Conker's Pocket Tales was a Game Boy Color game released by Rareware in 1999. It stars Conker the Squirrel, a character mostly noted for his future game for the N64, Conker's Bad Fur Day. Conker was also seen in Diddy Kong Racing, but Pocket Tales marks his first solo action/adventure game. When CPT was released, it was also playable on the Game Boy and there are quite a few differences with it, such as the title screen and in-game play. I’ll be reviewing the Game Boy Color version of the game. All fields are scored on a scale of 7; the number of levels in the game.
Story: 3
It's Conker's birthday, and his girlfriend, Berri, has thrown a party for him. Everything looks good, but is about to become better when a trolley comes in with a cake. Conker gets excited, but Berri realizes that it wasn't the cake she made. Soon, the cake explodes and out pops a villain, the Evil Acorn. The Evil Acorn kidnaps Berri, steals Conker's presents and invitations, and ruins Conker's birthday. Now Conker must get his presents (and invitations) back along with Berri, or his birthday will be ruined.
The reason why
I had to give such a low score is because of its originality. It's a little
cliché and is something you might see in a Mario game. There isn't
more to say here.
Characters: 4
Well, first and
foremost, you have your protagonist, Conker. Then you have Berri, your
damsel-in-distress, the Evil Acorn; the antagonist of the game, Honker,
who serves as your rival of the game and is a skunk but has the same body
structure as Conker; a bunch of small enemies like bats,
bugs, and crows;
bigger enemies like giant mushrooms; the bosses of each world; and finally,
"acorn friends", who give you advice in the game such as which level to
go to next if you're stuck, or if you pick up a key, where it goes.
There aren’t many
characters in the game, but it's also nice since you don't have too many
characters to keep track of. It's nice and to the point. However, most
of the acorn friends act as if they are the same person, even though there
are many. The only distinguishable friends are the
Forest Guardian
and Forest Wong (who both give you advice), a sheriff, a blacksmith, a
guy named Dusty, and a boat maker named Ted. When you enter a certain world,
some of the other acorn friends have distinct personalities (such as western
or old English accents) and occasionally, you'll run into acorn friends
who live in huts and look like they're part of a tribe or something.
Basically, there
could be more characters, and those acorn friends could’ve had a bit more
personality to them.
Gameplay: 6
The main objective
of the game is to get your presents back, like I mentioned earlier. There
are 8 of them in each world, 2-4 invitations in each world, and 2-4 special
presents in each world. The regular presents are blue, the special presents
are red in color. While it's nice to try to get them all, you really need
the blue ones to finish the game. The invitations are optional, too. If
you do want to get the invitations and red presents, you eventually get
a higher "rating" in the game. The
rating doesn't
matter since it's a name like "Conker Stomper", "Forest Fiend", “Birthday
Bonanza”, among others. However, in the first world, there's an underground
cave with different doors, and as you rating gets higher, some of the doors
open and some contain special presents.
Besides collecting presents and stuff, you also can use many items. Conker can use a slingshot and shoot conkers (which I believe are a type of nut) at enemies, a torch to light up caves, a pickaxe to smash rocks, a saw to remove piles of wood, and a snorkeling mask to breathe underwater and swim. There are other items, too, but eventually you get rid of them (such as parts to build a boat). Conker can also collect acorns for energy, and when you get hit by an enemy once you lose one acorn. You can hold up to 99 acorns and conkers. And apart from that, there are many block puzzles you need to solve by pushing blocks into holes in order to advance into another part of the level as well, as stomp puzzles where you stomp on switches in a certain order.
The gameplay of
this game is just like other games made by Rareware, such as the Donkey
Kong series, especially with the puzzles, which are common in Rareware
games. Overall, the gameplay is fine.
Levels: 7
What can I say - the levels here are simply amazing. Each level has its own theme and story to it:
Willow Woods: Serving as your "home base", you can travel to the other worlds from here, as well has having to find presents in that world as well. Set up in the style of woods, there are also smaller areas such as Mushroom Town, Spooky Woods, The Windmill, The Old Barn, Mushroom Lake, and the Forest Guardian and Forest Wong's homes. There's also that underground cave with the doors in it. The main story is trying to get your presents back and learn more about the Evil Acorn in the process. The boss of this level is a giant caterpillar named Hssamean.
Vultureville: A western style town (with the music being western-like as well), you access it from The Old Barn. In this stage, you meet Honker and learn more about him, as well as find presents. Vultureville introduces you to stomp puzzles and its two vulture bosses, Luxo and Sol. It also introduces mini-games such as panning for gold and an expanded version of a Willow Woods shooting mini-game.
Krow Keep:
A creepy castle in the middle of creepy woods accompanied with creepy music
and crows flying outside and inside of it, Krow Keep is the first real
challenge you'll have in the game. The castle is like a big maze, and it's
very easy to get lost here. There isn't much of a story
here, but there's
many secrets in the castle you can find such as invitations and special
presents where you won't expect to find them. Krow Keep is an interesting
level boss wise since the boss, Waldorf (a mage) shows up frequently as
a recurring mini-boss. It's definitely a unique but occasionally annoying
level.
