Gadget Twins (Genesis)

Today's game revolves around King's men like in previous game. This time they can fly and looks like still kid but they're old enough to drive drill into cute villains and hold gold coins that enough to buy second apartment on their own. They're Gadget Twins (1992). 

This title screen looks childish but there's some rather unsettling part of it. The twin's face, yeah a bit. The controllers on bottom, obviously. The mantrap claw on "w", is simply "What the heck?". The menu only contain "1-player mode" and "2-players mode". No option setting or whatnot but at least i don't have to worry about true ending is locked if you go with "normal" difficulty setting.     

 

Of course, there's story of this game and it's pretty simple: At night, Thump the bad green plane steals Magic Gem that kept on King's palace while constantly wiggling his eyebrows.   

Then morning comes, The king very surprised that the gem is missing. Then he summons the gadget twins.

 

The twins also surprised with the fact that the gem is missing! Why the twins have worse expression than the king? Is the gem really that important? Or the artist just have fun drawing wacky surprised expression? Anyway, Bop and Bump (which to be honest i don't know who's who) goes after Thump although they barely have any clue that leads to him. Maybe they know Thump before this on that day where he stands at Gadget Plaza (every place or thing in this game starts with word "Gadget", you have to take my word for it) and swears with megaphone that he will steals the magic gem on this fateful day.

Level 1. Gadget Bay

 

You probably can guess that Gadget Twins is shooter game because the protagonists (and other persons) are plane. But Bop/Bump only has spring with boxing glove at its end. So the genre is horizontal punch 'em up instead of horizontal shoot 'em up at least for now. Here's the control: d-pad to move Bop/Bump around, 'A' button to unleash attack, and 'B' button to switch weapon. By switch weapon, i mean cycle Bop/Bump's weapon on his side. See that small yellow arrow? That means i prepare my down-directional weapon. You can only cycle weapon in clockwise order but at least i can attack enemies on my behind and i really appreciate it.

Then i delve into water thankfully i don't need oxygen to breath so i can be underwater as long as i want. Defeated enemies will drop either big coin (that worth 20 money) or small coin (that worth 5 money) and you can guess that i can buy something in shop. To enter shop, you have to press 'C' button near that shop hole.     

 

Here's the shop screen. The purchasable items are on bottom row. I can buy either bigger boxing fist or the aforementioned mantrap claw. I can put the former on every side but the latter only for top and bottom side. Unlike the boxing fist, the mantrap claw will stays for awhile after reaching its maximum range before retracting. Therefore this weapon has slower rate but has potency to be more accurate to hit enemies.    

 

You can find power ups on chest but -get this- they're not fixed, they're entirely random. In other shoot em up game, there's certain pattern on power up drop or you can cycle them by shooting them but not in here! I test it with save/load state. Sometime this chest contain 1up but in this occasion speed-up item appears. It's quite baffling and tedious especially in this relentless game. Yes, you heard me. This game is relentless despite the kindergarten-ish setting. I mean sure Bop and Bump has health bar instead of adapting one-hit death system. But the problem is there's no post-hit invincibility at all! So once fish/plane/boot/etc make thorough skin contact with them, they will get hit multiple time and the feeble range of their attack can't help much. The enemies can get stun when hit but only for tiny split second. So if you can't get health refill consistently (which happen quite often to me), you will have really hard time playing this.    

 

There's Thump on submarine shark that can draw his false teeth in and out. Every boss and sub-boss have their own weakpoint and you can't just punch them anywhere even though they're all big target. In this case, the weakpoint is the shark's eye. I know what you think "Why not attack Thump's cockpit?". Any hit on it just doesn't register. My strategy is" hide in corner left bottom so the sub-boss is lured to approach me then i swiftly get his eyes by using the claw. Rinse and repeat. You can see the sub-boss/boss' health on bottom-left corner and represented by yellow stars.

 

You get various pick up such as 1-up (small yellow plane), speed up (fast forward symbol), speed down (rewind symbol), instant-use screen-clearing bomb (cartoon bomb), health refill ('E' symbol), and temporary invincibility bubble (shield symbol). I also like to point out that there's 2 row of star on top hud. The top one (red color) is the health bar while the bottom one (yellow color) is Gadget Twins' speed level. By the way, i replace the bigger boxing fist with yoyo which has more range and damage power.

