Digimon World: Data Squad

Rating Everyone 10+ Genre role-playing Publisher Namco Bandai Games External Links Official Digimon World: Data Squad Website

Look out Pokemon, your rival has returned. Namco Bandai has released the latest installment of the Digimon series, Digimon World: Data Squad. The game, which is based of an anime under the same title, focuses on the same characters as the series. You get to control Marcus Damon, the main character, and his pal Agumon, a yellow dinosaur-looking fellow as well as a small cast of other characters and Digimon.

Like many show-based video games, there is virtually no introduction as to what is going on in the context of the game. It is assumed that if you are playing this game, it’s because you’ve watched the anime series. The story starts off with Marcus being teleported into a bland green landscape, along with Agumon. You are informed through a phone call that you are to find and stop some certain Digimon causing a ruckus. Having not seen the series, I was not quite sure what was going on, but I shrugged my shoulders and began to explore the area.

I quickly discovered that there was no mini-map to help guide me through this overworld dungeon crawl. Since the landscape is very similar from area to area, becoming lost is inevitable. This problem is compounded by the fact that you get to enjoy a random encounter about every five to ten steps. These random encounters quickly become a chore and, due to their length, can make you forget what direction you where headed in.

Here is a handy time based guide for combat in Digimon World: Battle starts, and a pulsing screen with the words “Battle Drive” cross the screen. Five seconds. The battle loads, and pans across showing your Digimon and your Digifoes. Two seconds. The camera zooms in on the Digimon taking an action and the screen is filled with options. Two seconds. You select your option. One or two seconds. Select your target. One second. Your Digimon attacks. One to five seconds. The attack hits. One second. The damage done is shown. One second. If the target dies, it freezes in place for a moment then turns into an egg that floats up and down. Four seconds. Repeat this for every turn, and a few of the above for every enemy’s turn. After a little testing the quickest combat turn for one Digimon was about 10 seconds and, depending on what happens, can last to about 25 seconds. As you can see, combat in this game can take a ridiculous amount of time.

Now back to your combat options. When the camera pans to the active Digimon, the screen is flooded with options. The basic options, Action, Guard, Escape, and Support are subdivided into dozens of other options that fill every inch of the screen. Action options, which your Digimon have very few of, are repeated on the screen. The more your Digimon wants to do a certain move, the more it is listed. The same can be said for the other basic options. Support options are unintelligible at best and reading the instruction manual gives little insight into the several options that appear, such as Tighten, Look Around, and Cheer Up.

The storyline is unremarkable with no character development. Most of your time will be sunk into looking at the Digimon evolution map and random encounters. The graphics aren’t too bad. Cell shading is done fairly well in keeping the feel of the game close to the cartoon. Sound is a bit repetitive, as in most dungeon crawlers, but it isn’t horrible. Taking into account all of these things, this game has nothing the keep players interested, unless they are Digimon diehards.