Necro-Nesia Playtest

via ign

I previously thought Bandai Namco's Tamagotchi was the worst of Japan's sizable Wii launch lineup. Then, I played Spike's Necro-Nesia. If you want a Wii horror adventure game where you kill screenfulls of insects... well, if you can do without the insect part, you can still play Resident Evil 4, you know.

Necro-Nesia somehow manages to do everything you don't want to do when using the Wiimote. It's like a guide to making a Wiimote compatible game using reverse psychology. All Wii developers should play this and think sarcastic thoughts.

The control scheme gets the part about moving your character with the nunchuck analogue stick right, but the part about using the system's fantastic new pointing device as a means of surveying your surroundings was somehow translated into players slashing the device in order to make the main character evade enemy attack. This move doesn't use any of the Wiimote's positional information -- you always get the same evasive dash to the right no matter how you swing the device (a left dash can be done by shaking the nunchuck). They made a control device for this type of input years ago. It's called a button, and there are a bunch of them that could have been used for this maneuver to free up the Wiimote for something more useful.

That's just an example of what's wrong with Necro-Nesia's control scheme. Why is a button as prominent as C used for switching your flashlight on and off? Why are the controls for slashing with your weapon and throwing rocks so complicated? Why do you still have to go into a menu in order to select weapons and items when there's a toggle button that's limited to just two items? Why do the controls switch to Resident Evil tank controls when you're inside a cabin?

And on the note of whys, why do the insects leave behind money exactly?

Crappy controls make me throw my Wiimote. Stupid videogame logic makes me do something much worse: swear while throwing my Wiimote. So, you're trying to escape this bug-infested island. But you're not the first! Some previous adventurer was kind enough to leave notes at strategic locations, providing details on the background story. These notes also serve as the starting point for puzzles of varying stupidity. "By the way, I dropped my lighter somewhere in the area." Maybe by finding the lighter -- say, by defeating this enemy spore point -- and lighting the lantern in the cabin, something will happen.

How you progress through the game, by finding the required lighter or whatever other absurd quest you're given, is the best part. All you do is walk around until you see a yellow dot glowing on the map. This indicates where you should go next for things to happen. So, you go there, and things happen. Necro-Nesia is a game about finding yellow dots.

The only redeeming factors with Necro-Nesia are its story and characters, but only because you'll laugh at them. The opening sequence sees Ray, the main character, arrive on a bug-infested island with his friend Mike and his love interest Michelle. This island has lots of rare bugs, as Michelle points out (do make sure and download the intro video from our video page). Uh-oh! It seems that Mike has the hots for Michelle too, and he decides to confess to her right there on the spot.

The only thing missing is the crappy English voice acting. Someone should pick this title up, give it the worst translation ever, and release it in America under a new "B-Game" label.

Unless you're planning on making fun of it, Necro-Nesia has nothing going for it. Visually, it has progressive output, but the bland colors and poor insect models would look bad on the Cube.

Necro-Nesia might suddenly get better once I've advanced beyond the 3 hour mark, but I'm not planning on finding out (I just couldn't take it anymore!). Years from now, if someone should ask you to name the worst title from the Wii launch, you can't go wrong with Necro-Nesia.