Homemademech - Playstation 2 Graffiti Kingdom reviews

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Graffiti Kingdom

As you might have heard there’s an interesting new game coming out on the PS2 later this year called Okami. No, no, it has NOTHING to do with Okage (Shadow King). Okami is a game where part of the game’s originality of gameplay comes from the use of calligraphy as both weapon and gametool for puzzle solving. You play as a spirit wolf (female) and it’s your job to bring life back to the death world, all the while bashing the evil that caused the destruction in the first place.
To do this you can use your tail as a calligraphy brush to slash a paint trail across the landscape in your battle to restore the balance and bring life back to the world… but now you’ve come to the crux.

For all it’s usefulness the PS2 controller is no stylus. It does not seem capable of working well on a game that might have been a thing for the Nintendo DS (since some of the game requires use of the “calligraphy pad” to deal out paint strokes… so how about a new kid’s game that taps into your inner artist, and gives you a little bit of a workout on your drawing skills with a PS2 controller to warm you up for Okami?

Graffiti Kingdom is a intriguing slice of platforming with an original twist.
As the game starts you are introduced to one Prince Pixel, a rather lazy piece of royalty who’d rather duck out from his royal duties and ditch on his studies… that is until one day his ditching causes him to end up in this hidden room where he finds a strange brush like tool. Once he takes it, and is lured into trying his newfound powers by his soon to be nagging companion Pastel (a girl who is in the form of a “dog”), he’ll unleash an ancient evil that once roamed the land and it’ll be up to him to use his newfound Graffiti power to bring balance back and lock this evil away once again… if he can build up the motivation for it that is.

Sadly you have been straddled with a character that doesn’t seem capable of building up the actual motivation to save his own homeland! Throughout the game he whines, nags, and basically mumbles his way through battle after battle seemingly unable to even attempt to foster some reason (or enough motivation) to save the day. And Pastel is no better, nagging her newfound companion one moment, then putting his half (bleep)ed efforts down with her snide remarks the next (all the while as she hangs off his back). Yeah, Ratchet & Clank this ain’t.

The gaming is not the most original… or is it?
Yes, it’s standard platforming… except for the fact that you can create your own personalized hero here, as well as capture and use your enemies for your own gain as the sky’s the limit with the Graffiti Pad!
You can’t fight as Pixel. The only way to fight in this game is to transform into different graffiti creatures, gained through combat or later on created by your own hand. Each creature is unique, and has abilities that can help you… but those abilities can also be added to other creatures, or to new creatures, as you open up the abilities of this game to create new creatures as you level up.

Once you get ahold of your graffiti tool you begin to open up a whole world of possibilities with the graffiti tool (a first for gaming that I‘ve ever seen). Accessible only at certain spots (where you can replenish your health and save your game), you can change preexisting creatures (earned as you battle them and pick up red cards containing their data) or make new creatures… but only AFTER you raised your level up to a certain degree and earned all your abilities.

As you start you only have a few abilities on your graffiti pad to make creatures (so you start the game by picking a few creatures and tweaking them, practicing your technique as you modify and alter pre-existing creatures). Then once you gained enough levels and opened a majority of the tool’s ability to create, as well as learned all the lessons you can on creating your own graffiti creations, you can start to make your own entities. This is by no means easy, and you’ll need to spend quite sometime working on your creations and learning how to put your newfound creation options to their fullest use, but once you learn how to make creatures you can start making your very own customized creatures to play in this game.

And, yes, that’s the big gimmick of this game. Creating, customizing and using your creation in gameplay.
The gameplay itself seems rather pedestrian, and not too challenging… but not for long. Once you reach the halfway point (and enter the second of three “castles” to gain keys to reach the boss, who happens to be the (ahem) “devil”… devil?!? I’m surprised Religious Right activists haven’t slandered this game since it’s main boss is… well… the “Devil”. Anyway back to the game, once you reach the second castle you’ll begin to fight harder and harder bosses, and the challenge of the gameplay starts to pick up.
It might be easy going at the start but once you get into this game you’ll find it all the more important to start honing your drawing skills and start putting together a graffiti creature or three that’ll be able to handle specific situations that you’ll find yourself in as you play.
Ok. Let’s break this down since I pretty much laid out most of the game already, and what’s left can be meted out in the breakdown.

Graffiti Kingdom Breakdown
What’s Hot?
What do you know? A somewhat original game. The platforming action is not the most original, and this isn’t a true RPG (or as this game promotes itself, a RPA (Role Playing Adventure)) as it is a cut and dry platformer in my opinion, it still has an original aspect that makes the game interesting, that being the graffiti pad and the ability to tweak and customize existing creatures (captured during gameplay) or create entirely new graffiti creatures (from skills and abilities you open up as you level up).
While this isn’t a big thing, it is something if you are the kind who likes to be creative and has an inventive streak, and there is also a story here in this game too.

What’s Not?
While the thought of working the graffiti pad to create new creatures is interesting, most of the game this one aspect revolves around is basically a been there done that affair. Yes, once you reach halfway the game starts to become challenging but it’s not to a tune of something new (at least from the half of the game I’ve seen). It’s got some nice level constructs (some of the levels look nice and seem at least if not original than something I rarely see in platformers), and it does get challenging halfway through, but it’s not a slice of original ala We Love Katamari. Still it does have it’s good points so it’s not entirely bad.

Moments to Remember?
The story does have it’s quirks and is abit weird as you walk this odd couple of the not so enthusiastic prince and the kinda mouthy sidekick graffiti (probably human). That and your enemies are abit eccentric too (to say the least).

What to Ignore?
When the Religious Right finally takes note of this game and the boss that is known as “the devil” you can ignore them… though thankfully that won’t happen anytime soon since they’re too busy noticing the rather big mouth on Pat Robertson… like most of us haven’t noticed that he has such a big mouth.
Yes, Pat, what a big mouth you have… anyone else other than Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez you want to see assassinated? Sheesh!

Overall?
It’s got some original quirks to it, but the biggest draw of Graffiti Kingdom is still the ability to customize and create your own graffiti creatures (which you can fight with). With lots of effort and practice you can even put out some really nice creatures to fight with! Of course I mean quite abit of drawing and doodling practice needs to be put in, so this game will probably appeal to the artistically inclined or those who like to really do something different with their platformers (aka RPAs).

Probably good for a rental unless you know someone who has artistic talents flowing like a rampant volcano and needs things to put their talents to the test, then this game might be the venue for these artists to express… heck, it’s better than having them scribble on the walls and floors and clean up is a breeze.
If you are not so artistically inclined? Wait for Okami, it’ll be out soon.
UNLIKE Kingdom Hearts 2 which seems to (despite Disney/SquareEnix’s promise) be illfated for a possible disappointing delay to at LEAST 2006 since I heard they haven’t even rolled this game out in Japan yet!

If the game hasn’t been dubbed in Japanese it’s nowhere near being done being dubbed in English.
Ergo unless the Japanese version comes out ASAP don’t hold your breath for the English version.
Nuff said… oh, right, check Graffiti Kingdom, at least rental wise, you might find it mildly interesting.

Playstation 2 - Graffiti Kingdom

Playstation 2 Graffiti Kingdom Reviews

Graffiti Kingdom

Playstation 2 Graffiti Kingdom Images