LocoRoco 2

The market is flooding us with more and more realistic productions, with newer and newer graphics. You can often go wrong, if we are looking at the game or just a picture. And although I remember that it was said the same way eight years ago, now such words are gaining credibility. In the pursuit of photorealistic visuals, filmmaking and realism, we often forget that it is not this factor that determines whether the game is honey and will be remembered for a long time, or after the initial buzz caused by an intrusive promotional campaign, it will go somewhere into the dark regions of video game history and only a few will remember it.

I will explain right away - I generally don't mind good graphics. I just mean that the games are now based on the principle of craft work. Apparently, if we take individual components, we have a surefire hit. The graphics are stunning, on the best engine, with effects that we can't even name. Gameplay super intense, spectacular and refined. Music selected by specialists, based on the latest trends, possibly composed by ... and so on, you know. And yet, after combining all this comes out a product that is fun to play, we exploit it, have a great time, put it on the shelf and ... we forget.

And then comes out - not to look far - World of Goo, which makes a sensation, everyone is delighted with it and is more popular than many high-budget production. And yet it is almost an archaic game, with two-dimensional graphics and an idea ... Come back, an idea ?! That's right.

I must admit that at the beginning I was not convinced by Loco Roco. "Some stupid things for kids," I thought, waiting for the new Need for Speed at the same time. Until I played and was absorbed. Enchanted and crushed. Then my life focused on waiting for the second part. Finally, quite recently, I got it in my hands. And then joy came.

Loco Roco 2 is a continuation of a very simple in assumptions platformer on PSP. All the fun focuses on the eponymous Loco Roco - spherical jelly-like creatures that must save their planet from the evil Mojo. Everything incredibly colorful, happy and positive. The biggest fun is that we control not so much nice creatures but the board. When we tilt it, Loco Roco roll in a given direction, and shaking it - we shoot it into the air.

During the adventure, we collect special flowers that Loco Roco eat, which they reproduce (probably by budding). However, we all know that it is only in strength that is why we can combine them into a larger booger. However, big snot can't fit everywhere, but luckily you can separate again. And so over and over again - depending on your needs.

The same pattern remained in the second part. In fact, looking at the pictures, you can be mistaken as to which version of the series we are dealing with. At first glance, Loco Roco 2 looks more like a separate game, fortunately it quickly shows how wrong we are. The most important change is the greater variety - there is no impression of repetition from the first part. Not only is each level different, it also focuses on something else. In the winter level, we mainly slide on the board and we must use the momentum, in the jungle we use lianas and solve the mysterious mechanisms of ancient civilization, and in the factory all surfaces reflect us and we feel like in Pinball.

In total, we have eleven different scenery here, in addition to the other is the meadow, hills, autumn forest, tribal lands, tropical islands, land shrouded in moonlight, Halloween level and absurd forest. Anyway, absurd accompanies the game all the time. The world presented as a cheerful planet is absurd, all levels are absurd, all beings appearing in it are absurd. Finally - the plot is absurd. Let me quote the creation of the action. There is a cheerful planet full of music, where Loco Roco and MuiMui sing and overall life goes on in full harmony and peace. However, on the distant planet Mojo, where only gloomy music can be heard, and all life is covered with black fluid, revenge is planned for the first part of the game. At that time, Mojo invaded Loco Roco, but brave snots repelled and humiliated the invaders.

So Mojo launch a piece of their planet at the cheerful creatures, full of hungry creatures, including their boss - Banmucho. Our first task is to free Nyoka, crushed with black ointment (a pink jelly rectangle protruding from the ground; smiling - like everything in this world). A single Loco Roco is too weak, but the eyes of the imagination are perceived as a larger booger made of a dozen creatures. So we have to gather a larger team through the first levels and free the poor jelly. Grateful Nyoki will give us access to the first mini-game instead.

Next, we focus on helping MuiMui and chasing Mojo from our planet (by the way clearing her of bad fluid) so that the music comes back to her again. In addition to normal levels, we have a lot of mini games, bonuses and secrets. There is also the Loco Roco race, where we bet on the one of them, and then we pray that he will win (we have no influence on it), we have a typical hammer smashing out of holes of creatures, there is also a scuffle. On each level we can find MuiMui, which then go to their hut (it looks more like a tuber or egg). This can be expanded with the help of found items. We create new rooms, put furniture or other equipment inside. Cool!

