disinclined's Full Review: Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box for DS
After being completely charmed by “Professor Layton and the Curious Village” for my DS Lite a couple of months ago, I knew that I couldn’t resist the sequel, “Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box,” especially when I heard rumors that it was bigger and better. Whether you’re a Layton veteran or just making your first entry into this quaint and whimsical world, “Diabolical” will have appeal for you – as long as you really, really like puzzles.
The Layton games were originally released in Japan and are slowly being translated for American markets; “Diabolical,” the second in the series, just came out in August 2009. Two more titles are releasing in 2009 in Japan, I’ve heard, and they’ll come to the U.S. sometime in 2010. That’s a long time to wait, so don’t blast through this game too quickly!
Plot: Gentleman puzzle enthusiast Professor Layton and his apprentice Luke discover a mystery close to home when Layton’s old mentor, Dr. Schrader, is found dead in his home. Their only clue is an unused ticket for the Molentary Express, the opulent luxury train that makes some very secret stops on its route. What could it mean, and who — or what — might have caused Dr. Schrader's death? To find out, Professor Layton and Luke will embark on a puzzle-filled mystery quest for the Elysian Box, a fabulous treasure rumored to kill everyone who opens it.
Gameplay: This is a single-player puzzle game with a main storyline, lots of mini-games (over 150 puzzles in total), and a handful of subplots to solve on the way toward figuring out the main mystery. You do not need to solve every single puzzle to beat the game, but there are checkpoints at various stages where you’ll need to have solved a certain number in order to progress further. You progress by chapters, and the game automatically saves after each chapter; you can have three save files going at once.
The puzzles are a grab bag of logic problems, riddles, visual/spatial challenges, mazes, and even classic chess challenges. This means that no matter what kind of puzzles you like, there’s something here for you, but it also means you’ll eventually have to suck it up and take on a puzzle you hate – or a dozen of them. Luckily, there are “hint coins” hidden throughout the game; one coin gives you one hint, and three hints are available per puzzle, although hints just won’t help with some puzzles. As with the first title, no advanced math skills (beyond basic arithmetic) are needed; while the questions often try to trick you into needlessly elaborate solutions, the answer is usually simpler than you think.
The game makes good use of the DS touch-stylus format. Many of the puzzles involve objects that need to be moved around (like sliding tile puzzles or sawing up boards); others are drawing-type puzzles where you have to draw a figure, solve a maze, or circle the correct option. The Memo function allows you to use the touch screen as a notepad to doodle or sketch notes as you ponder; it works like pulling a sheet of translucent tracing paper over the puzzle, so you can start working the puzzle, go to Memo mode, and not lose your place, which is a nice improvement.
Visuals: Much was made of the improved visuals on this second title, and yes, they are better. They’re never going to be stunning on the DS, but “Diabolical” does indeed have plenty more animated cut-scenes – whether you consider this a benefit is another matter, though, since you can’t skip past them and you have to watch them in their entirety. There is also more voiceover, as opposed to the “beeps” that would stand in for characters’ voices during gameplay. Though I find Luke’s faux-Cockney-urchin voice so incredibly annoying that I can’t say I really want to hear more from him, honestly!
The animations are actually quite detailed and lovely, in a cartoonish way. If you’ve seen “The Triplets of Bellevue,” there’s a very similar aesthetic in this game – kind of grotesque-looking, exaggerated people and rustic-Euro-village settings, with a touch of anime sensibility. It’s unique and visually distinctive, and it’s really grown on me through dozens of hours of looking at it. The puzzles are simply rendered, but with a bit more 3-D detailing and sophistication than the first title; a few puzzles ask you to identify the incorrect/missing detail by peering at an image, though, and the visual quality isn’t quite good enough to make that a satisfying task.
Music: The music was justifiably praised in “Curious Village,” and it’s similarly good here; there are separate themes for each physical area you explore, plus music during the cut-scenes, and the bonus game areas. Accordion is everywhere, and the music has a certain European feel to it. You don’t really need audio to play this game, and I often keep it muted unless I’m watching an animated scene, but the music is pretty decent if you want to listen to it, for some reason. But since there are a limited number of themes, you will eventually get heartily sick of the music, I promise.
Extras: In addition to the main game, there are extra meta-games, as with the first title. One involves making tea; as you play, you’ll receive various herbal ingredients, and the twofold challenge is to experiment until you come up with the 12 three-ingredient brews that make tasty teas, and to cure an entire village’s woes by serving them a cup of their ideal tea. Once you’ve presented every villager their perfect tea, you get a bonus. Likewise, you’re attempting to put together a broken camera in this game, and you’ll receive assorted widgets from characters as you play. I’m terrible at this one, so I haven’t done it myself, but again I assume there’s a little bonus payoff when you do.
As with the first title, once you beat the main game, bonus sections open up with additional puzzles. And any hidden puzzles that you miss in the course of gameplay go to Granny Riddleton’s shack, where they will wait patiently for you to come and find them.
Additional puzzles are available via the Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection each week for 33 weeks after the game launches, so there are several months’ worth of extra puzzles waiting for you online, too, which adds to the replay value of the game. The game is intended to last about 10 hours, but it took me more like 14 to beat, and I still haven’t hunted down and destroyed every last rogue puzzle, so there’s still more out there to finish.
If you’ve just played “Curious Village,” you’ll see a lot of similarity here, right down to the types of puzzles on offer. This can be a help, in that you’ll have an advantage in knowing how the game thinks and what kinds of sneaky tricks it likes to pull; but if you’ve played the first one recently, it may feel like more of the same. So if you’ve just beaten the first game, you might want to give yourself a break and try something else before delving back in.
Overall, this is a solid second installment in a great, fun series. The games pack a lot of extras and playing time in, plus a charming and unique visual style that’s very memorable and fun. This is definitely a game that will challenge adults and older children for many hours of brain-straining, puzzling enjoyment!
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