Punch The Monkey Game Edition!

I think Punch the Monkey Game Edition is in the running for "Most Misleading Title for a Game" along side the lovable Whizz. Upon playing Whizz you realize that it's not the toilet sim you had hoped for and after playing Punch the Monkey you will probably break down in tears. No, the game isn't bad enough to drive you to tears, it's just disappointing that it's not a monkey punching sim. Could be worse, it could be an educational title for teenage boys. While you think about what's so bad about an educational title for teens named Punch the Monkey, I'll let you know what the game really is. It is a member of the Rhythm Action genre. I could make a joke about the genre, but it's far too easy. Anyway, if you aren't a fan of Rhythm Action games, stop reading. This game isn't for you. It's more of the same "Button Pushing to the Beat". Whether or not that's a good thing lies on you.

Punch The Monkey Game Edition is based on the anime series Lupin the 3rd. This game takes music from the Punch the Monkey remix CDs and adds music videos made up from various scenes in the anime. As is the case with many games in the genre, Punch the Monkey uses the same formula of timing your button presses ala Simon Says only it presents it differently. In addition to the music video, you have a small black bar running horizontally across the bottom of the screen. At the center of this bar is a stationary crosshair, or gun sight. Icons representing the four face buttons scroll from left to right on this bar. Your job is to "shoot" them as they pass by the crosshair. To shoot them you simply have to hit the corresponding button as it reaches the crosshair. So, when an X icon passes by you have to hit X and when a O icon passes by you have to hit the O Button. You are graded for each shot based on how good your timing was. Grades range from great to poor. If you get three greats in a row a card will appear on the left or right side of the screen. Hitting left or right on the d-pad will shoot this card giving you bonus points. The point of the game is to keep the beat by constantly shooting these button icons. At set points in the song a second horizontal bar will appear beneath the first. This bar follows the same rules of gameplay as the first, only now you have to deal with icons coming from both sides. They scroll left to right on the top bar and right to left on the lower bar. This can get confusing if you aren't careful.

There is a skill meter at the top of the screen. The better you do the higher the skill meter will be. You have to raise it to a certain point by the end of the song to clear the stage. Sound familiar? Placed throughout the song are checkpoints. If you don't have the skill bar high enough when you reach a check point, it's game over for you. I really enjoy this checkpoint feature as it insures that you do good consistently throughout the song. This adds a bit of difficulty that is missing in games that allow you to goof off the whole song as long as you raise the bar enough before it ends.

Unfortunately one area where Punch the Monkey is lacking is the song list. There are only a minuscule 7 songs in the game. This is very disappointing and I've come to expect more from games in this genre. They easily had enough songs to choose from so there is no reason for the lack of songs. Don't get me wrong, what's there is good, but it would've been nice to have at least ten songs. There are four ways of playing each song in addition to two hidden modes making a total of six. You have easy mode which gets rid of a section of the skill bar and is very lenient on the timing. Normal mode which features the default skill bar and timing. Hard mode which makes the timing stricter and after that there is blind mode. Blind mode uses the strict timing of hard mode and puts a black line over the area surrounding your crosshair. Once the icons enter this black area they disappear and you are forced to time your presses based on the rhythm. Blind mode is by far my favorite as it relies more on the rhythm aspect rather than becoming a glorified Simon Says game. There are two modes which can be unlocked, but rather than spoil them for you here, I'll let you unlock them yourself. If you are dying to know, check out the great FAQ available on GameFAQs. It also gives out scoring info among other things. Definitely a recommended read. Also adding to the replay value are the three mini games that you can unlock by beating the game on various difficulties. Like the unlockable modes, I'd also rather not reveal these as I feel finding out about them yourselves is more rewarding. There are good descriptions in the FAQ I recommended above, so the more curious readers can find out if they want.

Since this game uses anime for the background music video it is often possible to be distracted. To succeed at the game it would be in your best interest to simply watch the crosshair bar and ignore the music video. Thankfully, Kaze was kind enough to give gamers the option to unlock these music videos and watch them whenever they want. This is can be done by using the coins you win from the mini games to "buy" the movies. When viewing the movies you are able to apply filters to the video such as pixelation or static. Also, since the video is not full screen you can change the current background with the shoulder buttons. While these are fun to do, they serve no real purpose.

The graphics in this game are about average. The animation is sadly confined to the middle of the screen and is somewhat smooth and of average quality for Playstation. Not too grainy but not too clear. Unfortunately, I've experienced some slowdown when there were a lot of icons on the screen at once. It didn't really affect the gameplay as it was minimal, but it would've been nice if the scrolling was kept at a constant smooth rate. The graphics change based upon how good you play which I thought was cool. The various backgrounds cycle and if you do bad those video filters I explained above appear.

Now, onto the most important part of a game in this genre, the music. As stated above, there are only seven songs. Each of them comes from remixes of music found in the anime. I've never seen the anime, so I do not know how different these tunes are from the originals. They sound like usual remixes with voice samples thrown in here and there. The music has an electronic feel while retaining the 70s anime flavor. It took a bit to grow on me, but after a while I began to enjoy it. I wouldn't be surprised to hear one of these songs in a Beatmania game. I must admit though, the music is an acquired taste and if you do not like it, the game is worthless to you. If possible, I'd recommend listening to the songs before getting the game. There is a song list in that FAQ I mentioned.

This game was a surprise coming from Kaze, a developer best known for Necronomicon, a pinball game on Sega Saturn. Punch the Monkey, while playing similar to most games in the genre and having a small song list still managed to entertain me. If you just can't get enough of the genre, Punch the Monkey is a worthy addition to your library, just don't expect anything new and amazing. Fans of the anime might also want to give this game a look. I'd only recommend that non-fans of the genre or those that are tired of it stay away. Also, keep the short song list in mind when buying this game. I wouldn't pay full price with only seven songs, even though there are multiple play modes. I'd pay $20 to $30 at most.

©2002 Ed Finnegan

Back to Review Directory