Missed something? Read Part 1 here, and Part 2 here!
So, we’ve caught plenty of fish, including a lot of weird ones, and we’ve won all of the actual fishing competitions in the game. Now, if we want to be known as the real Fishing Master, we need a Fiendfish. Oh my, this is gonna be difficult. So, now we’re in Oceania to practice a little more, and we start off in Sydney. There are 19 different species of fish here, and only one pink fish… but when you pull it out, it turns out to be an army of small fishies. Allow me to make the obvious joke.
So, we’ve caught plenty of fish, including a lot of weird ones, and we’ve won all of the actual fishing competitions in the game. Now, if we want to be known as the real Fishing Master, we need a Fiendfish. Oh my, this is gonna be difficult. So, now we’re in Oceania to practice a little more, and we start off in Sydney. There are 19 different species of fish here, and only one pink fish… but when you pull it out, it turns out to be an army of small fishies. Allow me to make the obvious joke.
Yeah, I had to do that. Anyway, our trip across
Oceania continues in Tasmania and Tahiti, but then we get news that there’s a
giant fish roaming the waters around Antarctica. It’s not just any fish; it’s a
giant squid, and it’s not any giant squid, it’s the Emperor Squid. It’s so huge
it terrifies people. In fact, how can I know, with utmost certainty, that we’re
not gonna be fishing out Cthulhu’s head over there? Oh well, we are not given any choice in the matter. The Emperor Squid
has very eclectic tastes when it comes to bait; the only thing that interests
it is a crown. The sole problem with that is that this thing fights like a
demon (what a surprise) and will frequently leave with your bait, because it can
easily break your line if not careful. Also, the crown costs 1800 Catch Points,
and you might have to shill out the cash for multiple crowns if you want to
have a chance. And since the Emperor Squid is a Plot Mission, you HAVE to catch
it. Yep, there’s no skipping that one. Fill your wallet, buy loads of crowns,
and chase down this Emperor!
Wait… Legendary fish, which are extremely hard to
catch, with most of them requiring the strongest baits, take a few – or in the
worst cases, many – tries before you can finally get them? Are you SURE this
wasn’t heavily inspired by Pokémon after all?
It's so big its picture doesn't even fit on the screen. |
HERE IT IS. THE FIENDFISH. DOOM IS UPON US. |
That night, the captain gives the protagonist a
marvelous trophy. And on the next day, we get a call from Fishy the eighth
dwarf – I mean Gramps. He congratulates the player, and then gives one last
surprise: He reveals to the player the location of the Isle of Mystery, a place
with only two fishing spots, but those spots contain all sorts of rare fish in
all sizes and shapes. It’s the perfect moment to visit this place! Go there and
have a blast! Special fish there include megamouth sharks, humphead wrasse,
golden toothfish, super sturgeons, giant squids, treasure chests (again?)… and
an upgrade to the Fiendfish, the Twisted Fiendfish, which nets even MORE
points! That one must be freaking gigantic.
After a while, you’ll get another call from Gramps;
he has “magic words” that turn all the blue fish you didn’t catch in any spot
yellow, so that you can know exactly what you have and what you don’t. Well,
except pink fish; those remain pink, so you can fish out pink fish you already
caught. This comes in handy to complete the fish journals, for which you must
try to catch every species of fish in every location. THAT’S a tough thing.
Just for reference, the whole list of fish that can be caught in every location
is more than six pages long. There’s THAT many.
Man, those fish journals sure feel like a Pokédex,
don’t they? It just makes me think that a Pokémon fishing minigame would be
awesome. Fishing out a Gyarados would simply be epic. In fact, a full-fledged
Pokémon fishing minigame where you’d go to the best fishing spots in the entire
Pokémon world would be great. Imagine going to Johto and catching the Red
Gyarados!
