Lock’s Quest (DS) Review
Locks Quest is a fantastically inventive game that mixes the construction modes of Ramparts and Desktop Tower Defence with real-time strategy, and a little role playing, to create one of the Nintendo DSs most compelling games. It looks and sounds great, has plenty of content and a genuine sense of originality and fun, making it stand out in the overcrowded DS market. It does have a few faults though, with some frustrating mechanics, uneven difficulty and generic storytelling occasionally getting in the way of the fun, but never enough to ruin the overall experience. Despite these few faults, Locks Quest manages to not only be one of the best strategy games on the DS, but quite simply one of the best games on the DS.
While Locks Quest obviously takes much of its inspiration from tower defence-style games, it mixes in some of the best ideas from real-time strategy, role playing and even party games so that it really shines as an original concept in its own right. Instead of mindless creeps moving from one side of the map to the other, Locks Quest adds intelligent enemies, objectives and most importantly, a protagonist, Lock, who can join in the battle if necessary.
Missions play out much like a real-time strategy game, except that all building is done before the start of the action. Once the building phase time limit is reached, the game then switches to a battle mode where it is up to the player to decide whether to use Lock to attack the enemy or to repair the defences. Missions can have a variety of objectives, from defending a base, to defeating a specific enemy, or to taking control of marked areas of the map. This mix of mission types helps keep things fresh and allows the player to try out different tactics and strategies. The range of available weapons and defences keep growing at a steady rate and this serves to continually change the way the player can approach battles.
The story is unfortunately a little run-of-the-mill, with a typical young boy must face off against overwhelming odds while using a gift he didnt know he had tale. It is a storyline that can be found in countless Japanese role playing games. It is entertaining and fun, but is certainly not going to set any new benchmarks for video game script writing. This is sad as it is certainly the weakest part of the game and with so much going for it; the game truly deserved a more engaging story.
Mechanically, Locks Quest is excellent, with some real thought put into the way the player interacts with the game. The building mode works well, but has a few little quirks that can lead to some frustration. The time limits to sort out the defences can be very tight and the 3D isometric view can also make some of the cluttered areas difficult to see properly, but these issues never ruin the fun. The tight time limits certainly add to the tension, but a little more would have been good, and the obstructed viewpoint can be really frustrating when the defences are left with an obvious weak spot, but they are certainly things that most players will quickly learn to overcome.
The battle mode is great fun and again adds another layer to the source material which obviously inspired it. Whereas in a typical tower defence game, combat is taken care of automatically, Locks Quest gives the player the option to join in the battle to either repair ailing defences or to attack the enemy head on. While this part of the game is most like a real-time strategy game, it differs by only giving the player one unit to control. This spilt responsibility requires the player to monitor the entire battle constantly and when enemies are attacking from three different directions, things can get complicated, fast.
Instead of just using the typical real-time strategy control scheme of point and click to attack, Locks Quest gives the player the option to use small touch screen micro-games to help increase the effectiveness of an attack. This concept is mirrored if the player wants to repair their defences mid-battle. These little micro-games really make the battle mode so much more active and give the player the ability to make up for any deficiencies in their defences.
Technically the game is excellent too, with loads of enemies and buildings on the screen, expansive fields and great touch-screen control. There are some limitations though, with enemy artificial intelligence often coming up short and some dubious path finding, but again, these faults dont ruin the experience.
The graphics are colourful, suit the style of game and are well drawn and work within the context of the game. Compared to the graphical quality of most other DS games, Locks Quest is certainly a standout. There was obviously a huge amount of effort put into injecting the environment and characters with some personality and style and it pays off with a wonderfully realised world and characters with actual character.
The audio is also quite good, with some suitably intense music to accompany the building and battle modes and excellent sound effects that really add to the feel of the game. Producing a good quality soundtrack within the limited audio capabilities of the DS hardware is often too much for most developers, but here the audio stands out as one of the best to come out of a western developed DS game.
The game has plenty of content with a lengthy story and plenty of replay value. While the story is far too generic, the battles are always fresh and keep the player engaged right up until the end. There is a multiplayer mode, but it unfortunately requires multiple carts to play. This is inexcusable in a modern DS game and is probably the biggest fault of Locks Quest. Most people will never get to experience the multiplayer portion of the game (including this reviewer) and as we have seen with other strategy games, multiplayer can easily help a game break out of the strategy niche and into the larger market. A poor decision in an otherwise excellent product.
Locks Quest brings together some of the best ideas of tower defence, role playing and real-time strategy games to create a satisfyingly original title that should be heralded as one of the brightest games on the DS. It is technically excellent and most importantly, it is very, very fun indeed. One of the genres that has been criminally underrepresented on the DS is the real-time strategy genre and while not a traditional real-time strategy game, Locks Quest shows that all it takes is a little bit of original thought to translate some of its best elements to the DS. The more famed real-time strategy developers of the world should take note, and then hang their heads in shame at their inability to take advantage of the touch screen in as meaningful a way.