Mako Islands:
Considered by many to be one of the (or even the) hardest level/s in the
game. The story is that a big boat race is going on, and you need to find
parts to build your boat. To get them, however, you have certain mini-games
to win at against Honker. These include a hurdles race, a coconut-shooting
game, a swimming race, and a long jump contest. Eventually, you build your
boat and race Honker around the main island at the end, which serves as
your boss fight. The challenge is the mini-games. They have a constant
control scheme of "push left and right on the D-Pad as fast as you can
and press A at the certain moment". It is hard since moving the D-Pad left
and right makes your arm sore, but if you have a Game Boy Player for your
GameCube, you're in luck since moving an analog stick is easier than moving
a D-Pad, in my opinion. Even the boat race has a hard control scheme because
the control is stiff and no instruction is given whatsoever on how to steer
it. You have move using left and right on the D-Pad to move up and down,
and even left and right. It's frustrating and time-consuming. However,
finding the invitations and special presents are very easy, since they're
underwater or on land in a
corner. When
you finish the boss, you get a key to the Aztec Temple… but we’ll get to
that later.
Claw Swamp: There is no story to this level, but the level itself is very straightforward. You go along one long road with some twists and turns, but it isn’t too hard to not get lost here. However, you can’t proceed to some parts of the level until you finish the puzzle games here, where you push boxes into holes, and you have to get all the boxes in all the holes. The boss of this level is the Swamp Fiend, whom you attack by stomping on his giant hands. This boss is a bit challenging because he moves very fast and can come up from the swamp below and crush you with his hands. When you finish him you get a second key to the Aztec Temple. The two keys open the door to where else?
Aztec Temple: If Krow Keep was like a bad dream for you, then Aztec Temple is your nightmare. The level itself is a giant maze with lots of pitfalls and boulders that can kill you with one hit. There are also places to swim, block puzzles similar to the ones in Claw Swamp, and finding the presents and invitations are a huge challenge. The boss, Golem, could be considered a little hard because you have to hit these spiders that he launches at you and he’ll try to suck you in and you have to move away from him. Personally, I thought he was easy.
Once you’ve finished the Aztec Temple, an underground cave opens up right under Conker’s house, and this serves as your final level!
The Catacombs:
This level represents the king of the mazes that this game can offer. Some
of the time it’s straightforward, other times the paths split in two different
directions and you can get lost. Along the way, you have to get yourself
past the block puzzles as well as find six Acorn
Friends and Berri.
When you’re finished, the Evil Acorn sets up a time bomb and you have to
get out of The Catacombs within five minutes (this serves as your boss
fight). The key is not to rush, yet this is a big level and it’s easy to
get lost, so for a final fight, this is a bit of a challenge.
Of course, the
Evil Acorn doesn’t get out in time, and the game ends with Berri and Conker
finally celebrating the birthday Conker deserves.
Graphics: 6
The game is presented
in an overhead view, kind of like how the Pokémon games are presented,
and this *is* a GameBoy Color game, so overall I’d say that the graphics
are pretty good. Not the best the GameBoy Color has to offer, but still
pretty good. The game shows detail in trees, shrubs, homes, even in the
coral underwater, and Conker himself doesn’t look too bad. The frame rate
is very good, especially when Conker runs and swims. In fact, during the
boat race the frame rate is pretty high (considering the fact that it’s
a speedboat race). The game (as far as I’ve seen) doesn’t glitch up on
any occasion. However as the cartridge save battery gets old, there might
be a few glitches.
Sound/Music: 7
Absolutely superb.
I love the music in the game because it varies between levels: Willow Woods
has a bit of a woodsy-like feel to it, Vultureville is western, Krow Keep
is a bit dark and eerie, the Mako Islands are tropical, Claw Swamp is jazz-like,
Aztec Temple has a mystery edge to it,but after that, nothing is new. The
Catacombs’ music is the same as the underground cave in Willow Woods and
the mini-game music is the same and so are the boss fights, as well as
when you talk to someone. The sound effects are okay because there isn’t
a lot (using your slingshot, stomping, pushing blocks, and when some of
the bigger enemies charge at you), but it’s still not too bad.
Controls: 6
You use the D-pad
to move Conker around and push things, the A button to jump, and the B
button to use your slingshot. The start button pauses the game and looks
at your inventory, and while the game is paused, press select to save your
progress. They’re very easy and straightforward. However, I took off a
point because as you get various items in the game, there is no function
to them, such as the saw, snorkeling gear, and torch; they’re just used
automatically. It’s kind of nice, though, but if the inventory is present,
why not use the D-pad to move around the menu and select the item you want?
Length: 5
This is an average-length
game; if you sit down and play through the thing, you could probably beat
it within a week or so. Some parts are confusing and others are easy to
get through, but there’s tons of exploring to do in the levels. I’m sure
I could put this in a replayable value section of the review, but the only
thing you can do after you beat the game is find all the special presents
and invitations. After that, there isn’t much to do, but the game is average.
It could be a large game, but it depends on how fast you complete things.
Difficulty: 4
I know I mentioned
some of the difficult things earlier, like the Mako Island challenges,
mazes, puzzles, and other things that might send your GameBoy flying out
the window or crashing into a wall. But, as I said in the length, you could
probably beat it within a week. You might need a walkthrough at some points,
but I rarely needed it when I played it.
Fun Factor!: 5
This is one of
those games where you’ll either love it or hate it. I personally had fun
finding all of the presents, invitations, and getting through all of the
levels. However, the game gets a bit repetitive sometimes, and at the end
there’s nothing else to do.
Recommendation:
If you enjoy a game filled with puzzles and a bit of a challenge, then you should get it. Copies of the game are rare to find, but I think it’s well worth your money. I don’t know how much the average copy costs now, but I think it’s under a dollar or so. Either way, have fun playing it!
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