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Dark Cloud for PlayStation 2
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Dark Cloud for PlayStation 2
109 reviews   4.15 of 5

Product Description

Summary

After playing this game for twenty six hours and listening to many mixed reviews for this game i decided that i have to review this myself. This is a fantastic game, I mean sure it takes the fighting system of zelda and implements it but it works, so why not? Dark Cloud almost flawlessly combines all of the key aspects of zelda, sim city, actraiser,soulblazer, and the legend of mana into one magnificent game. My favorite part of the game is the weapon building system, it is a little reminiscent of the system used by square in secret of mana but improved a thousand times. You can spend hours and hours just fiddling around with building up your weapons and then synthesizing them to another weapon and then building that one up and so on....

It is pretty much impossible to play through the game only once and get every available weapon since some weapons can be built up two different ways which adds depth as well as alot of replay value. Once you reach the end of the game you will spend anywhere from 5 - 30 hours just going back to previous dungeons and building up your weapons until they are maxed out as much as you would like them to be ( for myself i will probably spend over 30 extra hours just building up all of my weapons , which makes the length of the game alot longer for people like me ). I have played every single ps2 game that has come out so far and this is by far the longest of the all the games and is in my list for the top three ps2 games ( along with shadow of destiny and guantlet dark legacy ).

The graphics in this game are fabulous. On all six of the main characters in the game you can tell alot of extra time was spend on them compared to the npc's of the game. Each of the six main characters has their own distinct look and gameplay feel to them and they glisten with nice colorful shiny graphics. The tone that the game sets is great, it submerges you in a beautiful very colorful arabic-esque setting that is unlike any game to date.

The gameplay is great as well. It borrows straight from the n64 zelda series with everything from the lock on attack system to the character movements but who cares it is a system that if impletemented properly works and sony used it properly here to create great gameplay that is very user friendly and can be learned just seconds into the game. Although the gameplay is simple to use, each enemy in the later stages seems to be easier to kill if you select the right person to fight them with, so that throws in a little more variation in the game which is great.

Although so far it seems as though i want to marry this game there are a few select flaws with the game and i will list them here:
i) Fairly bad sound. The swishes of the weapons are great and the nighttime chirpings are great but the music never really varies throughout the game and it would be nice to have voices for at least some of the characters in the game.

ii) RPGs are my favorite genre and I love a good story but unfortunetly this game has one of the worst stories I have ever witnessed in a game. It starts off okay but the only problem is that nothing happens in between. Luckily since the story doesnt exactly keep you hooked the weapon building system is incredible and that is what will keep you hooked for hours on end.

iii) The only other flaw is that the first two towns and the last town are cool, colorful fun to create and walk around in but the two middle towns of queens and muska racka are pathetic and seem to have just been thrown in to add length to the game. They are just simply bland and uncolorful cities. A little variation in the town building would have been nice but this is simply a small gripe.

In the end the game does have a couple minor short comings but not enough to not warrant a purchase. This is game that should definetly be purchased even if for just the weapon building system which makes up the bulk of the time spent playing the game.

Sound

The sound is the area that seems as though not enough attention was paid to while the game was being developed. No voices for any character in the game makes the experience a little less fun, i mean it is the ps2 so voices for at least the bigger name characters would have been a plus. It also would have been nice to have a little variation in the music selection thorughout the game, it is like theres a universal song for happiness, sadness, and neutral. Each town should have a wide range of tunes that play and every dungeon should have music that matches the mood that has been set by the rest of the game. So overall the sound could have definetly used a massive overhauling.

Gameplay

The game play has been duplicated directly out of zelda but with a few added twists that just make it different enough to call its own. It has the lock on feature where you press a button and move with the enemy, then you can move close enough to do your basic sowrd attack with the x button or use a slingshot, gun, or ring from afar. You can also press L1 to switch to another enemy if there are two enemies in attacking range, just like zelda. The only area that the gameplay changes from the zelda formula is that you can select items from your bag and toss them at the enemy to cause minimal damage and you can also hold down the attack button to charge up a special attack which when unleashed will do more damage than a normal attack but will use up more whp in the process. So all around the gameplay sticks to the zelda roots and is fantastic.
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Sound

The sound also won't win any awards but the music fits into the gameplay and is pleasant and doesn't get on your nerves. Ambient sound effects accompy the soundtrack with birds singing in the morning, crickets at night, water flowing and sound of fire on a torch help further put you into the Dark Cloud World. A nice job.

