Viewtiful Joe

Because of my own resolution - beat more games every month than I purchase - this month came down to the wire for me. Viewtiful Joe was two things: fun and frustrating. Let's start with the fun. The gameplay isn't unique and the plot is nothing to write home about, but this is definitely a game you would enjoy picking up and playing. It's a beat-em-up at heart, but there are plenty of small "puzzles" and goal-oriented tidbits. Certainly the "thinkingest" beat-em-up I've seen, but a beat-em-up nonetheless. The unique twist that Viewtiful Joe offers - the twist that makes it a fun game - is the use of "VFX" powers. These abilities, acquired very early on in the game, allow you to change the flow of time. My favorite (and easily the most useful) was "slow," in which everything begins to happen in super-slow motion. This allows you to kick speeding bullets away and get a dozen punches or so off while jumping in the air. Another VFX ability was mach speed, which allows Joe to run fast and pulverize opponents and objects with a bevy of rapid punches and kicks. The final VFX ability was just the ability to "zoom in," which gave Joe some extra attacking power and also gave you a few new attacks to use. So, yeah. For five of the seven levels, the game was very fun as I used these abilities to just punch and kick my way through hordes of enemies and five bosses. But then the game got hard. Real hard. And due to my own time crunch - "must finish Viewtiful Joe before March ends!" - I was barely able to tolerate the frustration. Even on "kids" mode (yes, the easier difficulty setting mocks you by implying that it is meant for children), the final stages of this game were very, very hard. Of course, in a platformer, when something is very hard, all you do is keep on trying it. So while the game could easily be beaten in five hours by someone who knows what they're doing, I'd guess I took twice that long easily - five hours of actual gameplay and five hours of me dying on exceedingly difficult boss fights. Honestly, it kind of ruined the game for me. Through three levels or so, I remember thinking that I was glad I already owned (and could soon log) Viewtiful Joe 2, but if that game is much harder than this one was, I just don't know if I'll enjoy the time I spend beating it. In the end then, Viewtiful Joe is a treat to play but a hassle to beat. In that respect, it's a very typical platformer and nothing you need to check out.