 

The first boss is Thump...on purple giant plane that shoot-out mantrap claw from its mouth and its weakpoint is his eyes. You probably think that the boss is quite the same with the sub-boss. Well, you're quite right moreover most bosses in this game is stronger version of the sub-bosses on same stage, so get used to this sub-boss & boss similarity few times! And also Thump escapes everytime his subordinate/vehicle/vassal is destroyed. As for this boss, he has more capability than the submarine shark which is: he can send missiles at me that can be either avoided or smacked.

 

The level doesn't ends with the boss defeated. You have to go through a bit more where you will get some chest that hopefully contain health refill to repair the damage you get during boss fight. I don't have it but at least i bought this hammer. Heavy_mvm_loot_common02.wav.

Level 2. Zeppelin Attack

 

Yes. Yes. Impressive. Hammer hand may have big damage power and longer range. But it has slower attack rate and also there's "blank" spot on the arm because the only hitting spot is the hammer, not the whole weapon.

 

Therefore i re-buy the yoyo. Plus, i bought new top and bottom side weapon: spiked drill or whatever is it. Thing for sure is, you don't want it to make full contact with your molar. Thump is back and now he rides on balloon and not zeppelin. You can say that balloon is barebones of Zeppelin but this thing still barely Zeppelin. He can punch with those mean Morningstar and that's about it. The weakpoint is obviously the balloon part. I can say that because of that red star which marks a successful hit on enemy. There's also yellow star mark that appears when you get hit.     

 

The weather is getting bad but Bop/Bump still proceed dauntlessly...with his vacuum cleaner. Ironically, the weapon doesn't suck (both literally and figuratively). It's faster than the hammer arm and doesn't have "blank" spot. Although the level named "Zeppelin Attack", i don't get to defeat said zeppelins because they're just indestructible terrain and they can only unleash balloons and bombs. They're guarded with this cute robots that walks like ED-209, robot in Megaman X, or that bipedal robot that professor rides on in Contra Hardcorp.    

 

The boss is probably more resembles to Zeppelin, perhaps? It can drop bombs besides punching with that nasty spikes. The weakpoint also the same: the balloon part. It's nice aesthetic touch that the balloons will pop out if their "health" depleted so you have to target others balloon after bursting one.

 

Much to my surprise, there's bonus stage after level 2. You get lots of chest but they only contain big coins and i don't think they're useful, not as useful as 1-up at least. The fast way to open the chests is park above them and open them with the bottom weapon. Kind of like corkscrew open up a bottle of Champagne. There's time limit here but i'm not so worried about that as long as i get hefty money here.

Level 3. Lost City

 

If you grown up with wacky cartoon films, you should know the mightiness of metal weight! It's the proper drop bomb in this game and the best bottom side weapon too! It has the fastest travelling speed and deal tons of damage. Get it? Tons. Weight. ;D

 

This time, Thump is on spherical cuckoo bird that can springs his head, wing, and tail. My tactic is simple: just constantly drop metal weight on the cockpit. Heavy_specialweapon08.wav 

 

Haha! Look at that dumb face of the shark, he's so dumbfounded with the almighty metal weight! There's no chest in this level, instead the items stored in those yellow pots. So feel free to break those pots with high historical value!

 

I have no idea what this mini-plane does but i buy a couple of it anyway because i'm rich! Also i replaced the vacuum with flying bomb which is the slow-moving projectile that can only exists two of it on screen at a time.

 

The boss is this big goofy lobster and he loves to blow lethal-to-touch bubbles. Because he stands on the bottom, he's much easier target form my metal weight bombing. Demoman_specialcompleted04.wav

Level 4. Submarine Attack

 

Those submarines has weary expression of player that come to this point. Not me though. Ok, i feel bored a bit but i'm still curious what lies ahead next. Thump and his vessels, most certainly. By the way, that tiny barrel hold the pick-up items now.

 

Loch ness monster, sure why not? Or at least a submarine shaped like the legend monster as you can see their cockpit glass on his body. Just drop weights on his neck. That's my advice.  

 

On the other hand, the boss level is this goofy yet creepy octopus submarine. I should not replace the flying bomb with this hammer because it's pretty hard to use it against this boss or even any sub-boss/boss in this game. In my defense, the bombs are too cumbersome against the mooks that relentlessly come after me one by one in fast pace. Also i like to remind you that the main part of the level is auto-scrolling section that fairly often scrolls too fast even with maximum speed level. But regarding the sub-boss/boss, you can take your time easily to land a hit on them plus there's no time limit, thankfully.

