What at first I thought would be a game of the beat em up genre with "childish" aesthetics and style due to its main characters, colors and artistic style, turned out to be a game that under that appearance is crazy in terms of characters and situations that its protagonists will live. This is one of those games that has the mark of Japan in each of its pixels. It really is a strange game in terms of bosses and characters, but at the end of the day it turns out to be quite entertaining due to its oddities.
Today's Retro Review is about: Pu-Li-Ru-La.
Not only the graphical aspect of this game is the most rare and remarkable, but its story despite being the typical one in which we must go in search of something to save our people, has elements that make it quite unique and different from other games of the same genre. The story of this game focuses on Zac and Mel who have been assigned the mission to save their town and time, yes time. The town of Radishaland is where the events of Pu-Li-Ru-La begin and we are told that in this town time flows in a linear way due to a great machine that makes everything work correctly, however, one day the main villain of this game appears in the town and steals the key that makes the time machinery work correctly, thus creating an alteration in space-time that makes the past, present and future come together creating chaos throughout the place. For this reason, the protagonists of this game, Zac and Mel must go in search of the stolen key and defeat the villain who stole it, thus returning to normal all the temporal chaos that has generated all this.
Graphically it is a game with a lot of anime style, especially in its two protagonists, they are simple designs but they are well done and work very well in their environment. Generally we are going to find a great variety of colors in all the scenarios and at least in its first two scenarios everything is "normal", with their respective weird enemies, but that fit very well with their environment, however, after this, is when this game becomes quite weird, since it mixes the "animated" with the realistic and we will find digital designs of real characters throughout the game, we will even find the drawing of a nun with a huge tongue that attacks us, a pair of realistic and giant women's legs that attack us, people's faces that collide with the screen, it is a very Japanese game in every way, all very weird, bizarre and dreamlike.
But at the same time, all these oddities make sense due to the temporal chaos that is happening, so this is one of the most remarkable aspects of this game, since everything escapes logic, at least mostly, but it is an element that gives a lot of personality and originality to this game. Its final bosses are some of the strangest, most bizarre and eccentric that we are going to find in any video game and while I was playing I was always looking forward to see the next oddity that I was going to see on screen.
There is quite a variety of scenarios, each one weirder and crazier than the last, with a lot of chaos and out of the ordinary situations, this game is basically a trip with strong drugs and a lot of anime. The animations are fine, though perhaps a bit stiff, however due to all the weirdness happening on screen, it's an aspect that is ignored at first instance. And personally this game, in its graphical aspect I think it's a marvel.
The music in this game is okay, but they are nothing memorable despite being a game of the beat em up genre, which in general always has quite catchy music and which we will remember and hum many times, however, although the soundtrack of Pu-Li-Ru-La is not spectacular, it is quite decent and fulfills its purpose very well, plus some of these melodies fit very well with all the visual chaos that we will see throughout this adventure. As well as the sound effects are decent, nothing spectacular but they also manage to fulfill their main purpose and I think that's enough.
Pu-Li-Ru-La, as I have already mentioned several times in this review, is a fairly conventional beat em up game and does not innovate in practically nothing despite its bizarre and strange aesthetics, but it is still a highly entertaining game due to all its oddities. Besides, as you may have guessed, its mechanics are quite easy to learn because it does not add new elements or mechanics that distinguish it from other games of the same genre, all this without taking into account its enemies and final bosses, which in this aspect is very different from other beat em up games.
We can choose between two characters, Zac and Mel, which are equipped with magic sticks that will serve to attack the enemies that appear on screen, however in terms of mechanics these two characters are exactly the same (you can also play in cooperative mode). Like any good game of the beat em up genre its purpose is the same, to run a series of scenarios full of enemies of all kinds and with attack mechanics that vary until you reach the final boss of each stage, defeat him and continue advancing, something simple but very effective.
Pu-Li-Ru-La is extremely easy, entertaining and fun due to its craziness and situations, however it is an extremely short game, but very short and at most we will complete it in 40 minutes, I have even seen videos on YouTube that finish it in less than half an hour, so it is a rather negative aspect with respect to its gameplay, but to some extent it compensates with its great attractiveness and crazy visual and artistic style.
Pu-Li-Ru-La is one of those strange games coming out of Japan, which is a good beat em up, very conventional but generally very entertaining despite its short length. It's worth playing it at least once to visualize all the weird, bizarre, dreamlike, and even creepy things this game has to offer.