Phantom Dust

"To bad this game went so far under the radar..."

Gameplay: 9/10
You control Protagonist, a mysterious man, found in a cryogenic freezer tank. That is as far as I am going to get when it comes to the story, because it is so befuddled, that it would take me a week to explain the premise. Anyway, you can control a dust in order to give you power. After sitting through two chapters (and about 30 missions) to teach you the games basics you really get to start playing.

In battle you take in an arsenal with 30 skills that randomly spawn on the field. You use these skills to try to do the most damage possible to your enemy. Skills vary from short range blade skills, to throw bombs that cover half the field, to defensive barriers. There are over 300 skills in this game, which can erase the skills of an enemy, or increase your strength, or just change the global conditions. This may seem complex at first, but the system is fairly intuitive, and you should learn how to use it fairly quickly.

The game has a total of 114 missions across 7 different chapters. These missions charge you with everything from protecting a teammate, to fighting an overwhelming number of enemies, to trying to tackle a 60 foot boss. The missions are varied enough to hold your interest, and can be replayed at any time to earn "credit" which can be equated to money.

Graphics: 6/10
Not terrible, but this game needs some polish. The underground is very grey, and the main character looks like a clown. Everyones mouth is about twice as wide as a normal persons would be. The cutscenes are fairly well done though. The surface worlds are a mixed bag, levels like palace and panorama are fairly uninspired, but it is worth suffering through them for the sheer awesomeness of levels like highway, sein, and strange city. Nothing really blew me away, and for most of the game I was fairly underwhelmed

Sound: 8/10
This is okay, the Voice over is for the most part above average, but it isn't a work of art. The music is good, but the horrible violin noise at the beginning of each chapter is giving me nightmares. There are two footstep sounds all throughout the underground, and they are annoying. But the music does pull the game out, it was okay.

Replayability: 10/10
Not so much in starting the game over, but more in playing on the simulator, this game has almost an infinite number of ways to approach each situation. Arsenals ar very easy to alter, and I found the whole game to be, overall, extremely enjoyable to play over. You can go back to one of the really tough bosses and beat them down with all your awesome new skills. I will be playing this game for a long time

Rent or Buy: Buy, definitely, this game is to long an replayable for a rent, and it has live capabilities.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 07/05/05