Gameplay

Ah, gameplay, the ingreients that make this game so special come from several different genres. First is randomly generated dungeon crawling which involves fighting enemies and collecting weopons, items and pieces of town called Atla. A powerful genie been released who is oredered to destroy all the villages. But right before the goal is acheived a magician whisks away all the townspeople and houses before their destroyed. This is where the next aspect of gameplay comes in, "town building." Similar to Actraiser on Super Nintendo you navigate a simple to use interface to build and populate the pieces of the village you find in the dungeon floors. Placing a house and instantly seeing the results in the game is so addictive by itself I stayed up till 4 a.m. playing. Add to that simple fighting controls and a weapon buildup system that gradually has you create the ultimate sword and I guarantee you'll be hooked for hours.
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Sound

Whatever, sound doesn't really matter but DARK CLOUD has some very stirring melodies coupled with bland battle music. the actual sound effects
are the same story, great sound effects except for the noises the characters make when they attack or get hurt.(WUSSY) Either way sound shoud not be a determining factor in you buying this game or enjoying it.

This is a great production BUY it if you want a new game.

Gameplay

the gameplay shines and sticks out from other games. Sure the fighting is like Zelda 64 and Majoras mask but the rest is completly new. its hard to explain the Georama system except for saying that it;s like Sim City with micro management. The Dungeon fighting is long and difficult yet addictive, and to break the monotony
you can leave the dungeon when you beat a floor, and go install the pieces of Atla you have found, shop, save your game, and otherwise alter the villages you hAVE BUILT.
great gameplay (plus there's a fishing mini game ala ocarina of time (ONLY MORE DIFFICULT))
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Summary

Uh well people were saying that this game was going to be the Zelda killer and it is better than Zelda 64 and Zelda Majoras Mask but that is because those games suck but this game itself has a couple of real bad flaws that kill it and stop it from being a great game. The first flaw is that it is too difficult to get items and the second flaw is sword damage because your sword damage goes quickly and it is too tough to find the item that recovers your sword there is no excuse for taht crap. The graphics in the game are awesome the characters look cool and the backgrounds are looking good but the gameplay is the important thing and that is where this game comes up a little short. The gameplay is not awful but it is a little to complicated to be great and people who say this is for people under the age 0f 14 are dumb because they would not be able to figure this stupid game out at all.
The sound is bad because the music is good but the sound effects and the noise when the character attacks are really stupid.
Overall this game is okay but not good in any way.

Now for the ratings.
The ratings are in percentages and 50% is average so expect to see it sometimes now on to the score.
Graphics 90%
Sound 30%
Gameplay50%
Characters 20%
Story 10% What story? There is none.
Battle System 60%
Overall 50%
Bottom Line If you have to play this game just rent it do not buy it because it is not worth it.
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Summary

Dark Cloud is hands-down is thebest RPG for 2001, not that there is many of them, this game just rules the RPG catagoery for now. The game has a believable plot, great atmosphere, and it's VERY addicting. Within the first hour of gameplay I had the controls mastered, and yes this game does represent Zelda in many ways. However this isn't the case here, this game takes Zelda and multilpies it by 100!. The Geo-Rama is an excellent feature for this game, you collect pieces on each dungeon, and when you go back to town your job is to re-create it, and when you collect all the "Alta" (village pieces) for one house, you get reward of a sort. You also have to listen to some villagers, for instance if they like to hunt, place their house next to a cave, and you'll get a better reward from them! You can also build up your weapons to utterly destroy enemies, when your weapon is on L5 you can turn it into an orb, and put all of that weapons attributes on a new weapon! If it sounds hard, it's not. There is also other things in this game that will interest you like a hidden dungeon with an extra 100 levels of play, fishing, and some side quests for villagers. Also there is point and click walking in the village, just hit select, move the cursor hit select again and you are there. The same applies for dungeons, you can leave and enter with the push of a button.
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Sound

Let's get this out of the way first: this game has no voiceovers. there is the occasional sounds emanating from a character, but all verbal communications are text-based. While this is not necessarily a bad things, I expect more from a game recorded on a high-capacity DVD. The battle music-while repetetive-doesn't ever get on my nerves and the overworld themes in the different towns and in the dungeons are actually pretty darn good!

