Dementium II (DS)
Platform: Nintendo DS
Developer: Renegade Kid
Publisher: SouthPeak Interactive
Release Date: May 4, 2010 (USA)
ESRB Rating: M for Mature
Developer: Renegade Kid
Publisher: SouthPeak Interactive
Release Date: May 4, 2010 (USA)
ESRB Rating: M for Mature
Despite the almost annoying abundance of First-
Person Shooter's on the market nowadays, the
genre isn't represented very well on the Nintendo DS. The DS is such a cool system to make FPS's for -the touch-screen is like a mini, on-the-go mousepad - but for some reason, almost certainly lack of horsepower compared to the competition, an FPS DS release is rare. So when a game like Dementium II comes along, it's truly something special.
Renegade Kid's (the developer of Dementium II) main focus seems to be FPS's on the Nintendo DS, and from what I've played, they seem to do very good work. Their latest FPS on the DS is Dementium II, sequel to Dementium: The Ward (the latter of which I haven't played). Dementium II is not only an FPS, but it's also a Survival Horror game.
The majority of Dementium II lies in the single-player Story Mode, which features a cohesive plot split into 5 chapters. Gameplay in Dementium II is much more like (but not identical to in design)an old-school FPS, like Duke Nukem 3D, than a modern one, like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, due to the level design. The game places the player in one large world with only a moderately linear path: Even though it's obvious that one must go to the areas on the map that they haven't gone to already, what the player has to do and where they have to do it is all on them to figure out. So that equates to to engaging in light puzzles, as well as finding things like switches, keys, and codes, but the game never really tells you what to do with them, and most, if not all, of the time you'll have to either backtrack or further explore to use these items. This is ultimately much more interesting than the "Shoot stuff, move forward, watch cutscene, repeat" set-up because I felt like I was doing more, which added an extra sense of satisfaction. The straight-up puzzles are also very good, and I was even surprised at how impressive a few were.
The action in Dementium II is top-notch, with it's engaging, frantic first-person combat. The player maneuvers William with the D-pad (or A, B, X, and Y buttons for lefties), aiming is done via stylus slides, and shooting is handled with either the left or right trigger (L button for righties, R button for lefties). It is a very accurate set-up that I think works very well, despite causing hand cramps. I'm not sure if it's intentional, but the aiming is a little on the shaky side, which is minorly annoying. All of the weapons feel great with appropriate weight, all of them feel different, and there are enough throughout the game (none are all-that exciting, but that makes sense given the context) to keep things moderately fresh. Enemies are also varied enough, but none of them really screamed original to me. The only obvious problem with the game design in Dementium II is the lack of checkpoints: There are places to save every twenty minutes are so and that's it. If you make a lot of progression and die without making it to a save point, you will lose all of that progress, and it is pretty frustrating.
The plot driving the Story Mode forward is undoubtedly very interesting. I haven't played the first game, so I can't quite comment on the transition from that to Dementium II, but in this game you wake up in a hospital (for the insane) after brain surgery and soon learn that something is very wrong. The brain surgeon is the antagonist (debatable, actually, but that's complicated), who constantly communicates to the player through the intercom system of the hospital. The protagonist William is put in a very desperate situation, with one goal: Survival. The story is told through the occasional cut-scene, but mostly through numerous documents you pick up and the intercom announcements made. The subtle method of story-telling through these pieces of text are very interesting in their simplicity: The imagination of the player certainly takes over. Oh, and when that surgeon gets on the intercom? Scared me every time: The man simply taunts you with very horrifying information, and the fact that he's near but in an unknown place only elevates the scares.
