Review: Okage: Shadow King
The RPG that looks like it was designed by Tim Burton is finally on shelves.
Tags: Okage: Shadow King Categories: PS2 Reviews, Reviews
Posted by Craig "American Idle" Hansen on Jul 21st, 2003
| Title | Players | ||
|---|---|---|---|
| Okage: Shadow King (title page) | |||
| Developer | Publisher | Genre | Online |
| Action | No | ||
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Based on looks alone, Okage: Shadow King deserves some attention. Drawing its design inspiration from Tim Burton’s animated classic, The Nightmare Before Christmas, the game has a gaunt, elongated, creepy look that makes it stand out from the crowd.
As Sony’s second in-house RPG offering, Okage looks far less cookie-cutter in design than the highly derivative Dark Cloud. The game offers enough eye candy to make it fun to look at as you play.
But games, especially RPGs, must be more than just pretty pictures.
In the audio department, Okage is nothing special. There’s pretty much no voice acting, and the music isn’t exactly a Danny Elfman soundtrack, either. If one is going to cheat-sheet Burton, the music should at least match the spirit of the graphics. Unfortunately in most places, the music is forgettable as soon as you turn the power off on your PS2. Oh well.
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The story itself is a mixed bag. For the first time in, well… forever… Sony’s translators decided to loosen up and have some fun. There are some nice moments of parody, especially in the early going, such as when the hero’s sister is stricken with a curse that could doom her to a life of … comic relief.
It’s not exactly Conan O’Brien-quality humor, or even Working Designs, but at least we know someone in SCEA’s translation dungeons isn’t a mind-numbed robot. There were serious doubts there, for a while.
The story is a nice inversion of genre clichés. Rather than a young boy seeking adventure in the world beyond his town, our hero Ari would rather just stay home.
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Unfortunately, his family basically trades away his freedom to a demon named Stan who is out to rule the world, in exchange for Stan curing Ari’s sister. Unfortunately, while Stan thinks he’s one of a kind, there’s a whole world filled with “imposter” shadow kings Stan must dethrone to claim his throne, and by doing so becomes a sort of anti-hero.
The crap end of the deal falls to Ari; Stan needs a body and Ari’s is the one he’s gonna use, whether Ari likes it or not.
So, unlike some RPGs, this is no buddy-buddy road flick. Okage has plenty of opportunities for witty banter. And conflict.
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Speaking of conflict, the battle system in Okage is fairly generic. Purists who are spoiled by the inventiveness of the Final Fantasy and Grandia battle systems will likely whine to high heavens.
Still, let’s keep in mind that many classic RPGs had simple battle systems; while bland, Okage is no worse off than Lunar, most Dragon Warrior titles, or and number of Namco RPGs. And at least Okage is prettier.
The world Stan and Ari are given to explore is pretty big and filled with some unusually stylistic villains and monsters to confront. Unfortunately, the dungeons are rather bland and unmemorable, which may be part of an intended parody, but just doesn’t come off well.
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One of the complaints I had in the early going was the relative dearth of battles; it takes a long time to get to the first real conflict (and the first save point). However, after beginning to play PSOne’s Dragon Warrior VII, I’ll have to admit Okage gets you fighting sooner than that.
Okage claims to offer about 50 hours of gameplay; gamers obsessed with rushing through and “beating” the game could probably pull that off in about 30-35 hours, which is still kinda meaty.
There’s not any immediate replay value to Okage; there’s no hidden extras a second time through and the battles are just boring enough to make the game tedious by the time you reach the end.
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However, a couple years from now, Okage may draw you back for a quick replay if for no other reason than enjoying the highly stylized graphics one more time.
Too bad the rest of the games was less innovative. It could have been a real classic. If you haven’t picked it up yet, there are better RPGs coming. But it’s not bad for a change-of-pace diversion.
| What Works | Score |
|---|---|
| --Unique, Nightmare Before Christmas-style graphics | 4.4 |
| What Doesn't | |
| --Just about everything else | |
| Under the Shrink-wrap | |
| Okage: Shadow King’s window of opportunity is closing. Over the next couple months, PS2 will see the release of Shadow Hearts, Tsuganai: Atonement, Wizardry: Forsaken Land, and Baldur’s Gate: Dark Alliance, not to mention Jade Cocoon 2, Grandia 2, and the mother of them all, Final Fantasy X just around the corner. While visually diverting, Okage is only slightly above average overall; it was great when all those others were still weeks away from release, but will soon be overshadowed. If you don’t own it yet, you can probably afford to wait a year for it to end up in the bargain bin. | |
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Tags: Okage: Shadow King
Posted by Craig "American Idle" Hansen on Jul 21st, 2003 and is filed under PS2 Reviews, Reviews. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can post a comment, or trackback from your own site.
