Gaming Trend Review
The Munchables
- Official Site
- Platform: Wii
- Publisher: Namco Bandai
- Developer: Namco
- Release Date: 05/26/09
- Genre: Action/Adventure
Pros
- Easy to control
- Lots of level variety
- Pretty decent music
- Good boss battles
Cons
- Short
- Too easy
- A little too linear
- Some minor yet annoying control quirks
by Lee Evans
For a console to be successful, it needs more than major hits to keep it afloat. It needs a steady stream of mid-level titles that bridge the gaps between major releases, or else you hear complaints about the system gathering dust.
The Wii is kind of in that situation right now. It's had its big hits, like Wii Fit and Smash Bros. Brawl, but there are inexcusable gaps between releases that are filled with almost nothing except minigame compilations and fitness trainers. Fortunately for us Wii owners, other companies are starting to step up and fill in those gaps, and this year has seen several middle relievers crop up like Deadly Creatures, Boom Blox Bash Party, and others.
Another game that would like to be thrown on the pile of solid releases is The Munchables, which caught some eyes at E3 a while ago for it's Katamari Damacy-inspired scaling size gameplay. At the risk of making a horrible pun, is this a game worth sinking your teeth into, or will it leave you with an empty feeling in the pit of your stomach?
The Munchables takes place on a planet called Star Ving (rimshot) where your planet is under attack by space pirates shaped like food. You, being an extremely hungry critter, decide to engage in culinary mass murder by chowing down on all of the space pirates. As you eat the pirates, you get bigger and are able to eat bigger and bigger pirates until you're able to achieve the goal of the current level. whether that goal may be to eat the largest pirate, get to a certain location in the level, or eat a certain amount of an enemy.
The Munchables is relatively simple to control. You move around with the analog stick, you press A to eat an enemy, B to roll into them, and Z to lock on and move the Wiimote up to jump. You can hold down the A button to charge up your bite power and eat several enemies in a row, and the B attack can be used to break apart larger enemies into smaller, bite-size chunks. It's a fairly simplistic system, but not without issues. For instance, you're eating so many enemies that find yourself hitting the A button possibly hundreds of times a level. You can't just hold it down because the charge move will activate instead. It would have been nice if The Munchables would automatically let you eat enemies, because you're really not going to do anything else with them other than eat them.
The words "looks good for a Wii game" are many times faint praise indeed, but The Munchables is bright and colorful without being retina-searing. The environments look pretty decent, and one underwater area in particular can be singled out for special praise. The graphics won't win any awards, but they're decent. The music and sounds are also up to the task, as they're mostly catchy and fun to listen to.
Screenshots
However, The Munchables doesn't live and die by its controls, but rather what it's trying to do. It's deliberately trying to call to mind the easy, laid-back puzzle platforming of the Katamari series. However, there's a fine line between an homage and a blatant ripoff, and The Munchables straddles that line repeatedly. The handprints of Katamari Damacy are all over The Munchables in the early going, from the goofy music to the changing sense of scale. For instance, if your character is obscured by a wall, a grey circle appears where the character is, and it looks almost exactly the same type of circle in Katamari Damacy. There are also clear references to Super Mario Galaxy, especially in one level in particular that springs to mind.
As the game goes on, it gets more and more linear. The early levels allow for more exploration and a sense of wonder as you find yourself devouring enemies that gave you headaches earlier, but later levels will have you marching almost a straight path from one end of the level to the other. Sure, your character is getting bigger and bigger, but it's only because the game is letting your character get bigger, not for any special skill you may have or anything clever you've done.
That's not to say the levels are bad, though. There's one that takes place inside a haunted mansion that requires you to eat keys and unlock new areas of the mansion. There's another that take place inside a volcano with the lava rising after you. There's another that takes place in a cookie factory where you'll need to avoid flaming jets. They keep mixing things up, and it makes it an enjoyable experience.
That doesn't mean there aren't some clunkers. One mission in particular has you eating 100 robot fish, and you have to scour the whole level over and over in order to find them. They give you radar to find the fish you may be missing, but it's mostly useless, leaving you to roam aimlessly for that ONE LAST ROBOT FISH until you want to peel your eyelids back and shove crayfish underneath them just so you'll have something to do. However, one poorly designed level doesn't taint the whole game, and by and large The Munchables is fun.
Of special note are the huge boss battles. In comparison to your character, some bosses can be several stories high, which makes it extremely satisfying when you knock them down to size and eat them. However, the game will keep telling you how to beat them, which takes away a little of the danger and mystery of the bosses. Still, flinging yourself at a 30-story tall pineapple robot is always enjoyable.
A couple of other complaints: It's way too easy. When you get hit by an enemy, you shrink to a really small size, and if you get hit while you're in that state, you die. However, I never actually did. You can shake your Wiimote in order to recover, and your recovery time is so fast that you really can't die unless you're really trying. The dialogue is also pretty awful. After the first few levels, I couldn't take it anymore and started skipping the story sequences as often as I could.
The main quest is only about six hours long, but there's a lot to do afterwards if you're a completist. There's a timed attack mode, and you can unlock a new character, and there are collectibles scattered around the world. However, if you're not a completist, that's pretty much it. There's no multiplayer, and no new bonus levels or anything. I would have loved multiplayer, because eating your opponent would be absolutely hilarious. Maybe they'll throw it in the sequel.
So, is The Munchables a good mid-range title? Yeah, it is. No one is going to confuse it for Super Mario Galaxy, but it's still a lot of fun. If you have an opportunity to pick it up for a good price, I'd recommend you do so.
