ZaciSa: Defense of the Crayon Dimensions! (Wii U eShop) Review

Back in 2013, Nintendo revealed it’s Nintendo Web Framework, a set of tools that could be used by developers of web browser games to quickly and painlessly port their titles to the Wii U as native software. We haven’t seen a flood of notable titles inundate the eShop since the Framework was made available, but there have been a few titles that have made their way over to the Wii U as a result. While Mario vs. Donkey Kong: Tipping Stars is the most well known game to come from this initiative, there is a considerable amount of smaller titles built on it as well. ZaciSa: Defense of the Crayon Dimensions! is one of these titles.

Unfortunately, when you first boot up ZaciSa and get to navigating the menus and gameplay, it will definitely be obvious that this game has been built with browser-based technologies. Rather than looking and feeling tailored to the Wii U, it feels reminiscent of one of those browser games you played when the teacher wasn’t looking in high school. This is not something that makes the game unplayable by any stretch, it is just jarring when compared to games which probably had better tools and a bigger budget for interface design. There are tiny touch targets all over the place, and while they make sure that the action isn’t obscured by interface elements, they require some effort to hit accurately. They don’t really react to taps either, making it hard to tell whether the button was actually pressed. I’d describe the interface as serviceable, if not incredible.

Tower defense games, for the uninitiated, involve setting up towers to defend a central base. Towers offer differing kinds of defense against waves of enemies that move towards the base trying to damage it. As a player, you have a limited set of money with which to buy and upgrade towers, and it’s up to you to decide how the money is spent in an effort to destroy enemies before they can damage your base. ZaciSa mostly stays faithful to the tried and true tower defense formula, though it does differ in a few key ways which help to make it feel a little less like just another in the horde. The most interesting new element is that in certain maps your towers can move. They move around a preset path, say, in circles around the heart of your base, and this helps to add a sense of unpredictability to each round since you never know exactly whether the tower will be in the right place to defend when it needs to.

The towers you place are all fairly standard tower defense fare. You have your basic sentries with average range and firepower, towers with longer range but lower effective damage, short range but powerful bombers, towers which slow enemies advancing, for the most part it sticks to the tried and true standards of the genre. The Tesla Coil is one of the more interesting towers. It is able to use electric attacks which can chain a single shot between enemies. Most levels will call for a different combination of towers and upgrades, and you can change strategy mid level either while the game is in motion, or while paused which allows you to adapt to changing conditions. This came in useful on more than a few occasions. Conveniently, you can also speed the game up if you’re confident with how your base is set up. This helps to stave off a feeling of tedium and helps the game stay engaging just a bit longer.

I’ve already touched on the interface of ZaciSa, but it’s worth talking about the rest of the game’s presentation. Graphically the game is very bare-bones. The game uses a hand drawn aesthetic, fitting in with the Crayon Dimensions of the title, but it all feels rather… cheap, I guess. It’s probably to be expected since the game is rather cheap, but it was initially a bit jarring nonetheless. Much like the interface, the game’s graphics do what they need to, and not much else. The music is a definite highlight of the game. It’s all fairly generic electronica, but I found it to be really decent generic electronica. It never took focus away from the game, but helped to bring some excitement to the otherwise uninspiring presentation.

Review concludes below.

ZaciSa: Defense of the Crayon Dimensions is only available via the European eShop at the moment.