Welcome to... Fish Paradise? |
So yeah, I think that’s all there really is to say
about this game… And to be frank, I have to admit I really, really like it! I
think the Wii’s movement detection system allowed for more fishing games than
any other console could ever have. The key was to combine these new controls
with an interesting concept, in order to create a good game. On this level,
Fishing Master: World Tour succeeds where other, more basic fishing games like
Reel Fishing: Ocean Challenge failed. In the latter, all you could really do
was casting your line, waiting for fish, then reeling in. Sure, you could change
your lure if you wanted. However, the game was split into 30 missions (10 if
you couldn’t pay the additional 100 points, which is my case), and every
mission had very precise requirements… and you couldn’t move forward until the
mission had been completed. What’s more, the fishing spots never contained many
different types of fish, only the ones required for the missions. There was no
story, there was no character, there was only fishing. It was lacking
something… pardon the cliché, but one could say Reel Fishing: Ocean Challenge was lacking heart. None of those problems are in Fishing Master: World Tour.
Fishing Master: World Tour is also a sequel to a game called... Fishing Master. I didn't even know that! |
All the things to take into consideration when
playing this fishing game (the location, the bait, the length of the rod, the
season, the blue/green/pink/yellow fish) make this game complex, but very
enjoyable once you get the hang of it. One could say each season being only three
days long is too short to be realistic, but it could be quite the opposite; in
some cases, it feels too long. Sometimes you want to catch a type of fish, but
it only shows up on certain seasons, so you’re stuck having to wait for that
particular season to return. Also, the fact that each new set of bait is
unlocked after a tourney or when you reach a new continent. That may be an annoyance, but then again, most baits are unlocked only at the moment where they're needed for certain types of fish in the latest spots.
Now, about the fishing spots themselves: They are simply marvelous. And the music
that accompanies the game is a lot of fun. Its in-story use is also pretty
great: If you pull a normal-sized fish, the music playing will be enjoyable and
fun. If you pull a bigger fish, the music will be tense. And if you pull a
giant fish, the music will have a “boss battle” vibe to it. The real fish look
pretty great, and the special fish also look great. (Well, except the Humanface ones, and a few others...)
There's also a multiplayer mode, and whle I never got a chance to try it, I know up to four players can cast their line at once, and it's a competition to see who has the best catch.
I do have a few points of criticism, and here they
are: The CGI models of characters – other than the player character, his/her
pet, or the fish caught – don’t look all that great. The sea captain’s
movements are stiff and unnatural, and “Gramps” looks like a garden gnome with
a mechanism à la Nutcracker. In that aside from a quick wink, Gramps never
moves or even blinks, he just stands there, opening and closing mouth. At least
the captain has more movement than that. Sorta. Even the shop guy looks
alright, though his movements are kinda wooden too.
When we get to a new fishing spot, we get one e-mail
telling us which kinds of fish can be caught there, and we’ll often also get
other e-mails from people met during the competition… not all of it is
important, you’ll often get e-mails that just make you waste your time. What’s
worse, the list of fish in each fishing spot is split in two e-mails! You get the second one after you beat Story Mode! Couldn’t it be just in one e-mail and spare us the
trouble? I mean, after a while you get tired of getting e-mails. Besides, all
the fish can be caught from the first day you spend in a fishing spot, why
splitting the lists in two?
A final thing: The rivals. God damn it, the rivals.
Simply put, one of my pet peeves is the annoying rival who brags all the time,
claiming his superiority, until you beat him for good… Look, I can understand how
cathartic it is to teach a lesson to a person like that… But seriously, we just
don’t need to go against jerkass rivals. Pokémon dropped the “Jerkass Rival”
thing after its second Generation. J.J. is so full of himself that one can wonder
if there’s even enough space for his ego on Planet Earth, and Ryan… well… is
barely any better, he’s just more reserved and doesn’t show up until near the
end of the game. Also of note, neither congratulates you on beating them, so
along with being sore winners, they’re also sore losers. It’s just… The jerkass
rival is one of the tropes I hate the most. These two characters are easily the
most insufferable, annoying people in this game. And neither of them is called
Keith, so that’s even worse.
Come back here next week for another review!
This time, I will
be reviewing Hotel Dusk: Room 215. And I will be adopting a "Typewriter" feel.
Muito bom. Muito obrigado.
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