Well, it's that time again, moahr Madou impressions, this time with ''The Final Test'', the first of the Windows trilogy (albeit the last one I got to).
Story
This game takes place after the original Madou trilogy and before all of the other games, it initially starts as a throwback to Madou 1, with Arle attending to her final exam of the year, which involves dungeon crawling, Rulue and Minotauros also participate (remember how Rulue accepted Arle's offer, at the end of MM3 ), Schezo is there too, since he is interested in a magical artifact that is supposedly hidden in the tower where the exam takes place and Satan is the headmaster of the school, just like in Secret Of Elysium.
After a while thought, things take a darker turn, with Satan being reluctant to let Arle progress and wouldn't you know it, the coming floors suddenly change in atmosphere and enviroment almost as if they were a different dimension entirely. Not only that, but Arle and Rulue run into Schezo, who is trying to prevail against the seemingly invincible main antagonist of the game: Phantom God :
The two try to help him, but prove to be just as ineffective against the new foe, so Schezo in hopes that they can find a way to beat Phantom God, uses a spell that allows the girls to escape, while he sacrifices himself by taking a fatal blow and getting himself killed in the process.
Arle while distraught over Schezo's demise, presses onwards and encounters Doppelganger Arle (the same one from Puyo Puyo-n) and a group of bosses called the ''Jewel Guardians'', defeating them gives her the means to challenge Phantom God and eventually come out triumphant, doing so grands her the Seraphim Orb, which allows her to pass the exam.
Schezo's ultimate fate is kind of a complicated subject, there is an explanation as to how he came back in one DiscStation issue, but I have heard conflicting storys about what it was, so I won't go into that since I can't say for sure, the only thing that matters is that he came back,
Graphics
This game uses the same artstyle as Secret of Elysium, so most of what I said back when I wrote about that one applies here as well, althought here are some more sprites, just so you can see for yourself :
http://okiraku06.lolipop.jp/okiraku/de-tamaH3.htm
http://okiraku06.lolipop.jp/okiraku/de-tamaH2.htm
Now granted visuals aren't everything and a few like Skeleton T or Mamono did come out fine (suprisingly), but for a series that usually does really well in this department this is a pretty big letdown, I mean just compare Final Test and Tower of the Magician Schezo :
It just makes you wonder what happened, ya know?
Music
While there are original tracks a majority of the soundtrack consists of remixes from 1-3 and ARS and I'm perfectly okay with that, like the ''Beginnings of the Dark Wizard'' remix:
Gameplay
The Windows games are much like 1-3 in the sense that many things stay the same, the battle system hasn't changed at all between them, for instance, but there are some neat ideas here and there, like special doors that can only be opened by putting Puyos that you collect in battles and putting four of the same color into the fitting sockets in order to make them pop, which opens the doors or another floor where there were plattforms that would catapult you around and you have to make sure that you get flung where you need to go, by messing with nearby switches, I thought those were neat ideas.
As far as everything else is concerned I can say that this certainly a predecessor to Tower of the Magician, with some themes and puzzle concepts that would later come up in the latter game, with that said I think that TOTM did a better job overall, especially with how every floor in that game had a very distinct feeling to it, Final Test attempts to do that and does come up with some interesting ideas, but a number of floors do feel a bit cut and paste, with the same type of switch puzzle over and over again, which hurts it a little, it also doesn't help that things don't really start to pick up until Schezo kicks the bucket, they do refer to the fact that something is going to happen, but the real meat of the story doesn't come in until late into the game and they don't really do enough with the Madou 1 throwback concept for it to be interesting on it's own.
I was iffy on this game at first, due to it being one of the least liked games in the series, but as a whole I thought it was fine and inoffensive, it's just one od those cases where the sequel does such a better job and unlike 1-3 which were similar to each other, but also had enough going for them to stand out as unique in on way or another; Final Test struggles to stand out among the other two windows games (Secret of Elysium at least had a very odd, yet interesting style of puzzles, as I mentioned back then) , there are plot elements and gameplay concepts that do stick out, but they are pretty sparse, so what you are left with an installment that feels like a proto TOTM in many ways, but it still enjoyable, it's not like it has instances of bad design or lack of polish. It just doesn't have much that we haven't seen before and the artstyle is.... questionable as well.
To cap this off there are two more things about this game,that I'd like to share.
First off, it features the return of Lala, a character previously exclusive to the Mega Drive version of Madou 1 :
I thought that was a very neat suprise, since non-mook Madou only characters don't usually reappear between games. No Camus (from Game Gear and Mega Drive Madou 1) unfortunatly, althought they did bring him back in another DiscStation game:
So it all balances out in the end.
And lastly, in addition to the regular credits the game disc also has an anime short that doesn't play during the actual game, so if you haven't seen it before enjoy:
