Dokapon Kingdom - Trust Me

nitzmoff

Let's get this right out of the way: Over the top chibi, lego-like characters, terrible animation, it screams 'just a ps2 port,' and it's a party game centered around the normally solo-paly style of a traditional jrpg.

Still with me?

Dokapon Kingdom (for wii and ps2, I have the wii one) is one of the greatest multiplayer party games I've ever played. It takes the 'daring' approach of doing something a bit like Mario Party, but actually having fun and addictive elements in it that don't waste everyone's time (no 4p balloon inflation mini games here).

Up to 4 players (highly recommended) basically play a board game rpg, leveling up, exploring dungeons, fighting monsters and hoarding treasure, all the while mercilessly trying to screw each other over. To me, the game feels like an open world version of Monopoly with lots of combat and treasure.

Games can last about as long as you like, even lasting 20+ hours (you can save any time) like a real rpg. I can see this being an awesome game to play an hour of every time I have the same folks over.

The best thing I can say about this game is my pretty much non-gamer wife agreed to give it 15 min. with me the other day and we ended up playing for 3.5 hours, only stopping because she won. We both had a blast.

If this sounds even close to what might be your cup of tea- buy it. It's an Atlus game in classic short supply and soon to be an ebay only item like usual.

bounchfx

well you got me interested. I'll check it out.

nitzmoff

I'd recommend the Wii version if only for the built in 4 controller support, 16:9 and 480p. We've been playing on classic controllers which seem to be what it's most suited for for the non-hardcore.

ElysiumGX

I was planning on posting this same review tonight.

THIS GAME IS SUPER FUN!!!

I played this for many hours last night, with several friends on 4 player normal mode. A few of them switching spots to take over. I played throughout.

I was highly impressed. Now I want to buy it and play through the story mode, and get my gf playing it with me. The backstabbing, pranking, thieving of other players was an added thrill (which is the reason some decided to stop playing, letting anothers step in for a try). Even the game box says you'll lose friends over this game.

Once you get comfortable with the kiddy art style, and chibi characters, it's very enjoyable. The controls are simple enough for anyone. Nice familiar board game layout. Old school RPG gameplay. I recommend the Wii version as well. It's easy to lose several hours playing this.

My new favorite party game.

Slipstream

I blew through 8 hours of story mode yesterday with a couple friends, conniving, stealing, leveling and killing. Definitely a memorable and hilarious time

nitzmoff

My wife and I are playing a 'modified' run through story mode where we basically have a truce and are trying our best to make the 2 cpu characters suffer. I never thought I'd ever be playing through a fantasy rpg with her.

Our greatest achievement thus far was sending one of our opponents off in a tornado (a la Zelda) to a far away land filled with ludicrously tough monsters. I almost felt sorry for the poor warrior who was pummeled repeatedly as she tried in vain to make her way back home. The character even said things like "I'll make it back some day!" before her turn. Good fun.

ElysiumGX

One of my friends, through a delivery mission of some sort, became a Darkling for a limited (tho excessive) number of turns. This means, his character became an evil being with all stats many hundreds of points higher than anyone else. He cannot be defeated. As a bonus, each turn he gets a multiple number of spinners to increase his traveling distance. When this happened, the two other players tried to move as far away as possible. They moved into higher level areas, and died. I decided to stay 1 space from him whenever possible, or move to a space he couldn't enter combat. Keep your enemies close. He couldn't fight me, and I was able to avoid him, while continuing my game strategy for several weeks. Until the very end, he was able to earn enough dark points to gain a spell to summon me to his position and fight me. By that time, I was so far in the lead with points, and when his character was restored, he had nothing. I won. It was fun...for me.

I like that when you defeat another player in combat, you have the option to change their player name.

I like that when you rob a store, there is a large bounty placed on you.

I can't wait to play again.

ROSHAMBO!

skankerzero

been playing this all week.

great game!

Michael Knubben

What, a party game that's actually fun to play... twice?
I need to play this!

ElysiumGX

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gVbzRDobswc[/ame]

[ame]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=I18Sa7pgy0E[/ame]

Sassy Pants!

Mezz

Darn it, you people!!! As if I didn't have ENOUGH games that I need to spend my money on... now another! And this really does sound like a ton of fun. Hmmm... so to get, or not to get...

eld

So everytime there's some hope, and there's a game for wii I'd actually want to play, it's not even close to being available in any stores here in europe, WTF?

nitzmoff

It is a rare one. A friend of mine at work went looking for it after getting a chance to try it at lunch and can't find it anywhere.

Michael Knubben

Eld: even play.com doesn't have it, so I take it it's just not being released over here. I checked to see if maybe the European version had a different name, but had no luck

ElysiumGX

There appears to be no European release date set. Sorry guys. Maybe they're working on localization.