E3 2009 Preview
The pocket monster fad was quite the sight
to behold. Kids all over the world became enamored in these tiny creatures,
which seemingly had no purpose in life but to look cute and battle each other.
While Pokemon, Yuh-Gi-Oh, and several others are still
astoundingly popular, not much has been done to advance this genre over the past
decade. Thankfully, that is exactly what Sony and Novarama are looking to do
with Invizimals for the PlayStation Portable. And the best part? You
don’t need to move all that far to find the creatures that inhabit this world,
as they happen to live in the very room that you are sitting right now.
Invizimals
utilizes the PSP’s camera attachment, which snaps to the top of the portable
console. It appears as if a Sony engineer in Tokyo has discovered that the PSP
camera is more sensitive than the human eye and can therefore see life forms
that are living right underneath our noses. After watching a ‘live’ video
message from the scientist, you are tasked with locating some of these critters
in your very own home. To find them, you need to walk around your house, your
friend’s house, or any location that you have access to while watching the
camera feed on the PSP screen closely. When you get near an Invizimal, the
screen will begin to pulse as the sensor picks up their signal. Once the screen
flashes red, you are near enough to capture them. You throw down your trap—a
small, star-shaped object—on the surface in front of you. If you picked the
right spot, an Invizimal will appear on top of the trap on your PSP screen,
looking as if he is right in front of you.
Once the critter is visible, you can move
the PSP all around him. The game’s software keeps him (or her) firmly planted on
the card as if they were really there, and the developer even picked up the card
in front of us to show that the creature would now be standing in the palm of
his hand. The way that the software implants the Invizimals into the video feed
is seamless, as the developer moved the camera 360 degrees around the trap and
the monster stayed in place. You can also interact with the little guy in a
number of ways, demonstrated by the monster getting scared when the developer
yelled “boo” in his direction. At this point, you are tasked with catching the
Invizimal by performing a simple minigame. Some examples that were shown was
swatting at him, shaking the PSP, and even yelling into the camera’s mic, but
more will exist within the full game. Once you have captured an Invizimal, they
will appear in your inventory and be ready for battle.
The design of the creatures is in line with
previous pocket monster titles, but Invizimals has added a bit to this as
well. By continuously using the same creature in battle, you can upgrade their
skill and evolve their form. We were shown the evolution of a single Invizimal,
which starts as a cute and cuddly ice critter and ends up as a hulking
abominable brute that you probably don’t want to mess with. When in battle—which
was described as ‘real-time tactical combat by the developer—the PSP’s face
buttons trigger attacks that you carry out by performing some kind of motion.
Examples that were shown including blowing into the camera to trigger an ice
storm, waving your arm in front of the camera to send blasts of fire, and
casting a shadow on the playing field to cause a lightning storm. The fighting
looked fast and intense, as the player had to constantly cast spells and throw
attacks to keep the other creature at bay. The PSP can be moved at any time,
allowing you to view the action from any angle. In the end, the developer
destroyed the AI Invizimal, and racked up some nice experience points to boot.
In the end, Invizimals left me fairly
impressed. The idea that everything in your environment could possibly unlock
content in the game is clever, and the developer suggested that different
times/locations would produce new Invizimals that were unable to be discovered
in your home. The game will have over twenty single player missions as well as
Ad-Hoc and Infrastructure multiplayer modes. There will also be an online
bartering system that allows you to trade Invizimals with players all over the
world, just in case you feel the desire to “catch ’em all.”
Invizimals
ships in the UK this Fall, though no North American release information has yet
been made available. The PSP camera will come bundled with the game, as will a
trap.
