Henshin a Go Go, Baby. If you own a Gamecube, that phrase should be easily recognized. It's none other then Viewtiful Joe. Named Action Game of the Year, it is truly an amazing game, oozing with orginality like the before statement.
The gameplay is just one of V.J.'s source of popularity. It's just so fun. Being a side scroller, players want nothing more then an easy and fast way to dispose of enemies and move on - V.J. does just that. With the ability to slow down time, speed up time, and "zoom in", V.J. can use these powers to increase his strength, such as if you were to use your slow ability, and punch an enemy. The punch would impact, but the damage will be amplified, doing more damage.
The powers can also be used to solve puzzles. Slow can be used to make a small, insignificant, rain drop become a weight of some sort. Mach Speed can speed up the time of something, like a propeller to make it spin faster, thus rising higher. It'll take a bit of strategy. The game can also be very hard. All enemies (including bosses) have a certain weakness and you'll have to exploit this if you want a chance to win.
The graphics in V.J. are also very "viewiful". Hehe.. Anyway, the graphics are very pretty, coming out as a sort of cell shaded/ mix of hand drawn pictures and characters. Nonetheless, it is very pretty. The game also moves at a pretty stable rate. There can as much as 7+ enemies on screen plus the boss and the action will still stay tight. The framerate stays pretty stable throughout the whole game.
The sound is also very well done. From the sound of your punches impacting the enemy, to the numerous phrases Joe has to say, the sound never ceases. The only problem would be that for some of the bosses, it will be hard to understand just what they're exactly saying, and with the lack of the subtitles option, you pretty much have to strain to hear what they're saying - not that anything they say is very important and vital to the story.
Overall, Viewtiful Joe is a good game, very worthy of "Action Game of the Year" award by many sources. It's a game everyone can enjoy.
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