Retro Review: Phantom Dust

<p>Microsoft has had some amazing gems in their games catalog&comma; one of which was announced to be receiving a remake in this newest console generation&period; That game was <em>Phantom Dust<&sol;em>&period; Released on March 15th&comma; 2005&comma; the action&sol;strategy game was developed by Microsoft Game Studios and published by Microsoft Game Studios and Majesco for the original Xbox console&period; To be honest&comma; I had never heard of this game until very recently&period; I even missed the reveal of <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;phantom-dust-makes-comeback&sol;">the Xbox One reboot<&sol;a> somehow&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Unfortunately&comma; its developer&comma; Darkside Games&comma; <a href&equals;"http&colon;&sol;&sol;www&period;gameinformer&period;com&sol;b&sol;news&sol;archive&sol;2015&sol;06&sol;22&sol;phantom-dust-isn-t-canceled-but-it-isn-t-in-active-development&period;aspx">has been closed<&sol;a>&comma; and the game&&num;8217&semi;s development is shaky&period; Once I read about the premise of the game&comma; however&comma; I had to find myself a copy&comma; and it took me about two weeks to find one off of an internet auction site&period; I was very pleased when I got my copy&period; I popped it right into my Xbox and was swept away to a very different&comma; very barren world&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;90836" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-90836" style&equals;"width&colon; 599px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;09&sol;04181825&sol;phantom-dust-xbox&period;png"><img class&equals;"wp-image-90836 size-full" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;09&sol;04181825&sol;phantom-dust-xbox&period;png" alt&equals;"Phantom Dust" width&equals;"599" height&equals;"408" &sol;><&sol;a><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-90836" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;Phantom Dust&comma; Microsoft Game Studios&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>The story has a somewhat different take on the post-apocalyptic genre of gaming&period; In this world&comma; a mysterious poisonous dust has plagued its citizens&period; This dust wiped away everyone&&num;8217&semi;s memories and created horrible demons on the surface&period; This caused all the survivors to go underground&period; The dust didn&&num;8217&semi;t only have bad effects on the world&period; It also created Espers&comma; people who can transform their will into energy &lpar;much like Green Lanterns but without the ring&rpar;&period; These Espers go out onto the surface looking for ways to be rid of the dust and to find all the lost memories&period; This is where a group of Espers find you and your companion&period; You&&num;8217&semi;re both found in a pod and taken back underground&period; Your pod mate Edgar is obsessed with his locket&comma; and the picture of the girl found inside that he seeks&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>Once settled&comma; you begin your training with various missions that people send you on&period; You learn to fight&comma; learn to defend&comma; and learn a little about yourself&period; The one thing I disliked about the story telling was the fact that the game doesn&&num;8217&semi;t provide a smooth tale&period; Instead of being taken mission to mission by walking around the world or normal story beats&comma; you have to seek out people to give you missions where little tidbits of story are revealed to you&period; The choppiness takes you out of the narrative&semi; at least that&&num;8217&semi;s what it did to me&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>The controls are fairly easy to learn&period; The left stick moves your character &lpar;Alpha&rpar; around the world&comma; and the right stick controls the camera&comma; but not very well&period; What&&num;8217&semi;s even worse about the camera you control is that it is inverted and you cannot change it in the options&semi; it&&num;8217&semi;s very hard to get use to&period; Once you start running around the world&comma; glowing orbs appear&colon; red and blue&period; Red is an attack mode and blue is a defense mode&period; When you run over these orbs&comma; you hit the face buttons to assign them&comma; and once you push that face button&comma; you use it&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>These powers use Aura points and once you run out of Aura points&comma; you have to run around the map and recharge them&period; It recharges fairly fast during battle&period; To lock onto an enemy&comma; all you have to do is click on the right trigger–they can be anywhere on the map and you will be locked onto them&period; Once you&&num;8217&semi;re locked on&comma; you can just unload and take out all the baddies on that map&period; Doing this earns you credits and memory boxes&semi; both of which you can use underground&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<figure id&equals;"attachment&lowbar;90838" aria-describedby&equals;"caption-attachment-90838" style&equals;"width&colon; 640px" class&equals;"wp-caption aligncenter"><a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;09&sol;04181811&sol;iHIIxeSeVo9i1&period;png"><img class&equals;"wp-image-90838 size-full" src&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;cdn&period;bagogames&period;com&sol;wp-content&sol;uploads&sol;2015&sol;09&sol;04181811&sol;iHIIxeSeVo9i1&period;png" alt&equals;"Phantom Dust" width&equals;"640" height&equals;"480" &sol;><&sol;a><figcaption id&equals;"caption-attachment-90838" class&equals;"wp-caption-text">&lpar;Phantom Dust&comma; Microsoft Game Studios&rpar;<&sol;figcaption><&sol;figure>&NewLine;<p>The graphics&comma; while dated&comma; still hold up pretty well by today&&num;8217&semi;s standards&period; The cut scenes look nice and blend in pretty well with the gameplay graphics&period; The game has a nice steam-punk feel to it&period; The characters are well designed&comma; and you don&&num;8217&semi;t get too confused with who you need to speak to next&period; The backdrops to the world are pretty boring though and you&&num;8217&semi;ll find yourself getting lost very often underground because everything looks the same and the map is useless&period; It doesn&&num;8217&semi;t tell you where to go either–it just shows you the layout and what section you are in with no labels or anything&period; The over world backgrounds also look pretty bad&semi; they&&num;8217&semi;re all the same&period; Had the backgrounds been more dynamic&comma; it would have made this game even better than it already is&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;<p>I&&num;8217&semi;m very glad that I discovered this game&comma; but I&&num;8217&semi;m also sad that the remake or reboot is now on shaky ground&period; I will  play this on my Xbox One if it <a href&equals;"https&colon;&sol;&sol;bagogames&period;com&sol;check-out-the-leaked-footage-of-phantom-dust&sol;">ever comes out<&sol;a>&comma; but I&&num;8217&semi;ll settle for my original Xbox for the time being&period; I like the world that this game is set in&semi; it&&num;8217&semi;s different than most end of the world games&period; The controls&comma; while very different&comma; also work very well within the world and the game&period; If you have an original Xbox and the patience to search for a good copy of this game&comma; you should&period; It&&num;8217&semi;s definitely worth your time and investment&period;<&sol;p>&NewLine;