Costume Quest

The Good
I always appreciate when a game attempts to veer from the beaten path and take a risk, whether it be in mechanics, visuals, or features. I also love Halloween, yes you heard me right….but there is a point of why I am mentioning this. How many games can you think of off the top of your head that are set with a Halloween atmosphere and are turn based RPGS? Exactly.

Enter Costume Quest, originally a downloadable game on Xbox Live, this gem from Double Fine luckily got a PC port, and I have to admit, I had a really good time playing it.

Costume Quest places you into the role of a time in our lives I’m sure we can all relate to, and hopefully happily….dressing up for Halloween and trick or treating with our friends. But, unlike real life, Costume Quest is based upon a brother/sister duo who must recruit other kids to thwart an evil group of Halloween ghoulies from taking hordes of candy and causing havoc in their hometown. You will visit the suburbs, the mall, and the rural farmlands in search of the evil witch who has kidnapped your sibling, and is attempting to ruin your holiday.

The graphical style of Costume Quest is charming, to say the least. Many will dismiss the look of the game to be childish and cartoony, and it is essentially, but the art is beautifully done and really has personality. Colors look great, and really draw you into the Halloween atmosphere. The sound is well done too, with most of the audio fitting in nicely. There is no voice acting in the game, so there is lots of text, but I honestly enjoyed most of the dialogue, even if it was a bit childish and juvenile. I think that was the games intent, and it works well.

Costume Quest will remind you a lot of earlier style JRPGs on consoles with it’s combat style. Basically combat is turn based, and very basic and simple. At the start of combat your kids will don their respective costumes they are wearing and literally morph into a real life version of the persona they are imitating. There are ninjas, robots, cats, and spacemen to name a few and each costume has it’s own special function and attack.

There are some neat features that make the game work well as a basic RPG and that also fit in with the Halloween mood. Instead of coins, you will collect candy. Instead of inventory, you will be collecting candy cards and battle stamps. There are still the standard RPG quests you can complete, as well as the standard RPG mechanic of gaining levels, but it is fun and easy…and that’s not a bad thing.

Although definitely designed with the console in mind, the game still plays smooth and controls work well on the PC. Personally, I used a controller as it felt much more natural for me, but the keyboard works great as well.

Costume Quest is definitely worth at least one playthrough, especially if you are a fan of RPGS and Halloween like me. I guess I’m just a big kid at heart.

The Bad
Some complaints I had were the repetition of a lot of the random battles. While the animations are nice in battle, it gets old after watching them over and over before the battle can even begin. You will be fighting a lot, and thankfully Costume Quest is a pretty short game, because too much more of the combat in the game could have dampened my view on the overall product.

I also wish there was the ability to skip cutscenes and dialogue, which you unfortunately cannot do. The game is also very short, and will only run you about 6-8 hours max to play through.

The Bottom Line
Overall Rating : B-