Gameplay

Dark Cloud will be a pleasant surprise to many in the gameplay department. Gameplay ranges from dungeon exploring (RPG/Adventure), rebuilding towns (Sim City style), fishing (well, er..fishing!), combat and putting the town back together and changing it to suit the needs of it's occupants (puzzle elements). With all of these elements combined, the game never becomes boring and will suck you in for hours upon hours. Controls are spot-on perfect with the ability to lock-on to enemies and switch allies on the fly. The weapon upgrading system is also very cool. As you level-up your weapons, attachments such as fire, holy and cold become a part of the weapon-making room for all new attachments. After leveling up enough times, you can use the Status Break command to turn your weapon into a powerful orb with many of its former attributes. You then attach this orb to a new weapon to make IT more powerful. But be careful, when you start to hear that beeping (or see your weapon bar getting low) you better repair that weapon. If it breaks, it is gone (with all of the current attachments) for good!
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Sound

I love the music, it is mysterious, and almost enchanting. The only quarrel I have here is the same rythym going over and over again while in a dungeon.

Gameplay

The gameplay in my opinion, although repetetive (I was completely bored during the final levels of the Wise Owl Forest), has some intriguing aspects. As mentioned before, town building and placement plays a key role in the advancement of your character, (like getting powerup powder and battle ax for goro by meeting 100% of Matataki's requests). I also like the variety of weapons, which is another aspect which deviates from the orignal zelda concept. The targeting system is easy to control, although I find the actual attacks to be a bit unnatural at times. Overall, I must admit that the gameplay is quite remarkable, definitely one of the best action RPGs out there...reminds me of Secret of Mana, Dragon Warrior, and FF3 (these games are at the top of my awesome gameplay list).
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Sound

The soundtrack to this game is by no means that of say Final Fantasy Tactics or Xenogears. Since there are only 15 differnt tracks throughout the course of the game, they can get repetative but there are none that will grate on your nerves. The songs tend to be light-hearted and fit the particular setting they accompany. A little more variety would have been nice but that's just me being picky. The lack of voice acting also seems rather strange since we've seen it in so many games thus far on the PS2. However, if Sony was going to recruit some of the same actors as the Bouncer or ZOE, I'm kinda glad they opted for no voices. Still, with these being next generation games and there being a 6 month differnece between the US release and the Japanese release, you think they could have included some voice overs.

Overall, though not great, the sound is definitely adequet and you won't find your self turning the volume down and your stereo up at anytime during the game.

Gameplay

The real gem of this game does not lie in it's graphics, sound, or it's story. It's strength lies in it's rock solid gameplay that will allow for countless hours of arranging your atla and upgrading your weapons.

Essentially, the gameplay of Dark Cloud can be broken down into two major aspects: dungeon crawling and assembly of towns and villages. The main objective of the game is to collect various pieces of towns that were destroyed by the Dark Genie, called atla, in "dungeons" although the settings do have enough variety to not be entirely mind numbing, the overall feel is that they are much the same and can get tedious at times. However, the payoff of collecting up to 9 atla on each level is more than enough to keep you going. Once you've collected the atla, you can return to the town or village and start assembling it back together. There will be various pieces that must be put together properly such as one house may need a lamp and an extra room whereas another may require a clothesline and a torch. The buildings are then to be placed in any order you see fit, although meeting the requests of the townspeople can net you some very valuable items. One of the cooler aspects of the game is that you can go from the overhead camera view right into the town itself in real time with the push of the select button. This allows for easy navigation of the town once it has started to take shape. Overall, this aspect of the game surprised me the most since it turned out to be so very addictive.

The second major aspect of Dark Cloud's gameplay consists of weapons building. It seems as though the developers took some ideas from Vagrant Story but the system here is much less confusing and easier to achieve the "ultimate" weapon. Basically, weapons incur damage everytime you use them. If you're not careful, you could break it amidst a killer combo so it's very important to repair the weapon once it starts getting low. So, keep lots of repair powders on hand and you will be rewarded as the game progresses. Once a weapon reaches a certain level, it can be broken down into an item called a synthsphere that can be attatched to other weapons to increase their stats by 60% of the original. This is a very good means of not losing all the work that you put into developing a weapon once you find or win a better one. Also, weapons can be built up into more powerful ones if they reach a certain criterium of stats. This aspect of the game also turned out to be very fun, but it could also be frustrating to those who just want to walk into a room and hack away Resident Evil style on a bunch of monsters. It takes some patience, but I promise the end results will make you very happy.
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Sound

The sound is fine, but not outstanding. The (repetative) music changes as you get into battle, but the transition is not very smooth or effective. To hear this really done well, play Soldier of Fortune on the PC.

