a level.
The claws are the weapons for the chocobo to use; they can be
anything from regular leather to mithril mail and the same
goes for the saddle armor.
The best part of the game is when the player
completes each of the dungeons—the wonderful CG animation
that made FINAL FANTASY 7 popular are
transported to CHOCOBO'S MYSTERIOUS DUNGEON,
but in more of a cute sense. If you enjoy playing RPGs and/or
are a fan of the FINAL FANTASY series,
definitely pick this game up. It's hours and hours and hours
of fun for the avid RPG gamer and will keep you wanting more.
The Super-Deformed summon animations make this game worth the
money. Also, there is an extra CD with some demo Squaresoft
games like the long awaited PARASITE EVE,
FRONT MISSION ALTERNATIVE, and
BUSHIDO BLADE 2. (This may be all
convincing the avid gamer needs to purchase this game.)
Highly recommended from this reviewer as it will be a favorite
for Squaresoft game fans
everywhere. 
Rating: *** out of 4 |
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