Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo’s Dungeon Review

August 4, 2008

Remembrance of things past.

First and foremost, do NOT be misled by Chocobo’s Dungeon’s candy-colored, seemingly ‘kiddie’ presentation—the disarmingly-gentle box artwork, the adorable main characters. The realm of Memoria is a looooong way from Kansas, Dorothy, and this cackling wicked-witch of a game is out to kick your ass, my pretty—and your little bird’s, too.

Recipe for Chocobo’s Dungeon:

1) Take a…

Challenging roguelike play
Oddball story elements
Total couch-potato control
Lots of details, depth, and distractions
<i>Way</i> harsher than it looks
Uninspired mini-games, except Pop-Up Duels
Ear-bleedingly heinous voice-acting
And no Japanese option to dodge it

Chris Hudak is a writer, former San Francisco Zoo penguin recorder, frequent-flyer junkie, self-proclaimed lucid dream expert, poolshark-in-minnow’s-clothing, “student” of all things Japanese, borderline alcoholic (see “writer”), video-gamer-with-a-life, and moonlighting, kinda-sorta actor in his copious spare time. He writes weird fiction, and contributes articles to Playboy, Wired, The Toronto Star, and whoever else has money. Chris is the protagonist of the Harlan Ellison short story “Keyboard”—no, really—and someday wants a house in Walt Disney World.

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Challenging roguelike play Oddball story elements Total couch-potato control Lots of details, depth, and distractions <i>Way</i> harsher than it looks Uninspired mini-games, except Pop-Up Duels Ear-bleedingly heinous voice-acting And no Japanese option to dodge it

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