by:VGrevolution
A thunderous roar is heard. All of a sudden the great beast opens his mouth, a gaping hole of monstrous teeth and a blue flame comes streaming out of his mouth across the once calm city. Soon after, fire strikes a monstrous flying menace and sends him falling to the ground, and when he lands in the city, he collapses a building in a pillar of smoke and debris. The great beast, a gigantic lizard, thumps toward his fallen foe, sending tremors throughout the city after his colossal steps impact the pavement. He waits as his foe makes it back to his feet, and before this giant dragon can take to the air, he is put on this behemoth's shoulders and tossed across the city. Again, this beast, this man in a rubber suit, makes his way to the fallen beast�.
Well, maybe I don't need to be that specific, but these are not only the sites and sounds of the Godzilla movies, but also of the newest game, Godzilla: Destroy all Monsters Melee, published by Atari games. Surprisingly, this game ends the drought we Godzilla fans have so sadly been through in the way of video game reincarnations of our favorite radioactive lizard. The majority of these, which were craptastic at best and that almost killed any entrepreneurial ventures into the Godzilla license. We should be lucky that this license didn't die totally or this game would have never seen the light of day.
This game is a brawler, Godzilla style, and tries to reenact the classic battles he has been faced with through the many years by providing a wide assortment of characters to choose from. There are 11 in all, whether it be Godzilla 90s, to Destroyah, to the ever-popular mecha Godzilla. Even though some may complain that they are unbalanced, this is not really the case since each monster has his own strengths and weaknesses, from overall speed, to flying ability, to flat out strength in hand to hand combat.
There is really a monster for every kind of playing style and person, though to open up every mutation, you need to beat the game with different monsters in the Adventure mode, with only 3 playable characters to choose from at the start. This is not an easy task for most either, even on easy, since later monsters can be a pain to take down, and depending on who you use it will make the difficulty vary, from a challenge to possibly a breeze, to complete. This is the one area where I found weakness in this game, because it can easily be TOO hard to complete for some. You will find yourself cussing up a storm after you discover that when you take your monster's energy down to almost nil, he all of suddenly gets the skills to kick your gigantic butt all over the place, and will sometimes even defeat you. I can understand this in normal or hard modes, but definitely not easy. They are already hard enough to fight as they are, without them becoming a fighting genius at the last minute and kicking you ugly body around with skills that would make some Ninja masters envious.
Speaking of the Adventure mode, it actually has a story! Though it is good ole Godzilla cheese, it is still entertaining. It is as follows: Aliens want to conquer earth and have taken over the minds of all the monsters on monster island, so they can help with this venture. One lone monster manages to break out of this trance, and gives the aliens one monstrous headache by fighting battles with the other, mind controlled monsters. Granted this is no Shakespearian tale of conflict, despair, and justice, it fits within this game well.
Throughout your struggle to get to the final battle, you have many different fighting styles at your disposal, depending on the monster you choose. These range from being able to teleport behind a monster with an attack, to flying, to digging underground and popping up underneath an opponent. All is not lost, though, since most of these can be countered if you master your monsters moves. Other ways to battle is to use projectile attacks, from Godzilla's fire breath to an electric blast. Buildings can also be tossed at your opponent, but you will need to be careful because every building that you physically cause to be destroyed will influence who the military attacks, which is always lying in waiting to fire missiles at the most destructive monster, tipping the scales to your opponent's side. Along the way, you will find power ups that may recharge your energy bar for power moves, to activating your monster's super attack, which do the most damage out of the moves, to a monthra attack on your opponent.
All these various items provide depth to your battles, and can tip the battles in you or your opponent's favor if he gets on the ball and gets these when they appear. You will find at times, though, that you will just win battles by mashing buttons, especially in the adventure mode, which is to be expected from a melee brawler. But thankfully, these items along with some of your monster's counters can make the game a thinking man's game, for you players out there that prefer strategy. Which is put to the test in the game's wide variety of multiplayer modes.
