Tiny Diggers – An iPad Construction Truck Game for Kids Age 2-5

When IGN broke the news last week that Pipeworks was putting together another kaiju battler for Nintendo’s home console, PSP, and DS, I made a quick decision to read the article but not write about it, instead perhaps commenting when someone else on Aeropause mentioned it. But nobody did, and I’m done stewing on the subject, so here I am, complaining about how excited and apprehensive I am.

It’s called Godzilla: Unleashed.

IGN also broke the news years ago when Godzilla: Destroy All Monsters Melee was announced as being in the works as a Gamecube exclusive (it later ended up on other platforms). I was thrilled, being a fan of the great beast and his entourage, and the destruction I envisioned leaving in my path playing the game. The more screenshots I saw and stories I read, the more excited I got about the game.

I was given the game as a gift (thanks James) and it wasn’t long after that when the experience kind of fell apart.

The graphics and sound in the game were excellent. The character models were great, and the animations were really right on. The game felt very, very faithful to the TOHO classics. The problems came in with some of the choices the developer made, and the way the gameplay was handled.

To start with, there were only three kaiju available at the start: 90s Godzilla, Anguirus and Megalon. Everyone else had to be unlocked by playing through the single player once per character. I found a code online to unlock all the monsters, but they locked again when you rebooted the game, so every time you wanted to play you had to enter the code again. Annoying. And my favorite, Mothra, on top of all that, was not even playable, and instead was a special attack called out when you picked up one of only four items in the game.

Secondly, the areas you fought in were very, very small, and surrounded by translucent glowing barriers (barriers of laziness, you might call them). Perhaps these sections of city would have been impressive if you were a person in there, but much too small for giant monsters to fight.

And when it came down to moves, it felt like there was almost nothing there. Punch, kick, tail. The combo moves were flat and bland to me, to the point where I didn’t feel like I wanted to learn them.

On the other hand, this was more than four years ago, and my gaming skills and senses have changed quite a bit. Still, I’m concerned about this game. Apprehensive, perhaps. Check out the lovely screenshots and read up, you’ll see where the excitement comes in if you’re a Gojira person.

“Our buildings have always been one-hundred percent destructible — but we weren’t satisfied with that. We’ve amplified our destruction behavior, and now the buildings deform and char dynamically with your attacks. It really increases the immersion factor of the game to carve the buildings with your attacks. We’re punching up our destruction audio as well — for the most destructive Godzilla game ever.”

“Because of the new controller, monsters can now execute any or all of their primary actions independently – which means that you can charge while jumping in the air – fire your weapon during attacks, and move freely at all times. This totally turns the “canned” animation system of past fighting games on its head. Godzilla can be walking in one direction, attacking with his claws in another, firing his weapon in a third direction, and swinging his tail at a rear target all at the same time.”

Total carnage. I love it. WiiConnect24 support is also mentioned, but not detailed.

Via IGN.