➤ Bye bye, Kawase-chan 🎮

If you don't know who Kawase Umihara is, rest assured: we didn't know either. Or rather, we did not remember that platform that occasionally appeared on the Japanese shelves, selling a lot of copies and even influencing our local videogame production. An example? The guys from Team 17, the authors of the popular strategy series Worms, said they were inspired by the original Umihara Kawase for SNES when they coded the physics for their worms' grappling hooks. The first episode of the Japanese series, in fact, dates back to 1994, and has generated some sequels, as well as a sort of compilation for Nintendo DS, which have never left the land of the Rising Sun, except when they were important by fans who made it a kind of cult object. Flashforward to 2014, for the twentieth anniversary of the series, Nintendo has well thought of locating the new episode, Sayonara Umihara Kawase, and offering it through eShop with its original title in Europe and with the title Yumi's Odd Odyssey in America. And here we are to review it.

Kawase is back! But where had she gone? But above all who is he? And why do those fish have legs ?!

The 3D effect

Neither meat nor fish, allow us the joke: limited, it carries out the homework and does not in any way influence an entirely two-dimensional gameplay. Virtually useless: turn it off as well.

Kawase likes fish

It is true, the title of this paragraph seems to be that of a porn movie, but it is not our fault that the Japanese guys of TNN / NHK SC, developer of the very first Umihara Kawase, had invented this absurd scenario, which was then maintained in the various sequels and in this episode for Nintendo 3DS. Kawase and her friends (including a descendant of hers and a "chibi" version of herself, live the madness) got lost in an imaginary and abstract world of giant objects, suspended platforms and realistic-looking fish flying. or walk on dry land thanks to a pair of humanoid legs. That is, as you can understand it is not that there is a story or a rational premise, but a simple "just 'cause" that justifies the approximately fifty levels of play. The latter are actually not very large and with a little skill they can be completed in a matter of seconds: it is no coincidence that the game records our failures but also record times, complete with a leaderboard to brag about our skill.

Sayonara Umihara Kawase, moreover, is not a "long" title in itself and, indeed, it is possible to complete it in a few hours, but it took us a few minutes to understand why in recent years it has also made such a hold on Western audiences, carving out a niche of loyal supporters. The level design is in fact excellent in general, centered almost entirely on the protagonist's weapon: a simple fishing line. We will play with two buttons, in fact, one delegated to the jump and the other to the launch of the line and, optionally, we will be able to launch the line diagonally using the lats. This bizarre weapon can not only stun enemy fish, allowing Kawase or whoever to put them in the backpack, but mainly it acts as a grappling hook a bit like in Capcom's classic Bionic Commando, only with much more accurate and convincing physics. . You have to get carried away, be careful, but once you understand how to use it, you can show off truly spectacular stunts, taking advantage of every angle and millimeter to navigate the stages - especially the advanced, truly labyrinthine ones - and collect every object. The grappling hook can stick to any surface, and you can take advantage of the swing and momentum speed to perform realistically impossible maneuvers. In short, the ingenious and well thought-out level design is the backbone of a title that, unfortunately, does not satisfy in the same way in the various other fields.

Technically it is a colorful but certainly not exciting product, in which perhaps the classic 2D would have been more suitable than the questionable "2D and a half" chosen for this version, and the accompanying music - also proposed in a nostalgic 16-bit version - they are pleasant but soon repetitive. The main problem of Sayonara Umihara Kawase, in the end, lies precisely in that same level design that we have praised just now, in the sense that the developer Agatsuma Entertainment has not managed to balance the pace of progression well, alternating the most excited stages with others that are really boring and frustrating: this is the case with most of the "bosses", for example, who are proposed as environmental puzzles without the slightest shred of a hint. The player must therefore guess the solution, which in most cases consists of a maneuver or a particular use of the line, and almost always wait, turning his thumbs, for the boss to neutralize himself. The difficulty in some cases borders on pure masochism, with traps and obstacles positioned so intelligently, but also a little too diabolical, thinking of millimeter jumps and a timing in the casting of the line from pure precognition. After playing it, we understand why YouTube is chock full of "video guides" that show the solutions of the various stages and show off all the skill - or maniacality, do vobis - of the players, mostly Japanese, who uploaded them.

Comment

Digital delivery: Nintendo eShop Price: 24,99 € Resources4Gaming.com

7.0

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Your vote

Sayonara Umihara Kawase is one of those Japanese titles dedicated to a small circle of gamers, that is, the die-hard fans of the platform genre who will find in the title Agatsuma Entertainment bread for their teeth and a level of difficulty definitely over the top. The level design is often commendable, even when the stages get frustrating, and the mechanics of the line have been implemented with great care, but the brevity of the experience and the balance issues are a bit of a fight with the price a little too much. high of the software.