These multiplayer modes include a vs. mode, destruction mode in which you need to destroy the most buildings during a battle, team battle, and melee where you try to get the highest point total out of your opponents. Most of them can hold up to 4 players, but only vs. can you fight a bot and only one at that, which is a disappointment. If you can get over that though, you will find the heart of this fun brawler, when you face 3 of your friends in an all out monster mash or smash which is more aptly applied to this game. In addition to the multiplayer modes, there is a survival mode, for those that want a real challenge.
Godzilla: DAMM has a wide variety of cities to destroy in multiplayer or adventure; some more densely populated then others. From Tokyo (duh any Godzilla fan knows this), to Seattle, to San Francisco. These are unlocked as you beat adventure mode, and some are quite big, making for a fun stomp around town, destroying everything in your path if you so wish. You better watch it though, because like I said, the military won't be very happy with you if you mash their local city buildings, or worse yet, they may get really ticked off if you destroy their local pub on accident.
Try not to worry much about the difficulty to control your monster in these modes, since they are pretty responsive, though the overall gameplay is slowed down from other melee brawlers such as Smash Brothers. Moves are simple, such as up A, up X, and so on, though you can hit buttons together to pick up your opponent, which opens up different ways of taking down their energy, from chucking them across the screen to doing a special move to them that is unique to your monster. The only really suspect part of these controls is the hit detection, since you will find times where you could have almost swore you hit your opponent but it didn't compute in the game, even at that those times are thankfully few and far between.
Jumping is done pretty easily, with just one button which is also the button that causes your monster to fly that is an ability your monster possesses. In addition, running is done by the L button (jumping is done by R), which you will need to use if you wish to scurry from your opponent in a troubling time, when your downfall is almost near. Really, when all things are considered, the controls are very adequate for this game, except for the suspect collision detection.
Another positive comment in addition to controls is that the graphics are actually very good. They may slow down from time to time, but they in no way impact the fierce battles that develop within this game. When looking at what the game has to process, you will forgive this slowdown, since it has accurately detailed monster models, along with the hundreds of buildings, harbors, and even miniature moving cars and tanks to process. In fact, this game's details are so detailed, you can even kick the cars while fighting and watch them explode. Heck, this can be an entertaining thing to do when you aren't fighting, since nothing is more fun than kicking cars around, knowing that inside there is a poorly dubbed pedestrian inside. Ahhh, how sadistic this all sounds, but oh, how much fun it is.
Speaking of dubbing, this game's sound is also well done. All the sounds you hear are straight from the movies. From the thumping of your feet on the pavement, to the various squeals and growls of your monsters, to the sounds of their energy blasts. It is all here, even the classic Godzilla Marching Theme, which plays in the ending credits. Well, everything is here except for one thing, the buildings don't make any sound when they collapse, which is really disappointing but forgivable none the less. If you are a Godzilla fan though, you will appreciate these sound effects that are included. If you aren't a Godzilla fan, well um, you probably won't even be playing this game, so it is tough to tell what you would think. Voiceovers for the cut scenes in the adventure mode, are classic Godzilla cheesyness, and work well with the game
In closing if you are a Godzilla fan, pick this game up right now, you will not be disappointed. If you aren't a Godzilla fan, I suggest you rent, because Godzilla fans may appreciate this game more than those that aren't fans. The game is packed with destructive goodness, while knocking your opponent silly. Good graphics and sound help make this an even more pleasing package, so I suggest you go out and give this game a try. It may have its flaws, such as hit detection, hard gameplay, and difficult to master monsters, but you may find a sleeper here. Cautious, you may be, but put that aside, grab a friend, rent the game, and give this sleeping lizard a try. You may find a fun brawler, with Godzilla written all over it. That is definitely not a bad thing either!
Gameplay - 7 - Fun gameplay, though it can be mindless with good controls, but sometimes suggestible hit detection. Hard yet challenging AI.
Graphics - 7 - Good graphics, maybe not the best, but they are very detailed. In the way of cities, though, there is a slow down hit here and there.
Sound - 8 - Great Godzilla sound effects and music, though the lack of building sound effects hurts the overall score.
Overall - 7 - Definitely above average, and you can have a blast, but it may not be for everyone that is not a Godzilla fan. Give it a rent and see if you like it if you are cautious.