Final Fantasy Fables: Chocobo Tales - first impression

Now, I'm as warm-blooded, cheese burger-loving, and hetero as the next guy - so I'll admit to saying, "Meh" when I first heard about it. I didn't intend to pick this up at (evil game store) last night. I was hunting for Puzzle Quest: Challenge of the Warlords... of course, it wasn't in stock. I had store credit burning a hole in my pocket and wanted something new to play. Chocobo Tales lured me in w/ it's beautiful art and claims of fun through minigames, microgames, card battles, and plenty of multiplayer.

I'm only 2 hours in, so this isn't a full-fledged review... just a 'Holy decent purchase, Batman! This game is actually fun!'

The story holds to a typical FF setup... there are crystals, someone's going to steal/use them to destroy the world, you have to save it, along w/ all kinds of memorable 'characters' (white mages, black mages, cactuars, bahamut, etc). From what I've seen so far, the story is adequately interesting and amusing. Some of the dialog is hilarious... I encountered a troubled hamster w/ a lisp last night that ended his dialog w/ "Oh thnap!" I laughed so hard... and quickly ran to get my camera and take a picture.



The mini/micro games are surprisingly fun and have varying degrees of difficulty. Competing in them awards you more cards for Pop-up Duels... which are actually quite fun and engaging... (I've only recently received my 'Training Deck' that can hold 8 cards... but apparently, you do get to a 15 card deck at some point because that's what is required to play over the Nintendo WiFi connection. I'm really looking forward to trying that out.) The card battling is much better than I thought it would be, it has just enough complexity to keep it interesting and relies on traditional Final Fantasy elements to play out (CP, status conditions, etc). It's basically a Collectible Card Game in the cart... along w/ all the other fun stuff that is Chocobo Tales.

The last thing I wanted to mention is 'flow'. I was impressed w/ how everything flows together. Squeenix got it right here. The story leads you to mini games and microgames that you have to do well enough in to unlock the next part of the story or more cards to do better in Pop-up Duels. You have to succeed in Pop-up Duels in order to get further in the story. It sounds really simple when typing that out, but it has that Square Enix polish. Everything flows together really well. Perhaps when I get a few more hours under my belt, I'll throw together a 60-second review for the DS Life podcast.

Don't be afraid of this cartoon-y game. Playing it won't make you gay... though, it may make you late to work. Crap!