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North America

Viewtiful Joe

by Daniel Bloodworth - October 5, 2003, 10:41 pm EDT

Final impressions from the import of one of the hottest games this year. Just when you think it can’t get any harder, that’s exactly what it does.

Two words sum up Viewtiful Joe: style and difficulty. This is easily one of the most unique and stylish games to come out for some time, and the difficulty hearkens back to classics like Ghosts and Goblins.

Visually, Joe sports a unique cel-shaded visual style that’s a mix of Japanese and American comic styles. Thick and rough black lines distinguish it from other cel-shaded styles, and two-dimensional objects and background elements are mixed in to further give it that comic book feel.

Voice-acting is put to great use to give Joe extra flair and a sarcastic attitude. Joe often vocalizes his moves with quips like “Up you go fella,” “Can’t touch me,” or the already famous “Henshin-a-go-go Baby!” Similarly, whenever you pause, the announcer will make different remarks, such as “Take 5” or “Bathroom?” which change from stage to stage. Joe gets into lengthier dialog with bosses in cut-scenes, but although Joe retains his witty tongue-in-cheek comments, most of the bosses have been run through some filter that makes them sound distorted and muffled. At first, you may not realize they’re speaking in English, but even when you get a feel for the filter, it can be hard to pick up everything they say. Hopefully the North American version will be subtitled as was the Japanese version.

The game plays much like an old-school brawler, but as Joe gains his VFX abilities, the strategy changes drastically. Joe can slow down time, move super-fast, or zoom in to dish out more powerful attacks. The trick is that most of the time, using your VFX will drain your VFX meter, and if it gets too low, you’ll revert back to “regular” Joe. So you have to always keep an eye on your VFX meter and look out for film cans to make it longer. Dodging enemies is another key part of the strategy. Dodging attacks often disorients enemies, giving you an opportunity to use slow, hit their weak spot, and perform huge combos by knocking them into other enemies.

Speaking of combos, racking up points in Joe is essential. Periodically, you’ll be able to use your points to buy upgrades, more health, new moves, extra lives, and more. Capcom has made scores important again and given players an incentive to find ways to perform ever-more Viewtiful combos.

What cannot be stressed enough though is that this game is hard. You’ll have to learn specific patterns and strategies for every enemy you encounter, and baddies that first appear as mini-bosses later become regulars tossed in with the rest. The pace is made for endurance as well. Each episode has various checkpoints that you’ll need to pass. There are points that you’ll go back to when you lose a life, and points that you’ll move back to if you lose all of your lives. Save points? Well, those are few and far between indeed. The most notorious level is Episode 6 which pits you against five bosses in a row. If you lose your last life on the fourth boss, you’ll have to start over from the first. Once you get to the fifth boss, you can try again indefinitely, but if you get frustrated and turn the power off, then it’s back to the first one all over again.

The bosses aren’t exactly a piece of cake either. It can literally take hours to learn each one’s patterns and start getting your hits in consistently. They can tear you apart in no time if you get hit by them, and they have ridiculous amounts of health – some with as many as ten full life bars to whittle down. Later bosses seem impossible to hit or avoid, forcing you to find and hone in on the few weaknesses they do have in their attacks.

Hours and hours of sweat, cramped hands, and bloodshot eyes have gone into this game so far, and there is still so much left that could be done. Viewtiful Joe boasts a wealth of replay value, but it isn’t for the lighthearted. There is a music video, three extra playable characters, two more difficulty settings, and an unlimited VFX meter for the strong.

After you finish the “Adults” difficulty, you’ll unlock V-Rated. Then after you finish V-rated, you’ll unlock Ultra V-Rated. Let’s put things into perspective here. Let’s say that a “normal” game consists of Easy, Normal, Hard, and Very Hard difficulty settings. Well, VJ also has four settings, but if you were to line them up, Kids would be the equivalent of Hard. Adults would be in the same ballpark as Very Hard, and V-Rated and Ultra V-Rated would be entirely uncharted territory.

V-Rated has a number of differences, including more damage taken and a quicker drain of your VFX meter, but the big change is in the opposition. Enemies are tougher, there’s a lot more of them, and more advanced enemies show up early in the game. It's one thing to be running downstairs with a spiked barrel on your tail, it's quite another when every other enemy that pops up along the way is carrying some sort of missile launcher. Surprisingly, the bosses seem to be easier than the stages on V-Rated, but that’s likely because you already had to learn how to keep from getting hit the first time through, and this time you just have to keep it up longer to account for their increased life bars.

Ultra V-Rated borders on the impossible. There are no longer icons to tell you whether to dodge attacks high or low, so you’ll have to be quick if you want to attempt to dodge at all. As if that weren’t bad enough, even the weakest of enemies can take five hearts off of your life, which means instant death if you’re beginning anew. Luckily, VJ does allow you to carry over all of your health and moves from your previous game, but even then, it doesn’t take long to get taken down.

If you manage to beat all that, you can still play as the hidden characters that each have unique advantages and disadvantages – although the cut scenes are rendered senseless since the acting is garbled rather than being re-done for each character. Plus, there’s rumor that you can have a limitless VFX meter if you manage to get perfect “rainbow” V-ratings throughout the entire game.

Viewtiful Joe is clearly one of the most fun, stylish, and challenging games this year. Most people will never get through V-Rated or Ultra V-Rated, but it’s still a must-have for GameCube owners this season. As Another Joe would say, “Henshin-a-bye-bye!” (The sound of that phrase will send you into a panic soon enough.)

Viewtiful Joe comes out Tuesday and is available from our partners at Video Game Depot.

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Genre Action
Developer Capcom
Players1

Worldwide Releases

na: Viewtiful Joe
Release Oct 07, 2003
PublisherCapcom
RatingTeen
jpn: Viewtiful Joe
Release Jun 26, 2003
PublisherCapcom

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