What makes this a lot more interesting is the complications, the ambiguity, the mystery, and the horror. William is a very weak protagonist, only able to wield weapons that he stumbles upon, lost in a very bleak, isolated location, and most likely suffering from Dementia (I'm sure people have other theories about his hypothetical insanity but I believe he has Dementia). I always felt like everything else was stronger than I was, I was always at least a little creeped out, and I was always interested in what was actually happening (though not to a frustrating extent). This game doesn't really try for shock scares, but rather just putting you in a state of uneasiness, and I'd say it's very affective. Blood and gore is almost always on the screen, enemies are intimidating, ammo is very scarce (I found myself resorting to melee a lot), and the music is creepy. Only once or twice did I feel that the game threw an ultimately failed scare my way (a very expected shock scare), but other than that, pretentiousness really is non-existent.
The Graphics and Sound Design in Dementium II are, for a portable system (especially the DS), very impressive. Sure, it's disappointing to see things such as fire and icicles represented as 2D pixels in this otherwise polygonal world, and sure, everything pixelates close-up, but I think that the graphics more than serve their purpose. An immense amount of detail is portrayed in everything, animation is just about as smooth as it needs to be, the framerate refuses to drop, and minor lighting affects are used effectively. Music and sound effects aren't going to win any awards, but all of the audio serves its purpose as being creepy and atmospheric, but don't expect Dead Space.
The Story Mode of Dementium II is about 5-7 hours long, and can be played on three different difficulties. I would normally label this as a bad thing, but there are a couple of things here that doesn't make it much of a problem. For one thing the story works great in the 5-7 hour time period, feeling neither stretched-out nor compressed. Secondly, there is a Survival Mode included in the game with 5 waves that you unlock as you play the game, which is a fun diversion. But the main reason why this really isn't a problem is the now very low price of this game. Dementium II can be purchased at GameStop brand new for $7.99, and used for $6.99, so I can't imagine why 5+ hours of gameplay would be too little for only 7-8 dollars.
Dementium II isn't anything outrageously out of the ordinary for the genre, and nothing about the game is what I would call "amazing." Repetition does pose a problem, but playing the game in short bursts will make that problem wane. If you want an amazing Survival Horror Shooter, get Dead Space 2. If you want a really cool, old-school style FPS Horror game that you can take with you on-the-go for an extremely low price, pick up Dementium II while it's cheap.
8.5/10
Review written by Matthew Petras. The game was played for approximately 7 hours on a Nintendo DSi XL system. Any questions and comments would be appreciated, and thanks for reading!
Person Shooter's on the market nowadays, the
genre isn't represented very well on the Nintendo DS. The DS is such a cool system to make FPS's for -the touch-screen is like a mini, on-the-go mousepad - but for some reason, almost certainly lack of horsepower compared to the competition, an FPS DS release is rare. So when a game like Dementium II comes along, it's truly something special.
Renegade Kid's (the developer of Dementium II) main focus seems to be FPS's on the Nintendo DS, and from what I've played, they seem to do very good work. Their latest FPS on the DS is Dementium II, sequel to Dementium: The Ward (the latter of which I haven't played). Dementium II is not only an FPS, but it's also a Survival Horror game.
The majority of Dementium II lies in the single-player Story Mode, which features a cohesive plot split into 5 chapters. Gameplay in Dementium II is much more like (but not identical to in design)an old-school FPS, like Duke Nukem 3D, than a modern one, like Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2, due to the level design. The game places the player in one large world with only a moderately linear path: Even though it's obvious that one must go to the areas on the map that they haven't gone to already, what the player has to do and where they have to do it is all on them to figure out. So that equates to to engaging in light puzzles, as well as finding things like switches, keys, and codes, but the game never really tells you what to do with them, and most, if not all, of the time you'll have to either backtrack or further explore to use these items. This is ultimately much more interesting than the "Shoot stuff, move forward, watch cutscene, repeat" set-up because I felt like I was doing more, which added an extra sense of satisfaction. The straight-up puzzles are also very good, and I was even surprised at how impressive a few were.
