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GameNikki's Review (8/10)

Only a recent upstart, publisher NEC Interchannel has been making waves with the company's unique line of imports, like Tube Slider and Culdcept. Now that the PlayStation 2 gradually looms towards the end of its life cycle, publishers are beginning to take more daring steps to exploring previously empty genres. Puzzle games are a dime a dozen on the PS2, but card games are few and long between. Culdcept is a game from Omiya Soft, featuring an absolutely insane plot and a smart game engine hiding between the layers of unbelievable import silliness. If you've been waiting for an in-depth tactical card game, Culdcept isn't the first but it might be the best - depending on what you're willing to put up with.

First, the craziness. Goddess Culdra sees all, hears all and knows all. Her knowledge and powers are stored in the Culdcept, a book of creation and destruction. She also has a huge horn hat. Throughout history, events have been shaped by Cepters, or sorcerers trained in using the Culdcept to derive power in combat. Good Cepters bring around positive change, while selfish and evil Cepters create temporary periods of doom and gloom. This is the cycle of things, and for millennia the system worked. But seeing all, Culdra looks into the future and sees a vile and powerful Cepter who if left unstopped will destroy the entire universe. Something must be done! So she summons this guide who has the head of an old man and the body of a bouncing walking stick (still with me?) to go search for a Cepter with enough potential to save the entire universe and unleash THE POWER OF GREYSKULL. Ahem, I mean the Culdcept…

Culdcept focuses on the Cepter you create, who is found by the stick guy just in time to save the piece of wood from an evil bounty hunter Cepter. Apparently in this alternate universe, everyone who's anyone battles with little cards and a board game. Also, everyone has names that appear to be taken right out of one of those "Choose your own Lord of the Rings name" websites, and even after hours of playing, I still refused to memorize the most basic of the tongue-twister cast. Ignore the amazing plot, however, and a deep and enjoyable tactical strategy game opens itself up.

When you've challenged another Cepter to a battle, the scene switches to the board game layout where most of Culdcept is played. The size of the board depends on the opponent; at first, the boards are small squares and very simple. Later in the game multiple branching paths and massive boards makes the war an epic affair. The concept remains the same no matter what the number of tiles. Your character and the enemies travel around taking turns. At the start, the player draws a card out of their deck, possibly casts a spell to impact their turn or another's, and finally rolls the dice. They move accordingly, and then the strategy kicks in. If they land on a blank square, a creature card can be placed which reserves the spot of land and sets a toll tax for all enemies who land there, kind of like Monopoly. Except unlike Monopoly, if the opponent doesn't feel like paying the tax, they can challenge the creature with one of their own cards and start a battle. To win the spot, the landowner's creature must be destroyed in a single move; if the attack simply lowers the HP but doesn't finish the job, the opponent pays the toll, but the HP change is reflected in the creature and next time it will be much easier to kill. Whenever a player lands on a castle, they can make improvements to their overall territory, while landing on their own creature lets them upgrade just that tile. Again like Monopoly and building houses and hotels, you have to spend money to make money. Raising the level of the property will increase the toll on that particular square, but also costs plenty. The ideal tactic is to charge exorbitant rates on tiles guarded by extremely high-powered and tough to beat creature cards. Since the winning objective is to reach a certain amount of money, this is the way to quicker victory.

In this case, 'quicker' is relative. Matches still take up to an hour each, and no, I'm not kidding. The game simply doesn't know when to quit, and assumes players will be the same die-hard fanatics who don't know when to, either. Sure, Culdcept chopped into smaller doses plays well and surprises. Who knew a digital card game could be so fun and addictive? The depth throughout boggles the mind; the whole section above failed to mention all the options, counters and special abilities and exceptions employed to constantly keep players on their toes. Item cards can be used in combat to turn the tides of war, and tiles are separated into different element classes, like water and fire, that correspond to a creature type. Place a fire creature on a creature tile, and the character receives a modest HP boost that helps stave off the competitor's attack. Little twists like this make Culdcept fun to play, but in the import process, a recognizable story was replaced with pure gibberish, and does anyone really want to play a card game for hours at a time? All the game offers is playing cards, with few to no frills on the side. Yes, you can edit the Book of cards, but this hardly makes you care about the bollocks of a plot. Strategy and tactical fans should find Culdcept quite amusing, and fans of other digital card games can worship this as their new idol. Everyone else approach this quirky number with a mix of cautious apprehension and interest.

When you think of a digital card game, does the term 'visually stunning' immediately pop up, or 'backwards'? If you chose the former, you've not yet experienced Culdcept. Most games choose a dimension and stick with it, 2D games stay flat and 3D games feel good looking fleshed-out. But Culdcept can't make up its mind, and the choice of 2D vs. 3D for any particular portion of the game largely seems to be based on some random element, like a coin toss. FMVs in 3D, character sprites in 2D, boards in 3D and card drawings in 2D. It's enough to make a person dizzy. Of course, most of the effort goes into producing only the finest quality fantasy art for the large selection of cards in the Culdcept deck. Everything else looks like a SNES title gone bad, and with some cheap cutscenes thrown in for laughs.

Speaking of laughs, the plot gets loonier once the voice actors kick in. The girl's booming narrator voice is both grand and tremendously out of place, while the rest of the audio selections are just plain crazy. Simple music abounds, but some of the sound effects and other voices sound like a poor dub. In this case, the effect works, because Culdcept manages to draw players in. Sometimes the audio gets downright embarrassing, but mostly the off-put nature of the presentation accents the already illogical and confusing plot.

Since matches can take up to an hour each, Culdcept definitely tries to grab players for the long haul. The single player game is the only real attraction; there is a multiplayer option, but if you have another friend present who is into intricate card games, why not play poker or Magic the Gathering physically instead and save the money? Culdcept takes a very long time to beat, assuming you want to keep at it and not quit after you've gotten your fill in a few matches. For most people, several matches will be enough to give this curiosity a test run. It's great that Culdcept is out there for the hardcore tactical freaks, but the game plods along too slowly and forces too much devotion to be anything like an idle hobby. Prepare to waste your month(s) away, or just rent this beast and enjoy the unintentionally hilarious plot and general presentation.

Scores

Visual - 5.0
Two dimensions is old school, but mixing 2D and 3D? That's just... odd.

Audio - 6.0
Like the graphics, the audio sounds like a throwback to simpler times. Maybe that's just a way to dodge the effort of a complicated presentation.

Gameplay - 8.3
Addictive but lengthy, Culdcept is relatively easy to get into, and gets progressively deeper as you play.

Value - 8.0
Numerous hours of single player, plus book customization and other nerdy 100% completion things.

Overall - 8
Culdcept is certainly not for everyone, but take a rent and see--you very well may like it!

Last Updated on Wednesday, 15 May 2013 08:48

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