Animal Kingdom: Wildlife Expedition Game Sample - Wii
0"Animal Kingdom: Wildlife Expedition" is an obscure game within a niche genre, the "Interactive Photography Simulation" (or "Photo Safari"), developed by Success and published by Natsume in 2009. Part of Natsume's now-established family-orientated lineup and released at the budget price of $29.99, the game is sadly not very good. No, it's not because games of this kind demand patience and cater to a relatively small target audience, but because the execution is nonsensical, the gameplay is very linear, and the flow of the game is rather monotonous. Considering Success makes many budget titles in Japan (as part of the SuperLite brand, etc.), one can appreciate their ability to debunk the misconception that cheap = lame or inaccessible, but it doesn't take long for one to realize that Animal Kingdom not only fails to deliver, but fails to deliver in a genre that possesses very little competition from competitors. The game has its redeeming qualities, but its few flaws will make you wonder why exactly you're playing in the first place.
Now don't get me wrong; photography as the forefront of a video game is a very under-utilized mechanic -- it would actually be cool to travel a big city as a photographer and take images for an editor to earn cash to buy goods while executing a variety of other jobs or side goals, but the honest truth is that most games which make photograpy the focus are fairly lazy with either a limited world or inadequate programming. Still, there are some genuinely fun or interesting photo safari titles like Pokemon Snap, Afrika, and Wild Earth: Photo Safari. Heck, even Pilotwing 64 had an inetersting photography side diversion within its Hang Glider test, so I'm not foreign to such titles. Knowing all this however, you should still understand that I feel AK fails to deliver.
In Animal Kingdom, you play as a nameless male or female freelance wildlife photographer who is getting the opportunity of a lifetime -- to take shots of rare and exotic animals on the remote "Animal Island". There is generally no other plot besides this outside of you getting a robot helper named Stupendo and chatting with your boss and editor from the (unnamed) city, so I hope you weren't expecting one. The idea is to focus on the photography. In Animal Kingdom, you spend days driving around the island in circles looking for animal activity, which is usually from the signs of rustling leaves, bushes, dust, and trickling water (how you can't just SEE huge Elephants and Giraffes in the distance is beyond me). The driving is done by Stupendo and is on-rails, so you have almost no control over where you go, though you can speed up, look around, and choose alternate routes occasionally. You can also click on objects for medals which help you unlock collectibles and boxes to get extra items to make your trip last longer or go easier (such as Camo Tents to shoot animals without scaring them off, Transformation Sets to blend with animals, and a Squall Machine for rain). Take photos for your boss and extras to add to your photo album.
When you find an animal spot, then the "fun" begins. To give credit where credit is due, Animal Kingdom is one of the few games of this kind that lets you do any photo capturing on foot. Sadly, the controls are cumbersome (not because you have to use the Wiimote/Nunchuk, but because you turn while backing up and the photo view is sometimes blurry even when you aim it properly), the areas are really small and surround you with a red area barrier, the animals are not very smart, animals sometimes spaz out and get stuck in objects or become glitchy when they can't move around an obstacle, and the game bases photo quality on how close you are rather than actual skill or finesse. Considering most animals can be approached effortlessly (including carnivores, who don't even attack you) and you can quickly snap a high quality photo as they stand or run by, the whole portion of the game where you build animal familiarity or use disguises to approach them seems pointless and just tacked on. If the editor didn't present about a dozen specific challenges, this game would be completely pointless. Speaking of the editor, he evaluates your photos but doesn't even give pointers on how to do better, so you know there's not much of a system involved. This is trite even if it was designed for kids with short attention spans and while there's a SMIDGE more to this title, it is fairly unintuitive and dull as a whole.
While the game looks and sounds okay (with surprisingly VERY SHARP visuals and good audio quality), I would've felt cheated if I bought this at the original MSRP. Even buying it for $10, I've had more fun with low-budget Playstation games within the A1 line-up. Animal Kingdom is cute, but is not a game I can recommend, even at its low price point.