For being one of the most culturally significant manga this side of Sazae-san, Doraemon doesn�t
get that much press on this side of the pond. So while he�s been rendered in video game
format a bajillion times, he�s still perfect fodder for Strange Anime License Friday, brought
to you as usual by Felicity in Worcestershire. Unfortunately, from my own experiences with
video games in the Doraemon franchise... they�ve been hit-or-miss at best, and miss at worst.
Hudson�s take on the robotic cat�s adventures served as the precursor to Mickey Mousecapades,
the title that famously solidified Disney�s relationship... with Capcom. Could Epoch do
any better with this RPG version? Well, they actually did... if you�re willing to wade
through enough text to make that B-Daman game I did a few weeks back look terse and concise.
Playing as a dude (or dudette) who happens to live in Doraemon�s corner of town, you�re
in a panic following the apparent theft of your cat (by the town�s infamous PET THIEVES)
and it�s up to you and the cast of Doraemon to get to the bottom of it. And I�m willing
to guess you have no idea who they are anyway. Fine enough. After an eternity of plot - okay,
so it was probably only an hour but still, AN HOUR OF PLOT AND THIS ISN�T EVEN FREAKING
PERSONA - you learn that the Pet Thieves are, in fact, ANIMAL-HEADED ALIENS FROM OUTER SPACE.
And while your initial attempt to ToeJam & Earl it onto their craft is unsuccessful, they
come back to abscond with three of your friends before departing to their homeworld. Fortunately,
as has been the case since 1969, Doraemon himself is nothing if not a Deus ex Machina
Elemental, managing to produce a spacecraft from his pouch and blast you off into actual
RPG gameplay. And, by �actual RPG gameplay,� I mean numbers and attacks and commands, not
just fulfilling fetch quests and being introduced to everyone all at once.
And here... the game actually redeems itself. The standard random-battle RPG mechanics are
augmented by the introduction of �Friendship points,� vis those little yellow face icons
below the characters� stats. These are awarded for heroism (or lucky criticals) in the face
of battle, and follow a quick exchange between your party members. Collect three points and
a new command becomes available, which powers up the user and a teammate of choice for the
duration of the battle. It�s a spiffy little wrinkle, but I don�t know if it�s enough
to offset the tedium of searching for a lost cat for the first hour. I mean, geez, I�ve
got a detective agency in Hong Kong that handles all of that for me. I pay �em in Bryson
travelogues and the occasional volume of Chaucer.