Planet Monsters review

So far I must say that the Game Boy Advance has been suffering from a lack of quality titles outside of those offered by Nintendo. To date you are more likely to find me playing Advance Wars or Tetris and unfortunately Planet Monsters from Titus continues the disappointing trend that we've endured of late. The game is set around the Planet Monsters World Championship, held on what used to be Earth before a comet struck. Unlike most movies man managed to survive but unfortunately mutated into warrior monsters that like nothing better than having a good scrap. The World Championship was created to allow raging monsters a place to fight rather than out on the streets. The monsters are based on animals and dinosaurs that have existed, how a human can mutate into a crab is beyond me. The monsters are purely visual and do not possess special attributes so you choice is purely cosmetic and not tactical. The arenas are scattered across various countries from Brazil to Greenland to Japan where you are able to fight to the death. Weaponry available includes guns and bombs with various power ups, which reminded me of Mario Kart. There is a special multi player mode that you can use to link up with friends and engage in monster combat but this removes perhaps the strongest element of the game, puzzles. Planet Monsters tries to offer something new by combing puzzle elements and combat as popularised by Pokemon. Certainly the style and look of the game is aimed squarely at those unable to enjoy such delights as Doom or Eck vs Server on the Game Boy Advance. Bright colours and simplistic graphics do make for delicious combat and luminous levels. Perhaps the colouring artist was restricted to primary colours only? In the single player mode you are able to explore levels which at times are quite large and once complete take on a boss. The levels take the form of a maze and come complete with blocks that you can move and use to hit enemies lying in wait nearby. Moving these blocks as you can see from the screenshots can open up new avenues and routes to explore hence the puzzle element. The problem with the majority of games that try to combine various styles is that they often just don't work out as intended. While the combat element with friends is initially fun it does feel as if it has been tagged on as an afterthought. If Planet Monsters had built upon the puzzles and offered more competition through scores and time this would have been far better. My main complaint with most games for the Game Boy Advance is a lack of a save function, some forgo it completely, others offer a password system. Here Planet Monsters offers the latter, which I suppose is better than nothing having to scribble down long codes whilst on the move is not recommended. On first playing the game be warned as after the usual credits the screen will turn black for sometime before the game appears. When I played the game for the first time I thought it had crashed and surely something could have been done to remove such an annoying fault. Planet Monsters does have some good ideas but these have unfortunately not been expanded upon enough to justify its release and you'll find yourself losing interest rapidly.