Review: Chronos Twins DX (Wiiware)
Game: Chronos Twins DX
Publisher: EnjoyUp Games
Developer: EnjoyUp Games
Price: 1000 Nintendo Points
Genre: Platformer
Pro: Runs Very Smooth, time travel is always cool, interesting idea
Con: Easy to be distracted, twice the chance of death, oddly devoid of a tutorial.
Chronos Twins actually started out for the GameBoy Advance; however, development of the game moved to the Nintendo DS so as to capture a new market of gamers. It was released on the Nintendo DS in Europe several years ago, but never made it to North America. Chronos Twins DX was made available for download through the Wiiware channel just a week prior to it’s release through the DSi download. Now that you have had that history lesson on its development, let’s get to a review.
The Chronos Twins DX story revolves around a race of psychic beings known as the Llhedar. They are trying to defeat an evil alien race called the (sigh) “Twime” from taking over their planet of Skyla. You play as “Nec” –one of the Llhedar– who are able to exist in two different time periods at once thanks to a machine of their own making. Nec is on a mission not only to stop the invasion of the evil Twime, but also to avenge his brother “Nash” who died trying save the planet, as well.
There are several different control schemes that you are able to use while playing the game. You can either use the Wiimote and Nun-chuck combination, or you can use the classic or the GameCube controller. I won’t go into detail on how the controls are laid out for each of them, as I assume you’re all smart and adults, so for the sake of this review let it be known I used the Wiimote/Nun-chuk set up. Movement is controlled by the analog stick on the nun-chuck; that’s simple enough. You have a weapon in both time periods, so firing in one is done with the “A” button and in the other time period with the”B” trigger. Jumping is accomplished the same way, one time period is the “C” button the other is the “Z” button. It sounds confusing at first (and is) but once you play enough of it you start to get a handle on which fingers control which time.
As may be obvious from the above, Nec is able to exist in two different time periods: the present and the past. These are represented by the top and bottom screens. Nec’s movements are exactly the same in both screens. When one version of Nec moves forward or back, the other version of Nec makes the exact same movements. This allows you to manipulate either of the time periods to get through both of them. For example: when faced with a large gap in one time period, more than likely there will be either a walk way or some means of spanning the gap in the other time period. So when you walk on solid ground in one time period, you will basically levitate in the other time period. Make sense? This also has a way of working against you as well. Enemies in the past will hurt you in both time periods no matter what. If an obstacle like a spiked floor exists in the past, you must find a way to navigate around it using a handy little feature you can unlock later in the game. At one point you are given the ability to freeze time in one time period and allow it to continue flowing onward in the other. This allows you to solve the handful of environmental puzzles the game throws at you.
How much fun is this game? Wel,l in my opinion, it’s got a fairly limited amount of fun. Even after several hours of playing the game and finally getting the hang of the controls, I still had trouble with the “two time period” thing. Maybe it’s just me but I was constantly getting hit, falling off ledges, or dying simply because I wasn’t looking at the correct screen. Sure, that boils down to me basically not paying attention, but this also is the inherent flaw in having a game that has this type of gimmick. Having things that want to kill you in two different times and on two different screens makes it twice as hard not to die. Maybe playing it on a large screen TV was to my disadvantage. Perhaps this game should have just stayed on the DS given that I can easily play with my attention spread between two different screens when they aren’t so large. The up side to this is that there appears to be no limit on how many times you can die. I died A LOT and never hit a screen that said game over. Granted, I did have to start back at beginning of the stage I was in, but it never felt like there was much of a impetus to play things completely safe. In addition, the game hands out check points pretty regularly, which I guess it should be doing, given this “die often,” “pay attention to two screens” style of play.
I do like the fact that it throws in some boss fights here and there. These are usually the best example of use of the dual time zone gimmick. Most of the fights will have the boss in one area while the other screen is clear. The key to winning each of these battles is to use both areas together to overcome your enemy.
I really wanted to like this game a lot more than I ultimately did. I gave it a fair chance to win me over, but in the end I just didn’t dig on it. That could just be my preference in games. I am normally not a platformer kind of guy but decided to branch out a bit. As I said, I think the best course of action with this game would have been just to stay on the smaller screens of the DSi. It’s not a horrible game by any means, it just has more flaws than high notes with me. Hopefully there’ll be a demo and y’all can check it out. Wait, does the Wii even do that? Nevermind, then.