Level 5. Crystal Lake

That's right, we're going to meet the big bastard with hockey mask, FREAKING JASON VOORHEES...not really. This level is just plain snow/ice level. Boring, i know. Those 3 arrows indicate secret place that you can visit to get more power up.

After passing section where penguins and whales live, i encounter Thump (for the 9th time). Now his spherical cuckoo bird can swing a wrecking ball which inspired by Robotnik's flying vehicle, for sure. The problem in this sub-boss fight is: he reluctant to fly low thus the opportunity to drop metal weight on him kept minimum. So i'm resorted to using the slow bomb. Demoman_jeers08.wav

 

I hope you don't keep expecting Jason Voorhees cameo in this level because i ensure you there's none of that here at all. Perhaps this upside-down sinister-looking snowman can ease your disappointment.  

This time Thump is on fish that like to swing spiked wrecking ball and spit some vicious piranhas. Due to his slower movement, the fish is easier target than the blue cuckoo bird. As you can see that the bombs pass Thump without making explosion but that's how they work. They don't blow themselves upon contact instead they fly through enemies which potentially deal thorough damage but i have to wait for them to disappear after reaching their maximum distance before i can fire another ones. Nonetheless, the flying bomb is a must-have because without it you can't get the real experience of "horizontal shoot 'em up"!    

Strangely this bonus stage has exit door that very close to entrance. Maybe the developers are lazy to design another bonus stage so i'll be lazy too. Pick some coins above and immediately head on to exit.

Level 6. Thumps World

 

I didn't know what Thumps world means. Then i realize that Thump is the main antagonist which means this is his homeworld and hopefully the final stage. This level is filled with wicked-looking kites and jack-in-a-box that deal devastating damage if it manages to ram at you. Despite the cutesy look of this level, it's pretty bastard.

 

I was fool to keep thinking that the yellow box is chest that contain power up but turns out it's the dangerous jack-in-a-box. Instead, the power up container is chocolate coins as you can see above me. I forget to tell you that there's magnet that like to pull you toward it. There's also nigh-invisible current inside the water that alter your flight/swim plan.

 

Some enemies pose minimum threat such as that rubber duck and toy train. They just mind their own business, walking left and right. If you get hit by them, it's entirely your fault. 

This time the sub-boss is the mother of all hovercraft that i defeat in Lost City level and she looks pretty calmed or to be more accurate stoned. She stays on the ground which means she's sitting duck for my weight bombardment. When she hides on left corner, she sends her child that can fly straight up. And when she hides on right corner, she shoot out smokes from her exhaust pipe. Quite disgusting.

 

I forget to tell you that there's this boots around this level that reminds me of trap in Deception game. Also note that they're deadlier than the jack-in-a-box because they reach longer and faster.

 

The boss is significantly different than the sub-boss. It's Kangaroo that loves to jump around and occasionally punch at me. Often than not, i'm forced to hide on top-left corner. I can try to fly to other side but the boss hop really fast that i get trampled by him most of the time. Besides, i can aim at Thump really well in that corner. Both this boss and the hovercraft sub-boss has maximum health of 12 stars! But thankfully, they're easy to hit with the flying bomb. Ok. Calling it bomb is inaccurate because it doesn't explode at all. Maybe it's UXB (unexploded bomb).

Finally, Thump is on his last wit and decides to fight me plane-to-plane fair and square. Much like me, he has weapon on each side: boxing fist in his front, hammer in his rear, pizza cutter in his topside, and spinning blades in bottom side. I have hard time to hit him with the flying UXB so the metal weight is the best against him. Just mind that pizza cutter!  

 

As per usual, Thump leaves the screen with invincibility bubble after defeated. But this time, he's back with white flag and the magic gem! I thought it was cue for me to pick the gem myself but turns out i only need to wait for him to get to the other side of the screen then the level ends. Cm_sniper_gamewon_01.mp3

 

The gem is returned. The king is pleasant and show gratitude to the twins but they receive no reward or anything like that. Just a complimentary. But again, they twins get 1,210 money from their quest. It can't be helped. The only good thing to but is the bomb and the metal weight, that's it! Gadget Twins returns to their home in Gadget Town and they begin to think to buy home in some tropical island of "Gadget Island". Meanwhile The King have high-security device installed around the Magic Gem and put some regular patrol schedule so he can sleep soundly every night. While Thump goes to gadget hospital for intensive medical care. How he get the money for it? He sell the scraps of his friends/vehicles/vassals, of course. Happy end!

