It looks like Face Raiders has a challenger. When Nintendo’s 3DS launched in March we were blown away by its clever use of augmented reality gaming to bolster what was a relatively humdrum launch line-up.
In particular, Face Raiders, which turned familiar faces into enemies, was a favourite among the gamers and non-gamers at Gawker HQ.
That’s why I think that Reality Fighter has a chance to enthral a whole new audience when it hits with the NGP.
The game starts by having you create a character using the NGP’s camera to take a picture of your face. Once you’ve captured the image of your face (or a friends, or someone from the TV, Internet or a magazine), you choose your body type and the type of clothing you want to have your fighter wearing during his or her battles. (The game has more than 300 costume pieces and 200 different weapons.) The key here seems to be making the most ridiculous creation possible. You can also add some neat art-effect filters and even decide what sort of fighting style and poses your fighter will be using in matches.
There were a total of 16 fighting styles available when I played the game, each with a wildly different approach to taking out an opponent. The styles are as goofy and varied as ballet, boxer, shaolin and zombie.
Once you’ve created your fighter you’re ready to drop into a fight. As with Face Raiders, Reality Fighter uses the settings around you as a backdrop. That means you can stand around a table and play with your fighters duking it out on the table. Or you can snap a shot of a setting and sent it to a buddy who’s not in the room with you so you can have a shared environment. If you use an AR card you can even zoom in and walk around your fighters in the real environment as you fight.
The fighting is pretty straight forward, but not too stripped down. You have a light and heavy punch and kick, special attacks and grabs to work with.
It’s certainly no replacement for Street Fighter, Mortal Kombat or Dead or Alive, but it’s fun and it stars you. So it’s worth checking out.
Leave a Reply