An Entomophobic's Worst Nightmare - Combat of Giants: Mutant Insects

Well, I figure that since I'll be doing an LP of a DS game, I might as well go ahead and review one.

The Combat of Giants series, known as Battle of Giants in America, is a series of action-adventure games by Ubisoft for the DS. Each game differs somewhat in mechanics and theme, but there are several consistent core themes to the series - the ability to customise your character, wandering a large overworld and vicious battles against other monsters. Each version also came with a starter deck for the official trading card game, which I never bothered with.

Combat of Giants: Mutant Insects is the third title in the series, and eliminates the problems found in the prior two games, Dinosaurs and Dragons. Set 300 years after a meteorite has struck the earth and wiped out humans, insects have evolved to survive in this harsh environment by turning into giant mutants wielding the powers of the elements. As a giant insect yourself, you must beat the shit out of the other bugs and become the strongest on the planet.

The game allows you to pick from four different species of insect - Scorpions that wield the power of fire, Mantises that spit thunder and have awesome ninja fighting skills, Spiders that poison foes during the course of battle and Flying Ants that can freeze enemies. Once you have picked and named your insect, you are thrown into a post-apocalytpic, expansive overworld that sees you trampling wrecked buses and hovels, as well as hitting the occasional switch to access blocked-off parts of the level.

Visually, the graphics are quite impressive, with the insects sporting cartoony proportions yet somehow still fitting side-by-side with the realistic-looking world around them. You never get thrown by the differences between characters and world, and it just goes to show that the DS is capable of doing some pretty impressive 3D, even for a handheld of it's calibre. Your insect kicks up dust as it walks, fire crackles and every hit on an enemy results in a screen-shaking impact. Althought nowehere near as impressive as the visuals of, say, Mario 64 DS, the game still holds it's own visually.

The game is totally stylus-controlled - all actions are performed with the touch screen. In the overworld sections, you move your insect by guiding it with the stylus, smash things by tapping them and shooting plasma balls by tapping the insect and dragging to aim. During battles, you may be required to join dots to increase the potency of combo attacks, while swirling the stylus has numerous uses - from activating super combos to digging into the underground world, where more smashing and puzzles await.

When you do get into a fight with another insect, it becomes clear that the combat system is a vast improvement from the other games. You use four parts of your insect - the head, claws/legs and abdomen - to attack, selecting them with the stylus and dragging them towards the foe. You also have the option to dodge or block incoming attacks by flicking the stylus to the sides or backwards. Striking twice in a row allows you to pull off a damaging super combo by swirling the stylus, while thrice in a row gives you a regular combo attack. However, your equally huge and multi-legged foe also has access to these moves - this means combat quickly turns into a series of fast-paced, deadly mind games. Knowing when to strike and when to dodge is crucial to achieving victory, unlike the previous games, which were a bit slower and more clunky with their battle mechanics.

As you progress through the game, you pick up golden gems which are used to upgrade and customise your insect. You can buy various colours to make your humongous arachnid look prettier (I find gold looks good on a scorpion), upgrade body parts to make them deal more damage and purchase abilities that can come into effect during battles. These range from shields that reduce damage taken to elemental abilities that can turn the tide of battle. Be careful - some items in the store cost more than others, so knowing what upgrades will work for your big bug is crucial to surviving against equally-powerful foes.

As with the previous games, there is multiplayer, and as with the previous games there isn't that much to say about it. Up to four players can challenge each other in Tournament mode to decide who has the better bug, or two players alone can face off in a grudge match. If you have no friends (and I pity you if you do), then you can simply enter an AI battle to make sure you aren't getting rusty in the "beating-the-utter-shit-out-of-other-huge-mutant-bugs" department. Other than that, not much going on there.

The Good Bits
Mutant Insects is probably the high point of the CoG series. The boring line-tracing of Dinosaurs and the clunky gems system of Dragons is gone, streamlining the combat experience. Upgrading has been simplified a little, so you are never fussing over exactly what powers your mutant monstrosity should have. Combat is fast-paced and nail-biting as you wait for your enemy to foolishly leave an opening for you to take advantage of.

The Bad Bits
To be honest, the gameplay hasn't changed much from the first game, and this is a bit of a let-down. As before, wandering the overworld and hitting switches can get boring after a while, and connecting dots to bust out awesome attacks gets repetetive pretty quickly. The upgrading tree is somewhat linear, too - one wishes they'd allowed you to assign abilities to certain body parts of your insect, like assigning gem powers in Dragons. Multiplayer mode could also have benefitied from more options - perhaps a co-op mode that involved smashing things for points?

Graphics: 4/5
Gameplay: 4/5
Sound: 4/5
Multiplayer: 3/5

Final Verdict
While nothing like Spirit Tracks for gameplay or Wario Ware for replayabilty, Mutant Insects is mindless fun to the core, and definitely worth a look if you want to kill time and smashing giant spiders in the face is something you enjoy doing.

(P.S.: Entomophobia is the techincal term for the irrational fear of insects. Considering this is a game about huge, fire-spitting bugs, I thought the post title was more than appropriate.)