The Final Fantasy series never really took my fancy, and since it was never close to my heart I’ve never driven myself to complete the encyclopedia of sequels that they seem to spew out every so often you’d think that the developers got some kind of pixel fetish fantasy out of it. The combat seemed too non combative and the rest of the game looked like one long cinematic – like someone had taken you to the cinema only to watch the first forty five minutes of trailers and then tell you to bugger off before the actual film starts because it was cheaper for them to only buy one ticket. This is why I came to the conclusion that to get the full Final Fantasy experience you may as well play Pokémon battles on your GameBoy colour and stick a DVD on. That might be a closed-minded approach but do you really expect me to put half a lifetime into trying to catch up with the story, then bankrupt myself so badly that prostitution becomes my viable career of choice just to purchase them all. The answer to that question is quite simply that if the number at the end of your game’s title goes over two digits, it’s probably time for you to think of something new. And writing the letters in roman numerals doesn’t count; I’m looking at you GTA IV.
In the spirit of being utterly confused by story lines, Half Minute Hero puts you in some sod’s shoes and gives you a floaty witch lady, who even through pixel art you can tell mainly consists of boobs, and has the power to control time therefore deciding that out of all the things in the universe she could do with this power, she’d rather just stalk you through the game and occasionally throw in a sarcastic remark. You’d of thought after both Navi and the infamous annoying owl in Ocarina of Time that games had learned that mildly amusing one liners delivered every five seconds lose their humour value when they’re thrown in your face so many times that they may as well be bird droppings on Southend beach. Though that being said, I can’t think of anyone in the entire history of time that would’ve found either Navi or the annoying owl humorous. At some point prior to the game’s beginning some smart oaf created a spell that could destroy the world in thirty seconds and so now it’s up to you and your nifty little legs to save the day; because apparently a sprint ability is this game’s answer to a super hero. This is where the time-witch lady comes in and if you pray to her in a village, don’t ask – it’s as crazy to me as it sounds, she can turn back time and give you an extra thirty seconds. So really the developers should’ve entitled the game, “Half Minute Hero Except It’s Sometimes More Than Half A Minute and He’s Not Really a Hero: The Game”, but someone on their editing team had obviously some creativity and went for something slightly easier to remember. Other than that you have one boss at the end of each level and you have to do various side-quests within the main quest to build up enough strength to finally take down the boss.
This paragraph is dedicated to the combat. There isn’t any. The computer has your character flail himself, face first like Rex in Toy Story 2, into any enemies and the stats of the character determine the outcome. The end.
Being a port from PSP you’d naturally think that the controls for keyboard might not be as naturally inclined as those on an analogue stick wielding controller. The design team quite kindheartedly decided to therefore add a strong controller aspect to PC version, though this seems to focus on the Xbox controller which I can’t help but think this game is to Playstation as what Judas was to Jesus – loyal at first, but then when someone throws a few silver coins your way complete sells himself out to every platform available. The reason why I raise this point is that although when you load up the game it shoves a picture of a controller at you; practically yelling to use a controller in what I imagine to be an angry German voice, though I’ve never heard any German voice that doesn’t remind me at least vaguely of murder, global domination or schnitzel. Falling back on to the problem mentioned above, it does very much give you the incentive to use a controller, but it does so like a strict parent that wants to educate you in your own ways as opposed to spoon feed you. You see, throughout the whole game you might as well be carrying a translation dictionary along with you as even if you use the controller it still tells you all the necessary controls via PC keyboard. It’s even more unfortunate that when it says X it actually means B and when it says A it actually means go left. I don’t tend to think I’m incompetent but I don’t expect to rebind my own, actual fingers in order to understand which way I’m supposed to be walking in the game.
Sticking to the idea of its PSP origin, the game also provides you with a second option to play the game through the graphic style of the original – a 16-bit pixel art game which is quite cute and quirky. Take heed here as it’s very rare I don’t try and pry on these sorts of things but I actually like this design idea – it adds a level of character to the game that I find quite enjoyable, it’s not going to change your opinion on the game but it’s a neat little feature that a) is a nice little throwaway idea that they didn’t need to put in yet adds slightly to the experience and b) just caused me to use the word ‘neat’ so therefore shall stop me in my tracks for this part of the review before I start spewing fluffy bunnies and rainbows.
It was around about fifteen minutes into the game when I realised something strange and oddly interesting at the same time – I was actually having fun. It was a peculiar feeling, but surely it was fun. I’m not sure whether it was the strange art design, or the addictive level system; maybe even the fact that I’d had six coffees that day was what I needed, but I certainly was having fun. If you are interested in the whole cinematic styled-gaming that is Final Fantasy this game will probably be to your taste. And if that never seems to ever take your fancy then this is probably the closest you’re ever going to get to enjoying this type of game; mainly because thirty seconds of each quest is probably all you can handle.
xo