22nd February 2003, 8:00 PM
The box art for the quirky <i>Cubivore</i> features a quote from IGN calling the game "one of the most bizarre videogames ever created". Sounds like a safe bet to me. The opening sequence features a Cubivore (with its head looking like a GC logo) crapping in the middle of the screen, and running offscreen. If that's not bad enough, four insects then come and proceed to party around the pile of dung. I still laugh at it.
In <i>Cubivore</i>, you start out a little pig and move your way up the food chain to eventually evolve into a bear and a bird. As you progress, you find many other beings, of 5 colors: Red (Redapeds), Yellow(Yellowbrates), Blue (Bluocytes), Purple (Purpails), and Grey (Greyodons). You start out with one "meat flap". When you eat another animal, say a red one, that flap becomes red, and you mutate into a different creature. Eat a blue one and you mutate again. Eventually you get the opportunity to mate, and when you do, you die, and your offspring recieves one more meat flap. Now if you can get both flaps to one color, you mutate again, each color has different attrubutes. Redapeds have incredible jumping ability, Yellowbrates do more damage with their attacks, while Bluocytes can pounce from far away, Purpails can move backwards quickly, whereas Greyodons can run like the wind. Target specific types of animals and change all your flaps to their color to gain their abilities. Why would an animal do this? Because colorless beasts have appeared and taken away all the wilderness, causing animals to die off and the world to become a barren white land. At the center off all of this is the King of all the Cubivores, the Killer Cubivore. Do you have what it takes to overtake him and become King of the Cubivores?
Graphics are...subpar. I'm being nice by saying subpar. Everything, and I mean EVERYTHING is cubed. The animals, the grass, blood, the sun and moon, even ripples in water are square. You can count the polygons in a scene if you try. Obviously though, this makes for a light burden on the GameCubes processing, making for a silky smooth gameplay without a hint of slowdown.
Hope you weren't looking forward to a treat for the ears either. A few of the stages have a three second guitar riff repeated over, and over, and over again. Animals have various yelps, roars, and other noises, but nothing else to really justify having Dolby Digital sound. But hey, if you like that riff, crank up your stereo surround! I will say this, though, the music during the opening sequence (while the insects are having a crap party) has a beautiful piano song which I still find myself humming.
Graphically and audibly, this game is terrible, but it redeems itself with it's solid gameplay. There are nearly 150 different mutations, each with distinct strong points and drawbacks, and you'll have to work really hard to find them all. You find yourself loving how you're using your camouflage ability to pounce on unexpecting bosses. You find yourself stalking different creatures to gain their abilities, and using other animals abilities to take them out. Once you start playing, you won't want to stop until you reach the end...and it's tough. I won't say much, but it took me an hour of nonstop activity to fight the final battle. It is extremely difficult, not for the fait of heart. When I beat it, I breathed a sigh of relief, because had I played for one more minute, my aching hands would have jumped off my arms and strangled me for torturing them so.
If you're up for an addictive game and don't rate everything of graphics and sound, give Cubivore a try. Once you get into it, it's a very enjoyable game. I rate it 7.0 out of 10.
In <i>Cubivore</i>, you start out a little pig and move your way up the food chain to eventually evolve into a bear and a bird. As you progress, you find many other beings, of 5 colors: Red (Redapeds), Yellow(Yellowbrates), Blue (Bluocytes), Purple (Purpails), and Grey (Greyodons). You start out with one "meat flap". When you eat another animal, say a red one, that flap becomes red, and you mutate into a different creature. Eat a blue one and you mutate again. Eventually you get the opportunity to mate, and when you do, you die, and your offspring recieves one more meat flap. Now if you can get both flaps to one color, you mutate again, each color has different attrubutes. Redapeds have incredible jumping ability, Yellowbrates do more damage with their attacks, while Bluocytes can pounce from far away, Purpails can move backwards quickly, whereas Greyodons can run like the wind. Target specific types of animals and change all your flaps to their color to gain their abilities. Why would an animal do this? Because colorless beasts have appeared and taken away all the wilderness, causing animals to die off and the world to become a barren white land. At the center off all of this is the King of all the Cubivores, the Killer Cubivore. Do you have what it takes to overtake him and become King of the Cubivores?
Graphics are...subpar. I'm being nice by saying subpar. Everything, and I mean EVERYTHING is cubed. The animals, the grass, blood, the sun and moon, even ripples in water are square. You can count the polygons in a scene if you try. Obviously though, this makes for a light burden on the GameCubes processing, making for a silky smooth gameplay without a hint of slowdown.
Hope you weren't looking forward to a treat for the ears either. A few of the stages have a three second guitar riff repeated over, and over, and over again. Animals have various yelps, roars, and other noises, but nothing else to really justify having Dolby Digital sound. But hey, if you like that riff, crank up your stereo surround! I will say this, though, the music during the opening sequence (while the insects are having a crap party) has a beautiful piano song which I still find myself humming.
Graphically and audibly, this game is terrible, but it redeems itself with it's solid gameplay. There are nearly 150 different mutations, each with distinct strong points and drawbacks, and you'll have to work really hard to find them all. You find yourself loving how you're using your camouflage ability to pounce on unexpecting bosses. You find yourself stalking different creatures to gain their abilities, and using other animals abilities to take them out. Once you start playing, you won't want to stop until you reach the end...and it's tough. I won't say much, but it took me an hour of nonstop activity to fight the final battle. It is extremely difficult, not for the fait of heart. When I beat it, I breathed a sigh of relief, because had I played for one more minute, my aching hands would have jumped off my arms and strangled me for torturing them so.
If you're up for an addictive game and don't rate everything of graphics and sound, give Cubivore a try. Once you get into it, it's a very enjoyable game. I rate it 7.0 out of 10.