Imagitec Design Inc's Gadget Twins (1992) isn't Fantasy Zone and well-polished game. It feels tedious to play thanks to no post-hit invincibility and melee attacks that have relatively short range. The metal weight is probably the best weapon but sadly i can only install it for bottom side weapon. I forget to mention that the options are the most useless/worst in gaming history. They only exist to damage any enemy that touch them. You can't change their formation/position except they will always around your front side whether you facing left or right. The arsenal variety need more work. Most of the melee weapon feels same-y like bigger boxing fist, vacuum cleaner, Yoyo, and the mantrap claw. Put more projectile weapon is my advice. The weapon cycle feels too slow to be intuitive. I wish the "C" button is another "Cycle weapon" button but in counter-clockwise order. Maybe put the "enter the shop" function to shoot button or something. The randomness on pick up spawn feels bit baffling. Or maybe i wish the health refill spawns more frequently. The economy feels quite fair although there's not much use of money if you already have flying UXBs and metal weight. Dying will drop your equipped weapon but if you are fast and lucky enough, you can get it back. The game provides you with no password and 3 continues thus i feel that the game don't want to be cleared in relatively fair way. There's cheat that allow you to access stage select though. I give the game some credit because i can attack backward and defeating enemies has other purpose than securing my way which is to get coin. The coin will spin around wildly if you don't pick it some seconds after spawning. Whether this is good or bad, you decide. The bosses and sub-bosses have interesting design...in visual. In gameplay aspect, most of them are quite arduous to deal with thanks to their specific and small weakpoint. The music is strangely good for me. Not much i can speak about the sound effect though. The presentation is family-friendly although there's spikes, trap claw, or spiked drill around.

Gadget Twins (1992) is barely proper horizontal shooter game. I believe there's many horizontal shoot em up game in Sega MegaDrive/Genesis that better than this. You should play them, instead. I play this so you don't have to. Despite the cheerful tone of the game, it's not meant to play casually because it's still rough as unpolished magic gem.

Fat Princess - Fistful of Cake (PSP)

Today's game takes place in fiction medieval. It's not the usual from talented zero to hero. You play as a cannon fodder thus the game teaches you how hard yet bloody the struggle of working class to serve the royal family on ye olde time. It's SuperVillain Studios' Fat Princess - Fistful of Cake (2010) on Playstation Portable (PSP). 

Although the title called "Fat Princess", you don't get to play as the royal daughter. No. You will be played as one of her servants there. You probably know Fat Princess as playable character in Playstation All Stars Battle Royale -You know- that Sony takes on Nintendo's Smash Bros game but not really good clone of it. But i admit i want to test Playstation All Stars Battle Royale despite everyone's critic of it being not good. As for this game, my college friend introduced me to it back when i still have PSP Slim. I played to finish and my opinion is simple: Team Buddies is better than this. Does my opinion still true to today? We shall see!      

 

It's not mandatory but you can customize your character here. You only restricted to set hair, facial hair, skin tone, and gender voice. This model probably the closest to me in real life. No option for curly hair and bigger gut, unfortunately. 

 

Here's the sub menu on Single-Player mode. From top to bottom, we have: Campaign mode, free play mode, and lastly "Smash TV-like" mode which is very fun. Let's pick the campaign mode for now.

 

What the freak? Fine, i will read those damned instructions as i haven't played this game for several years.

 

There's no actual tutorial or training stage. This written manual is what you got. Quite a shame but it's quite working to me. If you can't stands of a dozen chapter or so (and each chapter consists of 2-3 pages), well too bad for you.

 

Once upon a time, there's blue and red princess. They play around in forest named "Black Forest" [Very Funny] and soon discover a giant cake. Ignoring the possibility of its bad hygiene or it's poisonous cake, they eat it. They keep stuffing the cake into their mouth and later get kidnapped by forest men.      

