My first year meeting up with Eidos yielded one game to peruse.  It seems the company was wanting to push Lara Croft and this was apparent from the images of the character plastered from wall to wall.  In the middle of the feminine chaos was an original IP that might just turn out to be fun.

Monster Lab

Admittedly when I first heard of this title on the list of games to be shown at E3, I thought it would be a third tier offering due to the name.  I’m happy to say that this simply isn’t the case and Monster Lab is a wonderful new IP.

In the game you are a mad scientist by the name of Professor Fuseless.  He’s helped to create the Mad Science Alliance.  Having agoraphobia, the good professor lives to create robots that allow him to view the outside from the comforts of home.  Of course, what would the game be without fellow scientists gone awry and up to no good?  This is indeed the case and it’s your goal to stop them before they wreck havoc on the five different regions.

The game is composed of two types of sections, building and fighting.  Building is made up of constructing your monster from various ingredients that can be collected as you defeat enemies in the fighting section or by mini-games.  I found that the building options gave the player many ways to devise a strategy.  Whether it be a giant hulking monster that may react slowly, to a smaller, yet more nimble creation, bases are covered.  When you’re ready to make a new part, you’ll need to experiment on them in the form of a mini-game.  Your accuracy will determine the rank, which is important for quality purposes of each part you make.  A higher quality part will be more powerful than a lesser grade.

Fighting, the other aspect of the game begins by navigating the map when you’ve finished creating your monster.  The map is extremely linear, though you’re able to move back and forth at will between points.  This comes in handy as there are enemies that wander around paths that you can avoid if you really want.  When you run into one of these enemies is when the actual brawling begins.  This portion is turned based and the goal is to knock the other monster out of commission.  A good strategy I found was to disable an arm or a portion of the body that looks the most menacing.  Most of the time, that tends to be the more powerful attack against you.  After a battle, you’ll be able to heal up your creation partially without having to go back to base if needed.

Besides the enemies on the map are challenges that make use of the Wii Remote and are mini-games just like experiments with newly acquired ingredients.  One, such as trying to block a mob from throwing apples on the screen seemed not to be tuned, but this was an E3 build and will probably be addressed for sensitivity I would imagine.

Monster Lab really seems to be a gem in the sea of Wii titles slated to be released this year.  The graphics looked great and the game play was fun and entertaining.  Also available to be played with a friend online, this was a treat to see in action and I look forward to the final version.

Overall

Not much to say overall about the company considering I was only shown one game.  I’m happy though that they are branching out into original games as that’s just what the Wii needs.