RETRO REBOOT | Maken X (Sega Dreamcast)

• Developer: Atlus

• Publisher: Sega

• Release date: April 25th, 2000

Before Sega learned how to market Sonic by veering away from his mainline video games, it was Atlus that would put the brand back into turning a profit through game software. Nowadays, the Persona series has made radical leaps over Square Enix's Final Fantasy series as the one of the more culturally relevant RPG franchises in modern times. Back in the heyday, Atlus was making a name for itself with its long-running Shin Megami Tensei and Persona games, noted for their complex and macabre storytelling that didn't play into the commercial fantasy tropes that was common for developers throughout the late 90's and 2000's.

I love their games. Even though the modern Persona games don't carry the same emotional impact of Tatsuya Suou's perilous pursuits in Persona 2: Innocent Sin or the bleak, dry, and desolate fight for survival in Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne, they're still very good games that resonate with today's audience. Then I stumbled upon Maken X during the days of building my collection. I immediately recognized Kazuma Kaneko's art, and assumed it was an SMT spin-off or side game. I guess it kinda is...sort of. What I was NOT expecting was it to be a rather intense first person action game with branching paths. Gotta say, it's quite fascinating, and stands out.

Well, right off the bat, the game wastes no time in throwing you into its bizarre atmosphere. This is Maken, a sentient, artificial life form created by (who else?) scientists to use as a weapon. Maken is the main character you control and through the use of a technique called Brainjacking, you can possess a warrior or person of your choosing, and take command of that person’s body.

Kay Sagami, the central character whom Maken’s mind is joined with, acts as a vessel, and is the sword’s only insight into humanity. Kay’s father, the lead scientist responsible for the creation of Maken, has been taken by sinister monsters known as Hakke and it is up to you to bring rescue his soul from certain doom, as well as stopping a psycho cult from world domination.

"I'm a firin mah lazer!"

The game’s fluid animation is probably the strongest plus from a presentation point of view. It moves pretty smoothly, but every so often when the screen gets cluttered with action, it experiences some slowdown. The enemies all look like incredibly bizarre humanoids and they move around like such, which another tip of the hat I give to Atlus. Their creature designs are the stuff of nightmares. Most of them with obscure faces and mangled appendages, completely void of any kind of reason or understanding. Atlus’ bestiary is like what would happen if Silent Hill and H.P. Lovecraft co-designed a Monster Manual.

The layouts are remarkably polished for the most part, utilizing a real-time 3D environment. There is a degree of detail missing, as some of the textures in stages can be kind of muddy and disorienting, which really hurts for some stages that have branching paths to access certain forks in the story, depending on which path you choose. You are never really sure the first time playing through a stage that you missed a secret door because they are never particularly indicated that they can open, so I often found myself butting into walls, seeing which doors opened or not.

The character models are not really that impressive and don’t push the power of the Dreamcast to any real limits. Lip synching is pretty bad as entire lines of dialogue will be spoken before a character’s mouth will move during cutscenes. Most games were still getting the grasp of this at the time, but Blue Stinger was out around the same time as this game and did a much better job at both model animation and synching.

The voice acting is brutal. This was the dark ages of VA in video games, where they either got the ADR’s son and his friends who all took a non-credit course in stage acting at a community college to do the voices in Brave Fencer Musashi or Ocean Group’s C list of talent to do the job, I guess the only way Dick Smallberries could get work. It is a little funny, but it can get rather grating over time.

Maken X’s overall strength (next to its fascinating plot) is its gameplay. It does feel weird playing a first person action title without a second analog stick, and it took quite a while for me to get used to it. Thankfully, the game can be a bit merciful in this regard, since Maken isn’t really all about high-octane action and precision is not particularly as important as in most FPAs today. Once you get past the initial awkwardness of the controller’s scheme, the simplicity of the controls are basic, yet they give you the prime tools needed. And there is a good deal of variables among the playable characters.

So as long as you find the easiest way to close the gap between you and the enemy, you’ll fare fine. You defend by pressing back, and you can immediately attack with a devastating counterstrike that does massive damage. With a locked on enemy, you can move in close and leap over your opponent and attack them from the back for critical damage. Learning and mastering these two skills along with hopping around your target like an angry hornet are keys to survival and even the toughest bosses will fall quickly.

You have a charge attack that unleashes the character’s special skill, but I don’t know why in a game where you are gonna get hit a lot would use an attack that drains your own health. Target lock-on gets interrupted easily if the camera or your POV sways too fast as a result of an enemy closing the gap too fast. This kind of sucks, as the baddie you were working on can flee briefly and you wind up playing cat and mouse.

Brainjacking, as previously mentioned, allows you to take control of a different person, sometimes for storyline reasons, to aid you in your quest. Early on, you hijack the mind of a pilot to land a plane to your next destination, but since he’s not a warrior, he’s slow, weak and takes lots of damage. Strengths and weakness vary, as the number of people you brainjack increases.

Tougher missions require stronger fighters if you follow the Blademasters storyline. Throughout the stages are Yinyang icons that level up your rank, allowing you to brainjack higher leveled characters. I am a little disappointed that you can’t customize the attributes of a particular character that you may fancy, which is what I was expecting at first. As the game progresses, depending on which arc you follow, you will mostly wind up with a roster of lower level characters that will become useless in later stages, since they will be too weak to contribute, that is, unless you get really good at it.

Depending on which direction you want to go with the story, Maken X can be a respectable challenge. That goes without saying that there not some issues in regards with some cheesy kills in this game. Most enemies will surround you with projectile launchers and can have a blast picking you apart while nimble, close-range foot soldiers keep you occupied. I think you can swat them away with a well-time strike, but I have never mastered this and have not practiced it consistently.

Stages aren’t too long and can be straightforward, but there are no checkpoints of any kind. You die once, and it is back to the beginning. The game can be pretty stingy with health power ups and most of the ones you find barely replenish what you lose in a skirmish. Surprisingly, I found most of the bosses to be pretty easy, with the exception of the Blademasters. Some of those fights can get pretty nasty. Getting the hang of making your way around some of the tougher opponents, like these terrifying iron maidens that can only be hit from behind, will aid greatly. Most fights in locked rooms will have you endure a battle with up to several waves of enemies and the damage can be taxing. Try to fend yourself with speed and guile, because brute strength will only hurt in the long run.

What Maken X lacks in customizability and dated mechanics, it makes up for in solid controls and high replay value to unlock various story branches and options. Certain bridges and paths are a bit ambiguous and it’s up to you to remember clues in dialogue to find out where to go, which can get annoying with constant backtracking.

As a complete package, this game is a very bold, yet slightly flawed, effort to make a very unique gameplay experience. I think it would have been really cool of Atlus and this crew made more games like this. It eventually saw an enhanced Playstation 2 update, where the first person perspective was adjusted to a third person view in Japan. Man, I wish that was the default...

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Verlane@gamefixshow.com

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