Let's Play Drawn to Life: The Next Chapter (Wii), ep 75: Finishing up

[@nehehehgraylois]

Man Circi was a really really good idea on paper, it’s honestly a real shame she was used in this shovelware experience. An unknown lover of Wilfre’s from a shady town who won the hearts of a village using her position to try to bring him back to life, only to not remember his face and make the same mistakes he made? It’s brilliant. If only the game properly fleshed it out, but that goes with everything. If they put more focus on the village like in the first game there’d be many more opportunities to follow her story and see how she interacts and gets along with the people. The first game’s story is by no means remotely perfect but its formula inherently made the world more interesting. Characters all had common interactions and arcs that unfold as the game goes on, I;e Mari coming to terms with a big responsibility, Jowee giving up his dreams of adventure to make the mature decision to stay for his friend, Heather overcoming her shyness, all the villagers bickering constantly, the fact there **are** so many villagers, it made the game feel genuinely alive and made you invested in their stupid “get us a page to draw a ball :DDD” squabbles. Meanwhile on Wii the characters are some of the most generic NPCs I’ve ever seen, and the closest thing to an arc is a random wedding that happened off screen. Characters never move from their spots, never interact with one another and just give you a lot of chores or occasional one liners. Their personalities are also somehow more empty than in the first game. With so many less villagers you’d think they’d have more time to shine but they all make the same inane childlike observations with little to actually add. The closest thing Circi gets to plot intrigue is that she hails from Shadow City, which could have made for genuinely fascinating interactions but was just a one off line. I think if the game at least had the charm the DS game did a lot of the more ridiculous moments like the constant buffering, glitches, crashes and softlocks would have been more forgivable. Charm’s what makes me look past the first game’s many shortcomings where this is definitely just copying homework. The physics stuff does look leaps and bounds better than Next Chapter DS and they do get an impressive amount of milage from it but it feels like a waste of a good mechanic being in an otherwise heavily middling game. Glad I followed along this LP, it was a lot more insightful than I thought it would be having never played this version myself. If nothing else at least the game was unintentionally hilarious. May God bless The Amazing Teleporting Jowee and his vapid interjections. Also WHAT THE FUCK NICK BRUTY WAS A PRODUCER?? He was a lead programmer for the Earthworm Jim games! Also it’s really interesting to see 505 in the special thanks. They’re the same people who bought the IP when THQ shut down. Really strange turn of events.

[@KeybadeBlox]

When you put it that way, I definitely could see Circi working well. As it is, she's just kind of there and very obviously the antagonist, but I love to imagine her actually interacting with the other characters and either forming some connections, or leading others to question her when she doesn't. This game really got me briefly hoping for something more interesting than it had when Shadow City came up, because I would've loved to learn anything about that setting or even just about a person's experience there. It was the one time I thought "whoa, we're doing something interesting with something from the first game," which is a nice feeling for a sequel to evoke. I think you're onto something with "charm." Maybe that's something I was missing from my musings about games feeling "authentic" somehow (or maybe it's just yet another intangible think I don't know how to describe). This game certainly has none, though, while I think it says something that I retained memories, even if very vague, of the first game for so many years.

[@mastercraftanimation6610]

Did you know where to get the last three hero templates from Isaac’s Shop, The Luchador, the goat, and the suit of armor hero templates? I’ve been looking for them from the past and for ages!

[@KeybadeBlox]

Unfortunately not! To be honest, with how this game is, I might not be surprised if they aren't anywhere to be found, but I really don't know.