Endless Ocean: Blue World
Everyone wants to live green and clean and the latest incarnation of Endless Ocean just does that. The Endless Ocean series is based on diving into the ocean and literally swimming with the fishes. You set out to discover the ocean and what it has to offer. But this blue ocean is bigger and has lots more to do. In my review of the first game, all you can explore was the immediate water and apparently every living thing in the sea is in that one spot. It’s kinda hard to swallow which made Aquanauts in the PS3 more acceptable to reality.
Jump to 2010 and here comes Blue World. There are now more realistic places to go. You now get to dive in the Artic or Antartic, the Amazon river and various tropical seas all over the world. All the underwater wildlife as well as amphibians, reptiles and mammals.
Endless Ocean: Blue World – Trailer
The biggest difference with this game is that it also brings along the danger of diving. SHARKS!!
Endless Ocean 2: Blue World: Sharks part 2
I really hate sharks. Although the game tells you when danger is near, every hit you take saps more of your air. Once all your air is depleted, you automatically return back to the boat. This makes exploring very difficult and frustrating. In the first game, you get to explore all you want without any danger. Now, you have a pulsar gun to fend off every type of aggressive shark out there.
Endless Ocean 2 Danger Trailer
The pulsar has no effect on piranhas so you’ll need to feed them first in order for them to avoid feeding on you. The main game is as long as the first game and more. You now get to dive with new human diving partners as well as the dolphins you meet and train. Sometimes they may help you with some of the sharks.
There side quests are back such as guiding other divers and taking pictures of the fishes. They’ve added salvage requests along with the task of curating an aquarium. You can now decorate your island base or your coastal reef project. The side quests are actually longer than the main storyline and will certainly keep you busy. This game is about to be the longest game I’ve played on the Wii in a long time. If you missed out on the first game, this is a perfect opportunity to experience diving without getting your feet wet. The graphics are much improved from the last but sadly the music selection is not as free as before.
The first game gave you a chance to pick what music to dive with as the game loaded when you started diving. You also had the opportunity to load your own music into the game via the SD card slot on the Wii and swim to the tune of your choice. Now however, you dive to the preset music and will not get a chance to change the music until you’ve completed a number of side-quests to unlock that feature. Not to mention that the music changes from area to area and also when you are attacked. I wish they kept the music options of the first game. Instead this game has been more stressful.
Sure you get the heart pumping action of zapping sharks, crocs and whales. But the whole point of me buying this game was to relax and music is not helping. The improvements to the game such as the length of the game, storyline and areas to explore is great. The realism is good with “aggressive” aquatic life chasing you. But the only flaw I see here is that the music option should at least still have been optional and that there should be a way to experience it without being attacked. Much akin to the “no-fail” mode in Rock Band.
I doubt that this game will be ported to other consoles. As with all these aquatic games, I wish the characters talked. Bioware has poisoned my gaming experience that all onscreen main characters should have voices attached to them. I hope the creators of Aquanauts come up with a new game. And please, have someone talking, even if it is in Japanese.
Procrastinating in the Heat 