It is amazing how many flavors the game has hidden in the game! I will mention only a few - if at a given stage we collect all the Loco Roco fruits, Picktories (colored balls, for which we then play minigames or expand the MuiMui bulb) and objects, then a funny scene is revealed. After collecting the right amount of notes on the board, we get easier re-passing it, and even its map!

After building the camera in the MuiMui house, we can take screenshots anywhere in the game. After creating the playing equipment, we can play (also unlocked) music. If we put an instrument, then one MuiMui can approach it and start playing, which will be heard! Creating more rooms, we find fragments of the map, which after building the laboratory, we can examine, which is associated with a surprise. After plowing, we will randomly get simple items (those that can grow). Also, as the tuber fills up with new inhabitants, presents await us. Even the loading screen has a surprise! I could exchange it for a long time, but I leave exploring all this to you - you will have more fun.

Fragment of the MuiMui tuber - I wouldn't despise myself ...

Someone may rightly notice: "okay, but it still looks like the first part". It's hard to disagree. Fortunately, in addition to greater variety of individual stages and more flavors, the authors decided to add something else. There have been boss fights, great indeed. The number of Loco Roco has increased to seven and now we choose which we want to wander. Each of them has its own different song. They also learned new things. They can dive in water, crawl into shells or stones and, for example, safely pass through places full of spikes.

As the game progresses, they also learn minor abilities, such as more powerful destruction of black goo, clinging to branches and bouncing off them, or pulling hidden creatures that usually hamster an object. It is worth returning to previous levels thanks to this, because with new skills we are able to discover previously inaccessible places.

We also collect notes during the game. After collecting a hundred we get a bonus (about which I wrote earlier). This is associated with a new, rhythmic mini-game. During levels we will meet places where Loco Roco can sing. Is it - to wake up a creature or cheer them up so that they give way to us, or just sing in an unusual place. A specific number (5, 10 or 15) is required then and sometimes you really have to work hard to collect so many of them. A patent known from the first part, but this minigame was added here.

If we manage to collect enough Loco Roco, they begin to sing, and we have to press the circle when the moving note is exactly above its reflections (very well-defined scheme, the easiest way to say is that it is the same principle as in Dance Dance Revolution , without the use of crotch legs, of course). The better we do it, the more notes we get and the better we can get the item. It's nice that depending on which Loco Roco we play, it is a different song.

Music deserves a separate paragraph. It's amazing. Suffice to say that my family hates me. They said for the first time in their lives that they don't mind Japanese music, as long as I don't listen to Loco Roco . In short - they don't know each other. All songs are - like the entire production - incredibly positive and unbelievably catchy. Believe me, without music this game would be just a substitute for what it is. In general, I think that the role of music in deciding the quality of games is underestimated.

I didn't find a single melody that I didn't like. These are not only cheerful melodies, but well thought-out compositions. They perfectly emphasize the climate of a given level or situation, match the characteristics of each Loco Roco, and the song from the main menu and the MuiMui song are simply fantastic.

I also really like the procedure that the authors used, namely - the more Loco Roco we have, the more extensive the music becomes. At the beginning, for example, we only hear the main rhythm. After collecting five creatures, there are drums, at ten - vocals, at fifteen - chorus, and at twenty we can hear the full composition. Little bajer - and how happy it is.

I wrote at the beginning that often individual components of the game look great, but together it does not give a sensational result. At Loco Roco we have great music, extremely cool graphics (in terms of aesthetics), enormous collections, humor - but what determines that this game completely crushed my mind (in a positive sense of the word)? What makes me write letters for ten minutes while writing this review, and spend the next half hour playing? What makes me absolutely in love and I haven't shaved in four days?

Imagination. Imagination. Three times fantasy. The whole world, all the rules that govern it, the concept, music, graphic style, senseless language that the characters speak - everything looks like it's created by a child. And we know that the most fascinating is the world seen through the eyes of a child. I am convinced that the Japanese make the best games.

Throughout this technology race, games like Loco Roco show that it's not really about the amount of effects, another billion polygons or liquid nitrogen for cooling graphics cards. Without fantasy and a pinch of genius, there is no question of a production that will enchant us and which we will remember in a tear in ten years. I already know a few people who have been allergic to Loco Roco. That it's childish. That stupid. Until they played. I had to use force to recover the console. Even now I sleep with a chain attached to it, and at night I see in the windows the silhouettes of hungry beasts, repeating like the "Loco Roooooocooo" mantra. The best PSP game!

Marcin "Yuen" Konstantynowicz

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