GameCube

Odama

So what is Odama? It's a crossbreed of real-time strategy, barking out military orders with a microphone, and squishing everything on the screen with a massive cannonball/pinball called an Odama, whether its enemy soldiers, towers, forts, or your own men. As you improve your skills with the Odama, the number of your men you flatten with your magical ball of death will shrink, but friendly pulverizing is inevitable.

Odama is unlike anything you’ve ever played before, with an inventive mix of pinball and military strategy elements that work pretty well together. Combined they create a frantic and unique game, giving the player a true feeling of accomplishment as troops pour through the goal at the end of each level. That alone makes it worth a look for those wanting to play something different.

You’ll never forget playing Yoot Saito’s Odama. Ever. It’s worth reminding you of that one more time. When this generation has long gone you’ll always remember that weird pinball/strategy game with the giant stone ball and the shouting into the Wavebird and the head on the metallic spider legs, and…

Premier flipper stratégique à contrôle vocal, Odama est un titre atypique qui risque de diviser les joueurs. Ceux qui seront séduits apprécieront la complexité du gameplay et le caractère éprouvant des missions. Les autres resteront perplexes devant ce titre où on ne maîtrise jamais complètement tout ce qui se passe à l'écran.

Despite my complaints, I'llbe the first to applaud the game for its excellent microphone usage and clever tweak of the pinball concept. For a lot of you, those features alone will be worth the price of admission. For everyone else, this is just going to be another missed opportunity for Nintendo to convince you to try something a little different.

Ich liebe Flipper. Gerne auch real in der Kneipe um die Ecke oder im Trocadero in London. Entsprechend groß waren meine Erwartungen an die erste Flipper-Simulation für den kleinen Würfel. Odama beweist mit dem innovativen Spielkonzept viel Mut, vernachlässigt aber die einfache Spielbarkeit. Ein solider Flipper-Strategie-Mix, nicht mehr!

Schwere, taktisch vielseitige Strategie-Flipperei mit guter Ballphysik, aber konfusem Spielablauf.

Odama is the third-best console game that involver rolling a giant ball over people. This is not the faint praise that it would initially seem to be, but neither is it the best of recommendations. This title is worth a look for pinball fans and anyone looking for a peculiar gaming experience, but wait until it hits the bargain bins to pick a copy up. Real-time strategy pinball is extremely fun, but lacks the staying power necessary to make Yoot Saito’s tribute to the everyman worth more than a rental

Few game designers have proven such an eagerness to disregard the status quo as Yoot Saito. Best known for creating Seaman, the virtual-life simulator for the Dreamcast that saw you engaging in conversation with a bizarre amphibian that looked disturbingly like Yoot himself, he and his development house, Vivarium, have now launched off into a equally bizarre venture with Odama, a strategy game that quite literally turns the battlefields of feudal Japan into a pinball table. If this doesn't sound like the most natural combination, rest assured that it's not. As admirable as it is for a developer to attempt something so totally different, admiration cannot fully compensate for what is an awkward and regularly infuriating experience. Still, there's something to be said for a game with such a fresh perspective, and that novelty will be enough to draw in some people, at least for a while.

The game itself resembles pinball during the majority of the game. The Odama ball is the pinball that is launched by the men in your army. You see the flippers at the bottom of the stage and each flipper is controlled by either the left or right shoulder button. The analog stick allows you to control the tilt of the board by moving the Odama either left or right once it's moving. Each stage or level includes a variety of designs for the Odama ball to travel including buildings to destroy and items to collect for your battle.

Odama, from development studio Vivarium (best known for Seaman on Dreamcast) and Nintendo, is something of an enigma both in concept and in execution. The title's premise usually effects the same response, which is, simply, "huh?" It's not surprising. After all, the game marries the core mechanics of pinball with real-time strategy elements and spins everything to a backdrop involving medieval Japan. A giant metal ball, the Odama, rolls through and over mountainous regions, destroying structures and flattening soldiers. That's right… huh? And if it didn't sound strange enough already, Vivarium has packed the title with a GameCube microphone that players use to command their armies.

A military pinball game with a microphone?! Odama certainly got our attention. It sounded so weird, we just had to see it…

I applaud that Nintendo was actually able to make a pinball game have some strategic depth, but it really feels like Odama is working overtime to make you fail its missions. And replaying the same stages over and over again is rarely fun, no matter how unique a game is.

Odama's pinball is straightforward, but it's not great pinball. The speed of the "Odama" (the ball) isn't always spot-on -- for example, sometimes, the Odama doesn't snap off of the flippers like it should. It seems like a minor quibble, but when this is the essence of pinball, and it's been missed, it's problematic. Additionally, tilting the screen with the left control stick is a little too effective.

Names like Shigeru Miyamoto and Tetsuya Mizuguchi will be familiar to many reading these pages, but Yoot Saito might not be. Producer and game designer of Odama, Saito was also the architect of the excellent SimTower during a stint with Maxis in the mid-90s, and later the charmingly bizarre Seaman for Dreamcast. Yet while Odama isn't good enough to stop the dust building up on the GameCube for very long, anybody fortunate enough to sit down with it for half an hour is likely to look for his name in future.

The story takes place during the Muromachi period of feudal Japan in the year 1539. The player assumes the role of a young general called Tamachiyo Kagetora, who is fighting against a rival clan in order to preserve The Way of Ninten (a philosophy that sees the greater good put before the needs of an individual). Tamachiyo is also seeking to exact revenge against his father's nemesis, Karasuma Genshin, but in order to achieve his goal, he must employ the use of two family secrets.

As flawed as it is, however, Odama is still strangely compelling and addicting. My abysmal performance and lack of progress did not prevent me from playing Odama for hours on end. The ancient Japanese theme is artistic and unusual, and has an off-beat, self-deprecating sense of humor. Odama could have been a winner if it were easier and less complex. I love to see innovation like this, but I could really do without the frustration.

Most games are fun for ten hours, after which you never play them again. Odama is fun for an hour, then you swear you’ll never play it again only to go back an hour later for more. It’s more like a Rubik's Cube than a video game, a weird enigma you can always pick up, just not for long. If you have the patience, feed this one some coin.

Odama proves that a pinball/strategy hybrid has merit. Who would've thought? But it doesn't take the extra step to polish all of the elements to make this potential beacon of innovation shine. I suggest trying the game if you get the chance; you won't get another experience like it, probably ever again. But a purchase is not recommended.