The Idolmaster

"Not American-friendly, but if you want to take the jump..."

Despite my name, I don't play Japanese games because "they're Japanese" or love all things anime. However, I do love playing Japanese games that are unique and odd (since heck, they put out all kinds of weird stuff) and don't remotely suck. Even if I don't know what's going on, I get to try to imagine what's happening and I've even gotten to the point where I can figure them out. This has led me to games such as DDR, Beatmania, Sangokushi Taisen, and now The Idolm@ster.

The biggest issue with Idolm@ster for starters is that it's in Japanese (well, obviously). But the problem is that it's entirely in Japanese, even the game menus. Even if you took a couple lessons in the kana and few basic kanji, that alone without any FAQ's or guides will most likely not help you much. There's tons of situations where you only have 3 seconds to answer (and you can't pause it during a few parts either), others where there's too much going on for you to try to read it all quickly. So if you're used to playing, say, dating sims and try to get by with that philosophy of taking your time and referring to a Japanese dictionary, this may be quite a bit more challenging.

That aside, I'm dumb enough to play through the game anyway to review it.

Graphics:
Cel-shaded anime games seems to be a really big thing for the past few years. I never understood why since they're usually ugly and awkward. Idolm@ster however was made pretty well. The characters movements and expressions are nowhere near as robotic (although repetitive after a while) as other cel-shaded games, and...well, you can't expect that much more depth in this kind of game. But really let's face it, you're not playing this game because it has mind-blowing graphics.

Like most dating simulations, during simulations the backgrounds are static 2D pre-drawn pictures, and during the auditions and performances it's a constantly-moving full 3D cel-shaded environment. I've seen very little, if not any issues with clipping (which seems to be cool with cel-shaded games) except for the "dressing up" parts but that's almost done on purpose. The art itself is enjoyable if you like anime-style art.

Sound:
The music is great, but not perfect. The songs itself has a pretty broad spectrum of Japanese pop, from ballads, older generic pop, to dance. For the most part, it's catchy. The background music during the different situations aren't particularly bad, but forgettable. The little jingles are pretty straightforward if something is good or bad. Again, nothing really stands out like a sore thumb in this department.

Gameplay:
This is pretty much what makes the game shine...again granted that you're pretty handy with Japanese. The most basic Japanese 101 students can probably get through a very small amount of the game, but will have a whole lot of difficulty in the simulation parts (strangely enough), which is most of the game. Unfortunately, what you do and say has a lot of bearing to how the mini-games go so you'll definitely want to read up on the background of game and know what you're playing before starting. Simply having a dictionary on-hand will be extremely tedious and frustrating since there's so much dialogue and some of the important dialogue you will not be able to hit pause if you wanted to.

The simulation part itself is pretty much your standard fare of dating sims. What you say will affect your idol's moods, her performance, and how she feels about you in the long run. Although you can't really date your idol (which, for the record, if you could would be disturbing since most of the idols are under 18), it's almost kind of fun to watch how they react to particular dialogue or situations while having some kind of accountability. The game is made very thoroughly, especially enough to thwart FAQ-lovers from trying to make dialogue guides (since dialogue situations can randomly change positions, quotes, and reactions through each game play, even if you reload the same spot). Since everyone naturally has their own likes/dislikes and nuances, everyone also reacts completely differently every day even to small stuff like how you say "good morning" to them (yes, there really are different ways to greet your idol each morning).

The mini-games themselves range from fun to irritating. Thankfully they're short enough so they don't get incredibly mundane and repetitive. The auditions (or performances) are also actually kind of fun and hard since you're "competing" against other potential idols, so it keeps you on your toes as well. Best part is, if you can make it this far while keeping your idol's mood (or tension) up, these are the most American-friendly for the most part (minus the lyrics training, which is straight up symbol-recognition).

Replay:
Another part that Namco-Bandai has done so well. When you complete one 52-week cycle, based on your previous playthrough you can manage more idols at once if you play through another 52-week cycle and you can even have more than one idol performing in the same group at the same time (which you are not allowed to do with your initial playthrough). Try different combinations as everyone has different chemistry with each other!

Overall:
Go ahead and call me a dirty old man but even on my first playthrough, I'm disturbingly having a lot of fun playing this, even knowing what I have to do when I do my second replay for better results. As inane, potentially frustrating, or weeaboo-ish as this game sounds, I somehow have to keep playing it to finish off my idol's 52-week career.

Oh man, now I'm actually calling her "my idol."

Anyway, this was insanely popular in Japanese arcades, and after playing and giving this game a chance, I can kind of see why.


The short of it:
If you are able to play Japanese 360 games (does not work on US 360's out of the box, so don't bother if you bought your system from your local US retailer...I already tried), you have the patience to read up on the game before you buy it, put any dispositions or biases about anime nerdiness aside, and you are able to put in some work to figure out the game (before and while you play), you might find yourself actually enjoying it a lot more than you think.

If you don't think you want to take that jump but still want to play something Idolm@ster that you can actually figure out easily, check out Idolm@ster Live For You! Even though that's also in Japanese, there's no detrimental simulation sections that you have to struggle through, but a lot more easier-to-figure-out (and in some ways more fun) game play.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 01/05/09

Game Release: The Idolmaster (Platinum Collection) (JP, 11/01/07)