Chocobo’s Mysterious Dungeon – First Impressions

I know it’s been out for awhile, but I only just got my Wii Freeloader. I have to say, I totally <3 this game. However, I’m a chocobo-moogle-final-fantasy FANATIC, so if I didn’t like it, then it must seriously suck. To be honest, though, if you’re not really into Final Fantasy or Chocobos and Moogles, you could probably pass this one by. Oh, and if you’re a big Aya Hirano (Polka in Eternal Sonata, Konata in the Lucky Star anime, Haruhi in The Melancholy of Haruhi Suzumiya) fan like me, you ABSOLUTELY MUST import this game. She plays Shiroma, the cute pink-haired white mage looking character. I’m 99% sure she’s the voice for the Moogle Hero, too. The Moogle Hero is so awesome!

Anyway, the game is a turn-based random dungeon generator thing. The dungeon has squares on the ground that you can see if you hold down the B button. Moving to the next square uses a turn. Attacking or using an item uses a turn. Unless you’re slowed or something, you and the enemies around you take turns. So you can just sit there and take all the time you need to decide what you want to do. Special abilities can be used if you have enough MP.

From what I can translate, you (Chocobo) and Cid get transported to some mysterious town where people lose their memories. An egg falls from the sky and a baby hatches from it, whom you have to rescue from people’s subconscious in order to retrieve their memories. This brings back fond memories of playing Alundra on the PlayStation. (I miss Working Designs…)

Each person’s subconscious is a dungeon and I’ve gone through 4 dungeons so far and the battle system is mediocre. First of all, I’m disappointed that there are no motion controls. Gimmicky or not, I like swinging the Wii Remote around. It’s fun. Chocobo’s Dungeon uses one hand, so it’s kind of boring. My second complaint is movement. I find myself moving either up and down or left and right, even though it’s possible to go diagonally. It just doesn’t work very well. I don’t know if it’s just my controller, but not being able to use the nunchuck to move around sucks. So the battle system leaves a lot to be desired.

What I’m enjoying the most about this game right now is the voice acting and the music. One of my obsessions is video game music, so when the soundtrack for this game was announced in Japan, I pre-ordered it immediately. The entire soundtrack is remixed versions of previous Final Fantasy songs like the boss battle song from Final Fantasy VIII, the song you hear when you find out about Setzer’s friend’s airship accident in VI, Melodies of Life from IX, or the Taru Taru character creation song from FFXI.

This target audience for this game is clearly fans of the Final Fantasy series. (Or Aya Hirano fanboys & fangirls.) It’s really fun and I’m really enjoying it, but I think that my obsession with all thing Final Fantasy is definitely clouding my judgment. As always, until I can improve my Japanese, I look forward to the English language release of this game so that I can understand more of the intricacies of the story and so that I can understand how to use ALL the battle commands. I get the basic idea, though, and that’s enough. It’s hard for me to say whether or not this game is import-friendly. There’s always a red checkmark on the mini-map to show you where to go next. And lots of visual cues. So maybe it is. So if you love FF and Aya, import it. If you just love FF, you can probably wait for the English language release. Oh, and I forgot to mention, it’s so CUTE!!!