Gameplay

Reptition is the fault of the game. The game's fault is repetition. The repition tends to fault the game. Level after level of dungeons (which turn into forests and other things, but are still called dungeons...) gets tremendously repetative. Also, with only one attack (well, some others, but you lose so many WHp's to do them that I tend to avoid them) per character, it ends up being circle, back away, block (optional), attack, repeat. The building of the village was interesting at first, but then starts to get laborious. Yet, somehow, the game is very addictive. Don't ask me why, but it is... The duels are interesting, though you spend so much time concetrating on the buttons that you don't see the cool stuff (think Shenmue action sequences). But the one thing that really faults this game, though, is repetition.
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Sound

With the opening sequence being a dance routine to summon an evil destructive force, you'd probably expect some creepy, evil, and ominous tunes to bring in the game, right? Wrong. The music in this game falls flat on it's face. The rest of the sound effects are alright, and serve their purpose, but Dark Cloud completely fails to live up to the tradition of inspiring soundtracks in RPGs and "Action-RPGs" alike. I still remember the creepy droning sounds coming from the evil cultists' temple in Secret of Mana, the ominous and forboding gong that introduced Sephiroth in FF7, and the energetic final battle music of Chrono Trigger. When the opening sequence is a dance routine, and a fairly boring (albeit well-animated) one at that, you'd expect the designers of this game to have paid more attention to the soundtrack. Well, they didn't. This, along with the lack of any character voices, leaves most of the game's cinematic sequences with a hollow feeling.

Gameplay

Dungeon exploring makes up the core of the game. You travel around a randomly-generated dungeon, searching for components of your destroyed city and a key (held by a random monster) that allows you to progress to the next level of the dungeon. Sortof a mix of Diablo and Zelda. However, the dungeons contain neither the puzzle-solving aspects of Zelda nor the hack-and-slash action of Diablo. Fighting monsters helps you buid up the power of your weapons, but you must also be desperately careful to protect the fragile durability of your weapons. If a weapon (other than the orginal dagger) loses all of it's WHP - Weapon Hit Points - it is destroyed and dissapears forever, ruining all of your hard work in building up your weapon. You have the option of enhancing your weapons with various addons, some giving "elemental" powers and some designed to work better against a specific monster type, but it is unclear exactly what the effects of these upgrades are. Generally, once you get used to the combat system in the game, all you need to worry about is your WHP; the actual combat effectiveness of your weapon becomes a non-issue. And, as I have eluded to, the WHP system adds frustration rather than depth to the game. Realistic? Maybe. But this is a video game - I'm not looking for realism. And besides, you still eat bread to make you better after being toasted by a dragon (where's the realism in that?). I found myself avoiding many monsters after finding the key to the next level - the meager gain to your weapon's ability was not worth the cost of repairing your weapon's durability.

After completing a level of the dungeon, you can go back to your town and place buildings, people, and furnishings that you have found below in the dungeon (via the Atle-something-or-other sytem as explained by the Fairy King). Generally this is all pretty brainless. You plunk down buildings, trees, roads, and rivers wherever you think they might look pretty. Sometimes people will ask you to put their building here or there, but this was never really a challenge in city management.

Then you go back to the dungeon and complete another level. And another, and another, and another. The levels are generally uninteresting and bland. I fully completed re-constructing the first city in the game during the time I had the game rented, and 14 of the fifteen dungeon levels looked pretty much exactly the same. The monsters get slightly more difficult (read: frustrating) as you progress, but otherwise not much is different. The combat system attempts to mirror Zelda's Z-locking system, but the lack of a truly three dimensional environment and lack of a jump feature leave the combat fairly simplistic. Occasionally you will have a "duel" - a cinematic-style fight sequence in which you press buttons at the proper time to progress, but these were few and far between and didn't last long enough to be a challenge. The fifteenth level was the boss of the first area - the first area where you have to use some semblance of tactics. Nothing as complicated as the patterned boss fights of Zelda, but somewhat strategic nonetheless. I can see how fights like this could become more interesting later on in the game, but for me the tedium and frustration of working through boring dungeon level after boring dungeon level isn't really worth it.

The plot, along with the rest of the game, is far from sophisticated (at least from what I can tell so far). It doesn't seem like the kind of game that would surprise you like FF7 or Chrono Trigger. And through the first section of th