Amazing Island

"Amazing wouldn't be the best word to describe this game...."

Amazing Island. Doesn't it just scream children's game? Nonetheless that's the name of this odd creature game that does something completely original. And I love my originality in gaming! Too bad not all originality can succeed.

STORY
In this game you play either a boy or girl who finds this book about a magical world called Amazing Island. You're fascinated by the stories, and only believe them to be fictional. That is until one night when you get sucked into the world and are forced to help the residents of the island battle bad shadowy figures known as the Black Evil (nice generic name). In doing so, you create yourself a creature to battle them. And I do mean, YOU create a creature.

GRAPHICS
Now if you're expecting Amazing Island to look...well amazing, prepare to be proven wrong. The graphics are not impressive at all. It has an anime look to it, and all of the creatures look like they came out of a Pokemon game. Too bad the graphics are exactly like something on the Nintendo 64. It's also a very cutesy video game. Even the bad guys like they could be your best buddy! I wished there was more detail and a lot more to see.

SOUND
The bad guys don't just look friendly, they sound friendly too. The audio is for the most part really lame. Wait, most part? I meant all of it! First off, there are no voice overs at all for this game aside from the grunts of the creatures you encounter...this sucks since there's a lot of dialogue and reading to be had. The music is totally forgettable and I can't remember a single song having come off of it. They weren't catchy at all, which is blasphemy especially for a kids game like this.

GAMEPLAY
So the overall look of the game isn't that great. What about the game itself? It's unique. That's all I can describe it as. Basically the big selling point of this game that I've mentioned earlier is that you create a creature. Yes, you! You can literally draw what the head, arms, tails, and other body parts look like! I drew out this awesome Eggman creature that had the moustache and fat belly and everything! You can have wings, whether they be cute or evil. Tons of different skins, tons of cool features here, believe me if this game was online it would be really popular because of this feature alone. But it's not.

After you've finally taken a huge time creating your pet, you go out into the story mode to unlock more creature parts and complete the game. So how do you play the game? Through a series of odd mini-games that aren't that fun nor interesting. The game boasts that your creatures can be different types like Water, Fire, rock, etc. The reality is that you can beat the game with any kind of creature at all. Being a specific type of creature may give you a slight advantage over some of the mini-games, but it's not such a huge improvement that you'll want to actually plan out what type to be. The mini-games just aren't enjoyable, and they don't last all that long either.

Speaking of not lasting long, here comes one of the worst points about this game that I can make. I literally beat everything in this game, AND I MEAN BEAT EVERYTHING IN THE STORY, so fast that it only took me 4 hours. I beat it so fast, that I'm writing the review already, only 14 hours after first playing it! It's so lame and short, I don't know who this game is for. The only thing you'll keep playing for is creating the creatures. They had an amazing concept too. I would've loved to compared monsters with other people! Why release it on the Gamecube when it isn't big on the online capability? Why make a game like this if it can only be played at home?! We wanna share our special creatures with the world!

IN THE END...
This game is a proud example of developers taking a cool idea, and going nowhere with it. That's a damn shame too. I love the idea of creating your own creature, but this game just isn't fun and it's way too short and easy. I'd suggest you maybe rent it, but that's a big maybe.

Reviewer's Score: 4/10, Originally Posted: 11/30/06