 

Eventually, their father the kings worry about them and tell their soldier to search for them. The picture may suggest that the kings are blaming each other for their missing daughter but i think that's just me. I should point out that there's voice acting in narration thus making it like legit storytelling. Engineer_cheers05.wav      

 

So here we are, about to rescue the princess before she and her friend are thrown into local gang's cauldron to make royal soup. The camera centers on me which is simple and fine. You see that big machine? That's hat machine that will periodically make hat for us to wear which will change our class. Hatless class called villager which has the least health but move fastest even when carrying thing around. To pick a hat, simply press "circle" button.

 

Upgrading hat machine can provide us with what the game called advanced class which in my opinion not straight upgrade from initial class but nonetheless will give us more variety. Before that, we need some resources to upgrade hat machine and only worker class can get them. There's 2 resource types: wood and ore. Wood can be obtained by chopping trees, simple! While ore can be obtained by mining particular stones that have shiny ore on it, which happen to be pretty rare to find. Hey! Why are you carrying precious ore like that, ice wizard? Leave the hard labor to me and other workers!

 

Yes thank you for the tip, your highness. Resource that i gather must be put on hat machine to add the resource stockpile. We only get warrior and worker hat machines for this first mission. So it's sensible for me to upgrade the warrior hat machine because naturally warrior is better suited for combat. To do so, i lock on to machine and hold attack button (default: "square" button).

 

There's no radar or minimap on play screen. You only get this map that brought by pressing "select" button. Our princesses are located on center top of the map. The brown ghost-like icons represent the tribal savages. The red and blue people represent us in respective color, nuff said. That one red person with explosion layer/aura, represents me. While reading the map, the game doesn't pause so you have to be careful when or where you read this map. It goes without saying that everyone moves in this map. Except the princesses because they're lazy currently being captive.

 

I'm fine, your majesty. I feel good with your concern, thank you! 

 

Have at thee, thou brute! None shall stand in my way, alive. While locking on enemies, i can see their health so i can decide whether to press on or retreat. There's cakes nearby if you feel like to stuff them into blue princess to make her fat so they have harder time to rescue her. But i want to focus on rescuing our princess immediately.

 

By pressing "up" on D-pad, i can rally nearby allies to me but only up to 3 of them. They can attach themselves to anyone who carries the objective in this case it's me princess carry the princess. That's some tongue twist for you, reader. Anyway, each person that attaches to objective carrier will provide speed boost on him. So i'm saved by them. Thanks, guys! And you too, ice wizard.   

 

Much to their surprise, the princesses found while still stuffing themselves with cakes relentlessly. The kings told their men to stop the princesses. Later on, the king believe that the cakes are cursed and declares that they're forbidden to anyone in his kingdom but the princess still carving for the cakes. The king has no choice but to send his men to get cakes. From his look, you can tell that he's frustrated with the situation,    

 

The mission objective is obvious: get cakes that lie around in this forest and give them to princess until they're bloated like parade balloon. Do you see the "+15" number nears me? That's the score that i earn each time i give the princess a piece of cake. The number will add to tally on top left which measure how well i'm contributing for the team. I can also earn point by killing enemies or delivering resource to stockpile. Each time i die, i earn negative point and i have to wait some time to respawn. I think the "3" number beside the point counter is my respawn time. Also i get longer respawn time every time i die. Hearts on the top center, are obviously my health bar. I'm not sure how many health unit that represented by one heart. My guess is 5 health point for each full heart   

 

To make my life easier, i can use this shortcut post that swiftly warps me to near the princess. Demoman_thankfortheteleporter01.wav

 

Phew! If i were too late for split seconds, we would lose this match. Thus i celebrate our victory with the piece of forbidden cake. I'm in the middle of regenerating my health there. There's no health pickup like in Team Buddies. If you stand still and do nothing, your character will sits down and munches cake to replenish his health. It's kind of tedious but beggar can't be picky as they said.  

 

Turns out, the princess' hunger can't be sated therefore the king asks us to bring mountain sages to him. There's 3 of them but you only have to bring 2 of them to win. In this mission, we have wizard hat machine. Wizard can burn our enemies to well-done. As much as i want to incinerate our enemies, but i have to decline. Instead i will be remain villager and focus on objective because we're racing here!

 

No, your Excellency. I'm DEAD! -_-#

Villager class maybe fast but it's not suitable for this mission because of its meager health. I need to change class only for the sake of bigger health.

I think worker is the second fastest compare to villager but i'm not sure. I have to put the sage to the throne room otherwise it won't count.

