Jade Cocoon: Story of the Tamamayu

"An amazingly beautiful game whose only mistake is not being a traditional rpg."

Jade Cocoon is one of the most disappointing games I have ever played, at the beginning, everything looks fantastic, the intro, the plot, the music, the characters... the overall look of the game, but sadly you will realize that all this potential was horribly wasted by their creators, Genki, what they have done with this game is unacceptable, and in my opinion they should be in jail.

Story:
The story itself is simply amazing, it has all the necessary elements to make it unbelievable, in its core, the story is very deep, interesting and original, it could have easily been one of the games with a better plot in history, really, but only the premise is terrific, because the during the game it is very poorly developed, the main reason is that this is not an exactly an rpg, but then we also have the fact that Levant, the main character is a silent hero, and Jade Cocoon’s story needed a lot of character interaction. A plot with an incredibly high potential but horribly wasted by the game’s structure.

Graphics 10/10:
The game is made by pre-rendered backgrounds, and while their quality is not as high as some other games for the PlayStation, their beauty makes them some of the most impressive out there, it is really a pleasure to walk around the wonderful landscapes Jade Cocoon’s world has. The 3D graphics are also very good, the character and enemies have very solid graphics.

The intro sequence is brilliant, just brilliant, it is perfect to fool those that play for the first time, because it makes you think this game is going to be the ultimate experience, and it is far from being that, I would say it is the ultimate disappointment.

The characters are simply marvelous, in the game you are never told if they were designed by Studio Ghibli (not even after finishing the game or in the instruction booklet), but it is obvious that they were designed by them, it is impossible for an anime fan not to see that, Studio Ghibli is responsible for making the animation of some of the most beautiful movies of all time, like Princess Mononoke, Nausicaa, or the recently Spirited Away, a movie that won the Oscar to the best animation picture, and no wonder!, that movie is amazing, it may sound childish, I thought that at the beginning, but after seen it I can’t help but to admit that is one of the mot impressive movies I have ever seen.

Music 6/10:
Musically Jade Cocoon is one of those games where the music is extremely good, but very good only when there is music, and that is twice as disappointing. Everything was made using drums, flutes and such, so the game, combined with the beautiful ruins and forests that act as backgrounds, has an extremely nice ancient feel everywhere, but as I said before, only when there is music. It is true that it has more music than the average “game with not enough music”, but there is not enough anyway. So, this game is disappointing even in the music, because when there is some, it rules, too bad.

There are a lot of voices also, more or less 90% of the dialogue, and...surprise!, it is superb, yes you have read well, the voice action is truly excellent, the only problem is that sometimes when the “narrator” talks his voice is extremely hard to hear, and the same happens with an old man that tales stories at the cemetery. Aside from that, top notch voice acting, one of the best I can remember in fact.

Gameplay 7/10:
Jade Cocoon is not exactly a Pokemon rip off, it is much deeper and has more plot, it works in a different way, and it could have easily been not only the best Monster Breeder one hundred and a million times better than any Pokemon, it could have also been an absolutely awesome rpg, no doubt about that.

The monsters evolution is not all that good, because they never acquire new magic powers or abilities by themselves, I mean gaining experience levels, unless they already have some spells or abilities, there is no way to make them obtain some, and then their powers are pretty lame, only the typical fire ball or water splash, nothing really impressive.

Once we get some monster we are able to do like experiments like merging them with other monsters to create new ones (they are not all that new in the end really), or spun them to obtain money if we sell their silk on a shop, something that, by the way, is completely useless, because while our character is able to hold a weapons, armors and accessories, he hardly ever fights, and then, the items (I mean the battle items) are so expensive that there is no point on getting them, and that not to mention they are not exactly useful, because the few items you will find while catching monsters are better, shopping is meaningless as a result.

Merging monsters is interesting, and of course there are some hidden ones and everything, but this can only be done for fun, I mean, you won’t need to do this to beat the game or anything, you will see why if you play.

Another little flaw is that capturing enemies takes a lot of time, it is not like in Pokemon where you just throw the ball and it’s catch or miss, here the main character will start to play an instrument and after more of less 30 seconds you will see if the process was successful or not, it is very irritating after having played for a long time, maybe this is not exactly a flaw, but it is annoyance anyway.

And that takes me to the monsters, what is the problem with them?, they are pretty ugly, uninspired, and, well, boring. At the beginning we will see the common weak monster we usually see like bees, little lizards and these kind of “bugs”, but the problem is that we are going to see these type of enemies during the whole game (I mean small and weak looking beasts), the only impressive enemies are some bosses, but we can’t catch them, so what is the point?. And then we have something that is very usual in the common rpgs but that in a Monster Breeder is terrible, a lot of the monsters are just the same ones we have seen before only that with different colours, or with just a pair of wings, or with a horn here, a horn there...dull!, very, very dull, not to mention that is a filthy way to save work.

Aside from that there is also another thing that hurts this game a lot, but I can’t talk about it because I don’t want to spoil anything if you haven’t played and are planning to, those who really like Monster Breeder games are probably going to like it, but for everyone else the disappointment is going to be BIG.

As a result:
I don’t like to play this game because every time I do it makes me want to cry, everything is so beautiful that it is impossible not to think in every single second how incredible this game could have been as a traditional rpg.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 03/08/04