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Avatar - The Last Airbender: Into the Inferno
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Graphics & Sound:
Avatar - The Last Airbender: Into the Inferno is a game of a show that a lot of kids know and love. This doesn't mean the game has to be any good, but in this case, things worked out pretty well. The characters and the worlds they inhabit during the game all feel drawn from the same inspiration behind the show, which fans will love. The camera moves around as you move, showing important gameplay elements and drawing in close when necessary. Brilliant colors and little detailed touches in the game make Into the Inferno lots of fun to watch, especially when a second player can jump in and take part in the action. Two characters on screen sometimes feels crowded or confusing, but everything is generally handled well. The visual cues that you need during puzzle sequences are almost too obvious for experienced players, but this is probably not a game that will appeal beyond fans of the show's 6-11 year old demographic. Even for tween gamers that may only be passing fans of the show, there is solid gameplay here for anyone that enjoys action/platforming titles.
When you walk into a room, you'll see objects that are available for interaction outlined by a shimmering field. Some of these are destructible and will yield coins or scrolls. Others are the source for elements you'll use in "bending" or switches for solving puzzles. In some areas, you'll receive even more obvious hints in the form of helpful little Samurai Momo, who will instruct you on the mechanics of bending. There is good atmosphere created by the in-game music, and some nice sounds that accompany the actual bending. Our only gripe was that in some of the battles, it is hard to distinguish enemies and your character against dark backgrounds. You can tell there are folks running around, but the specifics are lost when the camera pulls back far enough. The trade-off is getting to engage in some large battles, and the freedom to run around a large space evading or attacking enemies. The camera angle also makes it possible for two players to get in on the action in co-op mode without cramping each other's style.
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Gameplay:
Playing Avatar - The Last Airbender: Into the Inferno on Wii is without question the best choice, considering the hands-on approaches the show's characters take in their bending magic. Bending with a button press is nowhere near as fun as pulling objects around by movement. The story begins with a great training level that shows you how to do basic bending magic using Aang's abilities. The object of the level is to escape a ship in the middle of the ocean that is under attack by soldiers of The Fire Nation. Pulling water initially is used here only to douse a fire, but you'll quickly find through experimentation that water can be whipped quickly into objects to destroy them. Water can also be frozen, either into blocks of ice or as the binding element for steam that would otherwise burn your character. Aang has a chance to engage with Fire Nation enemies on the ship, and shows off his hand-to-hand combat skill. The soldiers can be disabled by bending water and using it as weapon, but not as quickly as attacking them up close. The game consistently throws a large number of attackers at you, probably to allow for enough challenge when two players are engaged. The difficulty goes up considerably for a single player, but it just means that you'll rely more on charged attacks that knock down every soldier around you.
Early into Into the Inferno, you will find that solving puzzles using Aang's or his friends' abilities is a big part of succeeding. The initial puzzles are just how to use natural materials to keep moving and escape the burning ship. You also find areas where using materials will allow you to trigger weapons or objects in the environment that move things forward. At certain points, the bending magic will help you overcome otherwise impassable obstacles. There is always a way, but it isn't always obvious. Characters have some good double-jump abilities right off the bat that help them take advantage of hidden paths you expose by bending. The ability to switch characters opens up over half a dozen special abilities, some of them exclusive to one character. Using these abilities in combination will allow you to solve puzzles, but your skill in combat will ultimately determine how far you play without restarting from a save point.
A special area in the game, Ember Island, contains a few neat surprises. The best is a flying game that is very solidly done, almost to the point of being a game-within-game experience. Taking out a glider around the island, your character can explore and pick up objects to spend on bonus items, or compete in two different contests. The first is a straight flying race and the other involves shooting targets while flying. All three modes are lots of fun, and the coins you pick up along the way can be spent on bonus items. Some items, such as art or video from the game, are strictly for entertainment. Others are more practical and will add new abilities to your characters. Other ways to collect points that you can redeem are to destroy items in levels that contain hidden coins, and to explore hard-to-reach areas that hide more coins or secret scrolls. |
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Difficulty:
Younger kids will definitely struggle with the puzzles. Many of the obstacles are simple mechanical puzzles, but require an understanding of some basic physical properties, and cause-and-effect that young kids lack. The use of powerful attacks is never enough to move through an area, and battles don't necessarily reward button-mashing. Careful attention to your enemies' tactics is required to win, as well as good study on how the characters are differently positioned in terms of their bending abilities. Learning special moves is a must in order to go through battles unscathed, but a curious omission is any kind of health item within levels to help your character stay in the game. Switching characters lets you take out a damaged character and keep moving, plus there are checkpoints that register as you play to prevent you from starting over a level. The irony of this is that no comparable feature exists for auto-saving. The game saves, but not nearly enough to prevent you from having to play large parts of a level over if you have to shut down for some reason. This is incredibly annoying, since you've already solved the puzzles and beaten the enemies and gathered the items. Why there couldn't be any way to save more frequently is unknown, but this issue saps much of the enjoyment out of Into the Inferno, unless you've always got a few hours to kill every time you sit down to play.
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Game Mechanics:
The simplicity of the game's controls are refreshing. Even joining as a second player only requires a quick push of (A+B) buttons to get things rolling. The attack controls are simple sequences of button presses, combined with the player's orientation. Jumping moves are different than ground moves are different than moves combined with magic. There aren't a huge number of tutorials on the different attacks available, which is odd considering how much you'll fight enemies during Into the Inferno. Movement and jumping happens on the Nunchuk, which takes a little getting used to after you've played games where most of the central action is keyed to the Wii-mote. The Wii-mote action in Avatar - The Last Airbender: Into the Inferno is tied to using magic, targeting enemies or objects, and attacking. This works best in the end, since targeting with the Wii-mote is a no-brainer. Having the bending done on Wii-mote is also the right thing, since there are only certain places where your elemental powers will work. There is also the issue of tracking speed during bending, which is best handled with motion. Moving a blob of water slowly gives you a blob of water, but whipping that same blob side-to-side flattens the water into a sharp blade that can cut grass and damage enemies. Most of the bending powers have a directionality to them, such as lifting columns of earth or ice in order to reach higher ground. Bending as an offensive power is more about targeting, and not the easiest thing in the world to pull off against superior numbers.
There are lots of neat things that Avatar - The Last Airbender: Into the Inferno accomplished from a gaming perspective, regardless of how well it portrayed the characters and was true to the show. If you love the show, you owe it to yourself to try Into the Inferno, even if it isn't normally your genre-of-choice. Picking a genre for this is a bit difficult. There are definitely fighting-game elements, but plenty of puzzles and exploration as well. The flying gameplay is enough fun to keep Into the Inferno on the shelf for a while, even after you beat the main game. If only there were more online components to this, it might be even longer lived. If you haven't been keeping up with the show, you should still give this game a try. Who knows? You might end up connecting with Avatar - The Last Airbender through this medium before you spend time catching up on the series. In any event, Into the Inferno is a quality production that does this franchise proud. |
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-Fridtjof, GameVortex Communications AKA Matt Paddock |
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