 

I accidentally fall myself to this lava pool. Too bad i can't raise my thumb while drowning in lava like Terminator or Doom Slayer. Instead, i have cold dead expression. Being king's soldier is already lifeless anyway. In this map the lava will rises or goes down periodically, which effect platforming around here.

 

The sage can only works in full group of 3, so the blue king lets go that single one with unwillingly. Then they begin to analyze the cake with everything they got. Hey! Where's the cherry?

 

After days of research, they conclude that the cake's power is beyond their capability thus suggest to seek help from great oracle. To do so, we need to build shrine in this map. There's outpost that everyone can capture. Later, you can drop the resources on the claimed outpost instead deliver them all the way to castle. Naturally, worker class is essential for this mission and the outposts proves to be useful as shortcut to store wood or ore we harvested.

 

I search the shrine construction site at our base with no avail. Turns out it's in the center of the map. I'm not bright. Worker may be crucial for this mission but that doesn't mean the combat classes aren't useful. As you can see, my comrade just slain enemy builder. You can't expect healthy competition here. Also i notice that drawbridge is automatically retract or draw like in Mutant Penguin. I often thought that the AI friends are too stupid to do the objective mission. But when i'm about to take a lumber into nearest outpost, my friend finish the shrine. Such miracle!

 

The Great Oracle has spoken. It said that only prince's kiss can dispel the cake's curse. The red king feels infuriated because there's no prince on this region. Later on, a message comes from kingdom neighbor that their prince: Prince Albert will come here to pick a bride. The red king is happy about this and to make sure the prince choose his daughter, we're tasked with kidnapping the blue princess. See what i told you about "You can't expect healthy competition here"?  

 

This mission surely feels familiar to you because it's like "Capture The Flag" mission but with princess instead of symbolic banner with no real value. But again Team Fortress 2 defines the contested object as suitcase of intelligence so i'm not wiser. As worker, i can build gate at the entrance of our base that prevents enemies to get in without destroying it first. But if they get our princess, they can get out through it.

 

The advanced version of villager class is engineer which can throw bomb. It's surely step up than villager's hand axe. Everyone can charge their attack which results in more powerful attack than the uncharged attack. But i just realize that engineer's bomb doesn't do more damage when charged. The charging only make the bomb travel faster with more straight trajectory, not its damaging power. So i don't need to charging my bomb throwing all the time!    

 

Meanwhile the upgraded version of wizard is ice wizard that can freeze enemies. To be honest, i prefer to give burn status that gives enemies damage over time than making them slow or immobilize. In some miraculous moment, our ice wizard freezes our pursuer just in time so we can deliver the prisoner safely. Scout_thanks02.wav    

 

The well within their base is a shortcut to get out of there as soon as possible. It's extremely useful when i carry their princess...oh, hi! She must be belong to your people, right?

 

We're in tight score 2-2. The next successful kidnapping is decisive. Yet this idiot keep stuck near the wizard hat machine all the time. Medic_jeer02.wav

 

Demoman_jeers05.wav. This is my problem with the game. In Team Buddies, i can just going solo to accomplish the mission with just my strongest gun. Meanwhile in here, i can't do that because enemy team can and will gang up on me immediately. Even if i can defeat them one by one, they will just keep respawning but in the other hand i have unlimited respawn too and that also applies to my teammate. So i'm forced to "team-up" with my teammate to get to objective. The problem is they act on their own. Sometime they make a solid group to get the prisoner and obviously i can follow them. But most of the time, they do something separatist yet useless like resource gathering when we already have abundant stockpile or priest class goes by himself. Moreover, it seems the enemy's AI is more focused or smarter regarding on mission objective. Given that Team Buddies and Fat Princess have significant difference on the premise. TB supposed to be mixture of Real-Time Strategy and Action Shooter because i control entire team. Meanwhile FP is teamwork style game because i can only control my own character. As i play on one-player mode, i'm forced to rely on cpu-controlled teammate with sub-normal intelligence.   

 

This loading screen gives me an idea. Enemies can respawn infinitely but they sure take serious setback if i destroy their hat machine or at least this plan will gives me more time and breather to get into mission objective. Besides, engineer's bomb are said to be excel at destroying structure rather than enemies.   

 

There's the problem on that plan. I can't seems to hit the hat machine with my bomb. It didn't explode upon contact and the machine seems no matter how many bombs explode near it. But it seems the inside of enemy's base is lacking of guard so this if good opportunity to snatch the prisoner.

