Franchise revival is a showpiece title, but controls may get in the way.
We played Kid Icarus Uprising at the weekend's Nintendo World demo event in Japan and discovered a good side and a bad side to the game. The bad side is something that has been hinted at in impressions from past events: the controls. The good side is... well, pretty much everything else.
Kid Icarus Uprising is a rethinking of the Kid Icarus franchise as a shooter. It doesn't have much to do with the classic Famicom title, a platformer, except for the character and world elements.
The game's stages are split into two parts. You first control Pit in the air in what's best described as a 3D rails shooter. You have no control over direction here, so all you have to worry about is taking out enemies and avoiding bullet fire. In terms of story, it's said that the goddess Palutena is controlling the action here, having given Pit the gift of flight which lasts just five minutes (Pit normally can't fly).
Kid Icarus Uprising is a rethinking of the Kid Icarus franchise as a shooter. It doesn't have much to do with the classic Famicom title, a platformer, except for the character and world elements.
The game's stages are split into two parts. You first control Pit in the air in what's best described as a 3D rails shooter. You have no control over direction here, so all you have to worry about is taking out enemies and avoiding bullet fire. In terms of story, it's said that the goddess Palutena is controlling the action here, having given Pit the gift of flight which lasts just five minutes (Pit normally can't fly).
After those five minutes are up, Pit falls to the ground for the stage's ground component. Here, the game is still a shooter, but you have full control over Pit. You're free to move around through the stages, although based off the demo stages we wouldn't say there's an "explorative" component or anything. You can pick up items along the way, and does seem to be some variety to the stage designs other than just moving forward as fast as you can. The ground component ends with a boss fight.
If you're watching someone play (we got to watch director Masahiro Sakurai do just that during a stage presentation), Kid Icarus Uprising looks like a true spectacle for the 3DS. The flight sequences are fast and like a roller coaster. The ground sequences, particularly the massive boss fights, are also intense, with lots of targets small, large and humungous.
The controls proved to get in the way during our sampling, though. You control Pit through a combination of button and stylus controls. You move Pit via the analogue pad (the "3D Slider," as Nintendo calls it), aim by moving a curser around with the stylus, and fire with L. You can hold down L for a continuous stream of fire, or you can release L momentarily to charge up a more powerful shot. On the ground, you can perform a melee combat attack by getting close to enemies. You can also make Pit do an evasive dash by tapping the analogue pad in a given direction.
Our problems centered on the fundamental control system: it's just tough to move Pit around while consciously pressing the L trigger and also thinking about aiming. It almost feels like the game would be easier to control with a Wiimote and nunchuck pair.
Things get even messier in the ground stages, where you have to also take Pit's viewpoint into consideration. You can rotate Pit's view via a flick-style stylus input -- that is, you slash the stylus across the bottom screen, similar to a flick command on the iPhone. Actually using this viewing system can be tricky. We couldn't get the hang of it in our four play sessions.
We're going to give Kid Icarus and the developers at Sora (that's the studio Nintendo and Smash Bros. designer Masahiro Sakurai formed for the development of the game) the benefit doubt here and assume that the Kid Icarus Uprising control scheme can be learned through repeated play, and if not they will be making adjustments before the final release.
Our play session at Nintendo World has convinced us that if the controls don't prove to be a barrier, this will be a must-buy for the platform.
If you're watching someone play (we got to watch director Masahiro Sakurai do just that during a stage presentation), Kid Icarus Uprising looks like a true spectacle for the 3DS. The flight sequences are fast and like a roller coaster. The ground sequences, particularly the massive boss fights, are also intense, with lots of targets small, large and humungous.
The controls proved to get in the way during our sampling, though. You control Pit through a combination of button and stylus controls. You move Pit via the analogue pad (the "3D Slider," as Nintendo calls it), aim by moving a curser around with the stylus, and fire with L. You can hold down L for a continuous stream of fire, or you can release L momentarily to charge up a more powerful shot. On the ground, you can perform a melee combat attack by getting close to enemies. You can also make Pit do an evasive dash by tapping the analogue pad in a given direction.
Our problems centered on the fundamental control system: it's just tough to move Pit around while consciously pressing the L trigger and also thinking about aiming. It almost feels like the game would be easier to control with a Wiimote and nunchuck pair.
Things get even messier in the ground stages, where you have to also take Pit's viewpoint into consideration. You can rotate Pit's view via a flick-style stylus input -- that is, you slash the stylus across the bottom screen, similar to a flick command on the iPhone. Actually using this viewing system can be tricky. We couldn't get the hang of it in our four play sessions.
We're going to give Kid Icarus and the developers at Sora (that's the studio Nintendo and Smash Bros. designer Masahiro Sakurai formed for the development of the game) the benefit doubt here and assume that the Kid Icarus Uprising control scheme can be learned through repeated play, and if not they will be making adjustments before the final release.
Our play session at Nintendo World has convinced us that if the controls don't prove to be a barrier, this will be a must-buy for the platform.
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