Godzilla: Unleashed Double Smash Review

Godzilla Unleashed: Double Smash (which will be written as Godzilla DS for the rest of this review) is a really fun and unique portable game for the Godzilla fan’s gaming library.

To start out, you have the single player story mode with four kaiju to choose from (two air kaiju, which will appear in the top screen; and two ground kaiju, which, obviously, appear at the bottom screen). These kaiju are Mothra, Battra, Godzilla, and Megalon. You choose one from each category and off you go!

As you progress through the game, you unlock 3D concept art of the various kaiju you face. This is a really neat, cool gallery as it rotates the kaiju 360 degrees to give you the full model of the kaiju in the game. You also unlock various kaiju that are added to your roster for future play.

We get ten playable kaiju in this game: Godzilla, Mothra, Megalon, Battra, Krystalak, King Ghidorah, Gigan, Fire Rodan, Anguirus, and Destoroyah. A pretty nice roster, and more than what we got in Godzilla Domination, but not by much. It would have been nice to play as some of the other kaiju we have as opponents; such as Titanosaurus, Orga, Manda, and even Spacegodzilla.

We also face a nice array of opponents. Besides what I listed just above this paragraph, the player will also face Ebirah, Biollante, Hedorah, the Egyptian Sphinx (wth?), Jet Jaguar, and Moguera to name a few.

As I’ve played the game, I’ve realized that, like the Godzilla: The Series games for the Game Boy and Game Boy Color systems, the actual hand-to-hand combat moves are very pointless for this game; therefore, your beam attacks are your best friend. Unless you want to use your melee attacks, be prepared to lose some health as well. It’s a guarantee that you will lose some health every time you use them.

The only real time to use your ground kaiju is at the beginning of the level to build up your power bar to increase its longevity and effectiveness against the level boss.

The level bosses have some different attack routines, so it keeps you on your toes, but your beams are going to be the only effective means of defeating them. In some cases even, it’s the only way to defeat them. The only exception may be Jet Jaguar as you have to hit his head and any beam attack at him, including his head, is ineffective.

Also, like the Godzilla: The Series, the first game, the levels slowly progress along but you at least get to take control of your character. The levels are also linear and the destruction of buildings, sadly, is virtually nill except the occasional building where you have to use the B and Y combo buttons to destroy said objects.

If you get a high combo, the game may reward you with a few moments of invincibility. This is pretty nice, but not totally necessary. I spend much of my time anyways using the air kaiju and save my ground kaiju against the level’s boss.

What’s nice about this game, something I didn’t notice the first time I played it, is that if one of your kaiju’s health gets drained, you, obviously, use the next kaiju in line, but your knocked out kaiju will regenerate his health. It must be noted that this only works during battles with the bosses and the health meter will only restore halfway. This is a nice way of keeping the gamer involved as many times you’re going to get hit, and hit often, by the level boss.

Which brings me to controls. I sort of like the control setup they have here with the controls, but they are not intuitive. X is your special attack, A is jump, B is low melee, and Y is high melee. I still find myself using the B for jump and A for special. Not to mention I also find myself using Y for low melee and X for high melee. This seems to be the most intuitive to me as the lowest button has almost always tended to be the jump button on a four-button control pad. I would have liked for them to switch it around to this configuration, but this is a very minor gripe.

The graphics of the game have gotten an awful lot of negativity from various people. Some have even said the graphics may be the worst to date on the DS.

I am always left wondering what these people are thinking. The graphics are superb! Sure, they may not be pushing the limits of the DS’s capabilities, but the graphics are very colorful and the designs remind me of many of the animation styles we’ve been seeing on Saturday morning cartoons over recent years.

The 3D model gallery of the monsters shows them off in all their glory in a consistent 360 degree rotation! Be sure to visit this gallery as you unlock more kaiju!

The level designs are really colorful and detailed as well. You encounter a flooded Tokyo, a snowy Sydney, and Monster Island to name a few. They are nicely rendered.

The boss battles are really fun and the different battle tactics each foe brings to the plate keeps you alert and always looking for any weakness to exploit. Some of your villians take up the entire bottom screen (Jet Jaguar and Ebirah) while Biollante takes up both screens! I found it a bit funny that in the level involving Titanosaurus and Ebirah, that Ebirah was larger and the final boss of that level. It’s a bit weird, but really nice as I feel Ebirah has never gotten the respect he deserves. The battles can be a bit frustrating, but after you play one, you are hooked!

What’s also cool is that every time you start a new game, the game randomizes which levels you play. You never continuously play the same levels at the same points in the game. A really nice touch to spice the game up!

A downside to the game is the inability to save your story mode progress. If you quit, you start all over again. Unlike Godzilla Domination, the story mode on this game is quite a bit longer, which is all good and welcomed; but with the lack of a save ability, that’s a real downer.

While there are a couple of other modes to play on single player mode (Survival mode for example), the game, like Godzilla Domination, likes replayability. The story mode is fun enough to go through a few times through with different kaiju, but after that, you may not find yourself going back to it as often, despite the certain addictive qualities to it.

Godzilla DS is probably the best Godzilla portable game there is. Although some may disagree and say Godzilla Domination may be the better title, that’s okay. Both have tremendous pluses but also some minor setbacks. What one game doesn’t do well, the other one does.

Godzilla DS has a nice roster with fun, but repetitive, levels, exciting boss fights, and really nice graphics. The controls are not quite as intuitive as I would like them to be, they are manageable. The only real downsides to the game are a lack of a save feature for story mode and other single player modes to play in.

Overall, any Godzilla fan that has a DS needs to pick this title up! It’s really fun and neat!