 

Cm_engie_matchwon_03.mp3. I can't destroy their hat machine but we manage to put enemy's princess in this open jail thrice much easier than the last time. Maybe because i destroy their ladder on our wall, which allow them to infiltrate our base easier than destroying our gate first. I just realize that engineer is anti-builder because he's good at destroying what the workers build like ladder and gates. Still hat machines can't be destroyed, apparently.

I think that's it for the campaign scenario. Next, i'll show some of the free play mode which is called "Mess About".

 

Our objective in this map is simple: bring back our princess to her throne while keeping theirs behind the brig. There's custom setting of "Dilapidated" if it turns on we will start with broken hat machines except for the worker's. I think i will get more advantage because enemies can't rush in immediately like usual because they need to repair their machines first.

 

I repair warrior hat machine as soon as possible then hook up some friend and later set off to rescue our princess. This time the princess is... in swell condition so we have harder time to carry the majesty around. Did you expect me to say "fat" regarding the royal daughter's condition? Not this time. I got reprimand because of that. Next time i do that, i'll be in torture rack for hours.

 

Ok. All we need is to guard the base for minutes and our team will win. Do you know that feeling when in Real-Time Strategy game you order worker to repair defensive structure that's currently being attacked? Well in this case, i'm that worker and keep repairing this gate while enemy warrior hack it left and right. :P

 

And then we won. But this sod keeps on playing so i stab him over and over again while carrying the blue princess on her cell. That will teaches him to accept defeat in sporting manner.

 

This time we play "Team Deatmatch" mode. No princess involved, it's just us king's men kill each other to deplete other's life score. There's one ore deposit here which is surrounded by mud that makes everyone move slower. That worker shouldn't sacrifice himself to get this ore because he only become our victim.

 

It goes without saying that killing enemy priest that currently healing his teammate is top priority target. Therefore i keep chopping this priest with my worker's axe. What? The tool is deadly enough as long as i can make him dead. Naff said.

 

I did mention that it's not wise to get this ore but i'm lucky enough that this area is free from enemies. Besides we're in the lead.

 

Besides ladder and gates, worker can also build spring pad to launch anyone that stand on top of it. It requires many of our resources to build but my curiosity gets the best of me.

 

Our score difference is getting smaller so i figure i have to start killing again. After standing still on launcher pad for bit of forever, it launches me into the center of the map. As soon as i land, the game ends with our victory. Cm_heavy_matchwon_05.mp3

 

Next is "Grim Reaper" mode where one of us become grim reaper and we team up to kill him. There's hat at the end of map on each cardinal direction. At my end, i get engineer hat which is not so good for this mode.

 

After a grim reaper defeated, another grim reaper helmet will spawn near that statue. Take it and you become grim reaper yourself then start slaying everyone. Each human defeated will drop soul that grim reaper need to pick up to fill the soul gauge at top left corner. Once it's fully filled, the game ends. Whoever rakes the most point by gathering the soul, he's the winner. The grim reaper has the melee attack of warrior and drain life ability of dark priest, which is awesome. Plus he has health capacity of 8 hearts! Demoman_positivevocalization01.wav

 

Next game is "Queen's Rule" which is football/soccer with the occasion of hat class spawn on the field that you can pick up. I'm currently Dark Priest who feed on that bloke's life. You can't see this kind of magical experience in UEFA Champion League, can you?

I suppose i have to speak further about the class here:

1a) Worker, build structure and gather resource.

1b) Engineer, can throw bomb at enemies and structure. It can't be blocked with warrior's shield

2a) Shield and Sword Warrior, equipped with shield and sword also has the highest health capacity. His shield can block projectiles. His charging attack is spinning his sword at the spot which is good if he's surrounded.

2b) Twinblade Warrior, equipped with twinblade which is the melee weapon with the longest reach. His charging attack is flying to locked-on enemies and gives them additional big slash.

3a) Bow Ranger, equipped with bow and arrow. His charging attack is more damaging and faster arrow.

3b) Gun Ranger, equipped with -the game called it- rifle but in my opinion is blunderbuss, which has slower attack rate. His charging attack is unleashing more bullets that's more lethal on close range.

4a) Fire Wizard, who's excel at fire magic that can deal damage over time on enemies. His charging attack is either stronger fire bolt when he locks on an enemy or fire blast around him.