The action in Dementium II is top-notch, with it's engaging, frantic first-person combat. The player maneuvers William with the D-pad (or A, B, X, and Y buttons for lefties), aiming is done via stylus slides, and shooting is handled with either the left or right trigger (L button for righties, R button for lefties). It is a very accurate set-up that I think works very well, despite causing hand cramps. I'm not sure if it's intentional, but the aiming is a little on the shaky side, which is minorly annoying. All of the weapons feel great with appropriate weight, all of them feel different, and there are enough throughout the game (none are all-that exciting, but that makes sense given the context) to keep things moderately fresh. Enemies are also varied enough, but none of them really screamed original to me. The only obvious problem with the game design in Dementium II is the lack of checkpoints: There are places to save every twenty minutes are so and that's it. If you make a lot of progression and die without making it to a save point, you will lose all of that progress, and it is pretty frustrating.
The plot driving the Story Mode forward is undoubtedly very interesting. I haven't played the first game, so I can't quite comment on the transition from that to Dementium II, but in this game you wake up in a hospital (for the insane) after brain surgery and soon learn that something is very wrong. The brain surgeon is the antagonist (debatable, actually, but that's complicated), who constantly communicates to the player through the intercom system of the hospital. The protagonist William is put in a very desperate situation, with one goal: Survival. The story is told through the occasional cut-scene, but mostly through numerous documents you pick up and the intercom announcements made. The subtle method of story-telling through these pieces of text are very interesting in their simplicity: The imagination of the player certainly takes over. Oh, and when that surgeon gets on the intercom? Scared me every time: The man simply taunts you with very horrifying information, and the fact that he's near but in an unknown place only elevates the scares.
What makes this a lot more interesting is the complications, the ambiguity, the mystery, and the horror. William is a very weak protagonist, only able to wield weapons that he stumbles upon, lost in a very bleak, isolated location, and most likely suffering from Dementia (I'm sure people have other theories about his hypothetical insanity but I believe he has Dementia). I always felt like everything else was stronger than I was, I was always at least a little creeped out, and I was always interested in what was actually happening (though not to a frustrating extent). This game doesn't really try for shock scares, but rather just putting you in a state of uneasiness, and I'd say it's very affective. Blood and gore is almost always on the screen, enemies are intimidating, ammo is very scarce (I found myself resorting to melee a lot), and the music is creepy. Only once or twice did I feel that the game threw an ultimately failed scare my way (a very expected shock scare), but other than that, pretentiousness really is non-existent.
The Graphics and Sound Design in Dementium II are, for a portable system (especially the DS), very impressive. Sure, it's disappointing to see things such as fire and icicles represented as 2D pixels in this otherwise polygonal world, and sure, everything pixelates close-up, but I think that the graphics more than serve their purpose. An immense amount of detail is portrayed in everything, animation is just about as smooth as it needs to be, the framerate refuses to drop, and minor lighting affects are used effectively. Music and sound effects aren't going to win any awards, but all of the audio serves its purpose as being creepy and atmospheric, but don't expect Dead Space.
The Story Mode of Dementium II is about 5-7 hours long, and can be played on three different difficulties. I would normally label this as a bad thing, but there are a couple of things here that doesn't make it much of a problem. For one thing the story works great in the 5-7 hour time period, feeling neither stretched-out nor compressed. Secondly, there is a Survival Mode included in the game with 5 waves that you unlock as you play the game, which is a fun diversion. But the main reason why this really isn't a problem is the now very low price of this game. Dementium II can be purchased at GameStop brand new for $7.99, and used for $6.99, so I can't imagine why 5+ hours of gameplay would be too little for only 7-8 dollars.
Dementium II isn't anything outrageously out of the ordinary for the genre, and nothing about the game is what I would call "amazing." Repetition does pose a problem, but playing the game in short bursts will make that problem wane. If you want an amazing Survival Horror Shooter, get Dead Space 2. If you want a really cool, old-school style FPS Horror game that you can take with you on-the-go for an extremely low price, pick up Dementium II while it's cheap.
8.5/10
Review written by Matthew Petras. The game was played for approximately 7 hours on a Nintendo DSi XL system. Any questions and comments would be appreciated, and thanks for reading!
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