The Video Game Revue

Trauma Center: Under the Knife

I played a nearly obscene amount of Twilight Princess yesterday--roughly 12 hours worth. Right now I'm at the 15 hour mark and am a little bit stuck having just acquired the hookshot. It's definitely the single best Zelda experience that I've had since A Link to the Past, and there's a good chance that I'll finish it before moving on to any other Wii games (aside from Wii Sports, of course.) The Metacritic score for it has dropped to a more reasonable score of 96, and some other scores have shown up (Trauma Center: Second Opinion - 81, Super Monkey Ball: Banana Blitz - 77, Call of Duty 3 - 75, Red Steel - 68) although they are all in a state of heavy flux. I'm still wishy-washy on what Wii games to get in the near future--especially since I still have PS2 titles including Guitar Hero and Final Fantasy XII to fill time while better Wii games draw nearer to release--but Trauma Center: Second Opinion is emerging as a game that I strongly intend to pick up.

As I've mentioned before, I've been playing Trauma Center: Under the Knife for Nintendo DS and really enjoying it. I still have a ways to go before completing that game, but it has become one of the strongest Nintendo DS titles that I've played. The gameplay itself is certainly the highlight of the game. The action is fast and fluid, and the only real gameplay hiccup that I've encountered is that the zoom tool doesn't work if you draw too much of a circle (that is, if you loop more than 360 degrees around), which is not a big problem once you're aware of it. Generally speaking, Trauma Center takes the fullest advantage of the Nintendo DS's unique user interface capabilities, and after a while you really start to feel like a hardcore surgeon.

Some people seem to be annoyed that the game puts a lot of burden on the player to figure things out as one goes along, since there are many instances where precisely what you're supposed to do next is vague. Since the levels are generally very short and things speed up drastically once you know what to do, I don't find the trial and error type challenge to be a problem--in fact, I think it's fun and refreshing. It's satisfying to struggle through a level the first few times and end up being able to ace it by the time you're finished. There are definitely some levels in which a player could get stuck either due to confusion over what to do next or an inability to keep up with the action, but I haven't seen anything yet that isn't easily solved through persistent experimentation and practice.

The characters and story for Trauma Center aren't bad, but they're not particularly great either. The level of drama that is present between levels can't compete with what happens on the operating table, but the dialogue is kept fairly brief and can be skipped through quickly. Overall, I wouldn't say that the characters and story provide a huge motivation to play the game, but given the aforementioned superior gameplay combined with the drama and suspense of the operations themselves, the characters and story aren't really needed to motivate the player to keep going. They're only there to hold the game together, and they do a pretty good job at that.

I'm definitely going to be picking up Trauma Center: Second Opinion for the Wii, especially now that I've seen how well the wiimote behaves as an on-screen pointing device. There's a great deal of potential there for Second Opinion to expand upon the excellent mechanics introduced by Under the Knife, and I remain hopeful that Second Opinion will become a cult classic among early Wii titles.

posted by Parappa @ 10:31 AM