"Contact: The old school RPG for the new school players."

It started out as a simple test. All he wanted to do was interact with someone out there. All he did was send out a signal. Little did he know the adventure about to unfold.

Contact, from looking at the back of the box you can already, fully understand that this is no normal game. Cosmic Terrorists, power changing outfits and a crazy adventure.

STORY - 9/10
You play as... Well, you. The game starts out by showing you the lab of The Professor. You learn that he put out a signal to try and contact someone. Turns out, he's in a pinch.

But, before he can inform you of anything, he's attacked by a group of his enemies, the CosmoNOTs. Getting shot at, his energy cells are scattered, and one lands on present day Earth, interrupting a boy in mid-dream.

When everything settles, you begin controlling Terry, the main character. The story unfolds...

GAMEPLAY - 8/10
The gameplay mechanics are very simple. You can either control everything via touch screen, or, D-Pad and Buttons. Whatever tickles your fancy. Feeling crazy? Mix it up! You aren't confined to certain controls.

But, when the battling began, I was less than enthusiastic. You would think, "Oh. An RPG. Turn-based battles that I got tired of from Final Fantasy. Yawn." In a way, it's a real-time battle system. But it's not.

When you approach an enemy or NPC, you hit the B button, or, tap Terry and hit the attack icon. This switches you over into Battle Mode. From here, Terry targets the nearest target-able thing, and automatically begins to hit it. You can of course move and exit in and out of Battle Mode whenever. This actually makes for some good fights.

GRAPHICS - 7/10
From the start of the game, you see the Professor in a very isometrical 8/16-bit style. But, when Terry joins the group, things turn absolutely beautiful.

You still see the Professor in his isometrical style, and Terry in the very soft-toned top-down, pixel-painted style. The bad thing about it, is that Terry comes stand next to the Professor. The no-outline, pretty style does NOT mix with a 8-bit isometrical style. Good thing the characters don't stand side-by-side all that often.

FINAL JUDGEMENT - 8/10
Sure, the game has some bad moments, but overall, the game is amazing and a must-buy for any Earthbound fans. From first glance, the game looks like a standard Grind-and-Go RPG, but from further looking, this is the completionists wet-dream. You have hundreds of weapons and items to collect.

On top of it all, you have a very fine story to chew on. And when you finish that story, you have Wi-Fi to play with and you can go and max every stat, and complete the many side-quests. Even then, you need to collect the 7 outfits that have their own skill sets and abilities.

Have fun, and stay in Contact.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 08/19/07