4b) Ice Wizard, pretty much has the same magic attack as Fire Wizard but instead inflict slow or freeze status on enemies.

5a) Priest, has feeble melee attack. His charging attack is either continuous healing beam when he locks on an ally or area heal around him.

5b) Dark Priest, also has feeble melee attack. His charging attack is either continuous drain life beam when he locks on an enemy or area drain life around him.

6) Villager, has the least health. His slap can stun enemy with 50% chance. Stunned enemies will drop their thing that they carry and their hat. Thus villager is perfect to steal enemy's hat but not so reliable.

You can switch between basic and advance version of class you're currently in by "Triangle" button.

 

Most of the time, my team can score goal without me. But this time, they do "On goal"! Soldier_jeers05.wav

 

Also you don't often see a wizard eating a cake in the middle of playfield in real life football/soccer match, do you? That archer aims at me, doesn't he? What a schmuck!   

 

We win but the enemies keep playing again even after timer runs out. I admit the ai in freeplay mode doesn't know how to accept defeat stop. I think that's it for now.   

 

Wait! What?

SuperVillain Studios' Fat Princess - Fistful of Cake (2010) is another teamwork style game with building/construction element of Real-Time Strategy. As i have mentioned before that my problem with this game is i'm forced to team up with rather stupid AI teammate and there's so little i can do by myself to get into objective. The ability to call help from 3 AI teammate at most, doesn't help much. Because i need more than 3 of them against whole team! The classes are quite good but i feel like that Rangers are useless because their projectile can be blocked by shield. Also there's no other melee class besides warrior. My personal favorite is engineer class because i like being damage support class. I mean sure wizard is the 2nd favorite but i feel like that in any mission that requires base infiltration, engineer/worker class is necessary. Plus, engineer's bomb deal splash damage (that can deal damage to group of enemy) and can't be blocked by warrior's shield. When upgrading certain hat machine your team will get bonus benefit. Upgrading worker hat machine, will spawn big bomb near it. Because the fuse is too short to carry around, it only useful for defensive situation. Upgrading wizard hat machine, will spawn magic potion that will turns anyone within its explosion into chicken. Think of it like Morph Ovum in Heretic. Upgrading ranger hat machine, will lit all the torches in your base. You can make your arrow flaming by using them. It's kind of tedious to regenerate your health where you have to wait idly for seconds. Therefore Priest class is important. The melee combat is troublesome as your melee attack (except warrior's twinblade) has minuscule range so short that you can see your enemy's eyebrows in detail. What also feels bothersome is the absence of minimap or radar. The cakes may add a layer of strategy on "Princess Rescue" mission but the AI isn't bothered to use them, unfortunately. The variety of free play mode is pretty good. The "Grim Reaper" mode is insanely fun! The music is suitable for wacky medieval setting. The sound effect is mediocre. The graphic is fairly good. Voice acting on narration is probably the best part of this game. I remember the part where the princess has been kidnapped by dragon. The king's response: "A Dragon? Oh for *bleep!* sake! Who write this wretches?". It was absolutely brilliant.

 

My opinion still remain the same that Fat Princess - Fistful of Cake (2010) is less appealing than Team Buddies. Most premise of the mission or freeplay mode is battle between Red and Blue team which feels monotonous. Whereas in Team Buddies, you get to play with more than 2 teams. The soccer/football mode feels bit janky because i can't dribble the ball well. Meanwhile in Team Buddies there's football/rugby mode where i need to pick a bomb and throw it to enemy's goal for score. The mechanism of picking the bomb by hand is simple to control yet working. Unlike in Fat Princess where i need to nudge the ball in direction that i desire but ends up can't control it at all. So i leave the ball to my teammate and instead focus on killing enemies. Moreover there's no button to kick the ball so you have to rely on janky dribbling to get into enemy's goal. But don't get me wrong! Fat Princess is pretty fun game. The main gameplay is pretty solid and can works better if you play it with your relatives/friends.

In case you wonder about the ending of the story mode, here's from what i remember: [Highlight below]

Prince Albert (which has buckteeth) finally kisses Princess' hand. The red king shout happily "The curse is broken!". The prince ask "What curse?". The king explains and the prince smilingly replies "There's no curse, your highness. The cakes are just really delicious. Haven't you try them yourself?". Then they make group photo while the king still dumbfounded with prince's reply and his face has wacky expression. The end.