Foto Showdown NDSi
Foto Showdown is a camera based monster battle game exclusively on the Nintendo DSi where the dominant colors of your camera subject determine the monster you spawn to do battle in a Pokémon type duel.
Ratings:
Graphics & Audio: 12/25,
Gameplay: 8/25,
Creativity 10/25,
Fun 10/25
Total: 40/100
Foto Showdown is a truly unique idea taken to an inexplicably bad product with the only saving grace that it actually works as a dueling monster game. Taking photos and having the dominant colors spawn or determine the various monsters you use in duels is a great idea if it worked correctly.
Foto Showdown has two main parts in taking pictures for your monster management and the actual battles against either another player using the wireless play or against the AI of the game. Either way you have to start out using something to contain your monster which they term bullets and you have to start off with the basic ones and progress to better ones as you get deeper into the game.
The first thing you get is a basic camera and basic bullets to contain your monster and simply take a picture of something to have the game give you your first monster. You then battle against another person or the AI in a card duel where your monster has abilities and depending on how you use them against your opponent in the turn based fights determines the winner.
The dueling is almost exactly like many other card based battle games and not original at all with the same magic and physical abilities for attack and defense. The game is almost identical in the duel with Pokémon and plays very well for a game that is fun if your into these turn based battles.
The main difference between Foto Showdown and Pokémon is no wandering around finding monsters to fight with, you snap pictures of anything and have the game give you them according to colors, supposedly. I really do not think the color recognition system works well from the start and if you want a camera based game to catch someone's fancy from the start it needs to work from the very first shutter click.
If the game does not prove it can give you different monsters from the start you will not have much reason to stick around to see if things improve or are any different. I found that going further into the game seemed to only mean I acquired higher level monsters and the picture color recognition did not seem to matter.
When you have played awhile, if you can stand to, you will acquire better camera devices that will take better pictures according to the game and the upgraded bullets will allow you to acquire better monsters. In fact this system does not work nearly as well as the creators would have hoped because your first monster dealings will probably sour you on the whole concept and just frustrate you with the game.
There does not appear to be any rhyme nor reason for the monster choice when taking pictures, as a test I took pictures of a plain white backdrop I normally use for photos and got a Wyvern three times in a row. I then switched to a black background and got a Wyvern as well, I then tried a bright green piece of plastic and did get something different but when I switched to a red background I got the same Kuras.
I'm not sure if the color means much as using three very different colors with the whole screen being filled with that color under bright photo lights made no difference on the monster it gave me. While this may change further along in the game it is a shame they did not ensure this worked right from the start as taking pictures of different things in the beginning and getting different monsters is an important part of gameplay and value.
If I don't get at least some explanation that things will change further along in the game or actually see this from testing I am going to be pretty frustrated going around snapping pictures of things and not getting any variety to my choices of monsters. Right off the bat my value and gameplay longevity is out the window as I really am not trusting that things will only improve with more time I spend on Foto Showdown.
Aside from the photo stuff the game does work and you do get the full monster battle, albeit a Pokémon copy, that works just fine but the main taking pictures to get monsters just fails. When the game is promoted as "Battle using Nintendo DSi Camera!" you get a little excited that they finally have come up with some kind of actual use for the lower quality camera on the handheld.
The truth is it just does not seem to work all that well and if there is no real indication that it works well than you start the game off being disappointed. Other things also disappoint and bring your initial opinion down like no touch screen in the game at all, even for name choice.
I found this an exceptionally odd thing to advertise this as a Nintendo DS exclusive game and not even use the touch screen from starting the game up to shutting it down. The controls for using your monsters and camera all worked fine using the various buttons and D-pad but without the touch screen you again have that feeling of something being missing.
Gameplay is fine for the battles and you do have a good time while there but without being able to control what monsters you get other than to just keep plugging away at battles to win more monsters it feels aimless. Foto Showdown works well for the Pokémon type battles with video and audio also working well but when the game is exclusive to the Nintendo DSi because the game is based on the camera you expect that to actually work.
The game starts off being a disappointment with no actual proof the camera actually makes any difference in taking pictures of various things or just your floor. I had great expectations, or at least some, that this would be an interesting game and that the camera would finally see some use other than snapping pictures of my cat lying on my keyboard before I toss him back on the floor.
Foto Showdown only gives a bit of a different card battle duel type game in a different package that actually copies the Pokémon battles well. Foto Showdown is a letdown and if you're expecting a great game using the DSi you may be disappointed in the use of the camera but the base battles work well and are fun.