Fat Princess
Review
Fat Princess? Fat game!
by Blackened Beans
reviewed on PS3
Belly full (cntd.)
The Gladiate mode lets you enter an arena with a class of choice and fight against wave after wave of enemies. This mode is great for practicing different class abilities, but your score will also go on your statistics page for bragging rights. The "mess about" mode lets you set up a custom single-player game to get to grips with controls and objectives. It is a good way to pass time when the multiplayer modes are having issues. One hopes that the AI will be patched sometimes soon so that the single player will be more enjoyable, but even in its current state it's good – if not frustrating – fun.
The online play is where the fun is really at. You can take your character online with up to 31 other players. There's a much greater feeling of accomplishment in winning against real opponents than there is against the game's mentally challenged bots. I did experience some lag, with frame rate jumps and occasional clipping errors, but it is so minimal that it doesn't hamper the fun in any way. Most of the time, the game runs smooth as a baby's behind, even when things get hectic. The matchmaking system still has some kinks to be worked out. Finding a match can be quite difficult and when you do enter a match, there is a good chance the game won't be full. In these cases, the game spawns bots to fill up the empty player slots which, frankly, isn't much fun at all.
She's looking pretty
It is fair to say that Fat Princess is one of the best looking downloadable game released to date. It is technically impressive, retaining a smooth frame rate with solid textures and lighting. Even more impressive is the game's art. Fat Princess is insanely colorful, trumping even the likes of Super Mario Galaxy with its over the top color palette. The maps are large and offer a wide variety of environments ranging from volcanos to deserts and jungles. The sound can keep up, sporting hilarious taunts, cute voicework and excellent narration. The musical score is very fitting with tunes that are happy, epic and stupid at the same time.
Characters can be customized, but not to a great extend. You can customize your character's skin, eyes, hair and beard. None of these are much use as your characters will be wearing a helmet most of the time. Lame enough, changing your character from male to female only changes its voice and it is almost impossible to make a character actually look like a woman. With so few options available, the customization options feel rather pointless and a lot more could have been done to release its potential.
Go play!
Fat Princess is hilarious and is incredibly fun to play. It is easily one of the PlayStation 3's best downloadable games yet. The trophies and unlockable character options, as well as the promise of future downloadable content should keep you coming back for more. Sure, the combat is a bit shallow but that just makes it easily accessible. And besides, the team strategy involved in playing the game adds a lot of depth. Hopefully some patches can help fix some of the lingering online, AI and balancing issues. If you can forgive some connection issues and the idiotic AI, then you will have a blast playing this game. Without these problems, I would not have held back from greater praise. But fear not, even with these issues, Fat Princess is definitely worth your cash.
8.5
fun score
Pros
Excellent graphics and sound, genuinely funny, solid controls and good amount of strategic depth. Great value for your money.
Cons
Bot AI is stupid to the point of controller-chucking frustration. Connection issues.
