Alter Echo is one of those games where you have to be able to look past its shortcomings to get to the good stuff underneath – many gamers will see only a lame story and the most generic main character this side of Brute Force. But for those willing to forgo storyline for gameplay, Alter Echo is the stuff that sleeper hits are made of.
As a "shaper," you are able to manipulate echoplast, the most powerful substance in existence. You'll need to do so in order to combat the evil "father," who has you trapped, and blah blah blah. What this all means is that you get to shapeshift between 3 equally cool forms, perform 50 hit combos without a break in the action, and take part in some of the fiercest, fastest combat this side of Devil May Cry. If you combined the puzzles of a well made platformer with the intense fights of DMC or Otogi, you'd have Alter Echo summed up pretty well.
The game holds up pretty well with its presentation. The environments won't make the list of most original or most beautiful, but they are well enough designed to keep the flow of enemies coming, without the player getting hung up on obstacles or backed up in a tight space. There are also some basic but fun platform elements that make use of all your abilities. Nothing in Alter Echo will rack your logic skills, but you're always doing something, and there are no breaks in the action that plague many of today's more expansive platform titles. Characters also suffer from blandness, especially the main character, who seems like he was conceived and drawn up in the space of 10 minutes. Enemies are your run of the mill cannon fodder, but again, there is no shortage of them. Particle effects and explosions are where the game shines graphically, as the destruction of an enemy truly feels rewarding when you watch him explode in a flash of your gun form's grenade.
If Alter Echo has a true weakness, it's in the audio. The story isn't much to begin with, but the voice acting doesn't help matters at all. Worse still, it's not bad in the "Resident Evil" sense, but rather, in that "hit the mute button" sort of way. The game's music is generic and forgettable, and a soundtrack won't be in demand anytime soon.
Despite its shortcomings, however, Alter Echo is the kind of all-out action game that you don't play for its award-winning plot. The game has solid controls, some nifty gameplay elements, and lots of non-stop action. Any gamer that doesn't depend on cutscenes, CG, and cinematic plots to enjoy a game should check this one out.
-George
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