Review #204: Half-Minute Hero

 Time is money, yo!

 Half-Minute Hero is awesome. No, really. It's an affectionate parody of the RPG genre as a whole, parodying various Tropes and mechanics, condensing 30 hour games into 30 seconds. Kinda. It also contains a RTS(of sorts) sub-game, a shooter sub-game and a escort-mission sub-game. While it has that 30 second limit, there are ways to extend that limit, but stages last less than 5 minutes at most. It's a very interesting package, and makes the most of its gimmick without wearing it thin.

 The game takes place during 4 different centuries, beginning in Goddess Era 100 in which you play as Hero, who must defeat over 30 Evil Lords that have cast the Spell of Destruction that ends the world in 30 seconds. Hero gains the aid of the Goddess of Time, and together they travel together to stop the enemy that is teaching the Spell of Destruction to the Evil Lords. Goddess Era 200 has you playing as a beautiful Evil Lord, as he defeats the brainwashed humans and the one creating the tempering with the human minds. Goddess Era 300 stars a naive Princess that turns into a no-nonsense badass whenever she wields her crossbow, and must try to heal her father's illness. Lastly, there's Goddess Era 500, after two centuries of Darkness, it's up to the Knight and the Sage to resurrect the Hero and put an end to the darkness. The story is very tongue-in-cheek, as it makes fun of everything it can. There's a level that slowly turns into gameboy graphics, starring Evil Lord CATS who has 'set you up the bomb', if you know what they mean. Even at it's bleakest, the game is always trying to put a smile on the player's face, and it works, it's particularly effective if you enjoy RPGs and know what it's parodying, but even then, I think the humor would work on anyone.

 Hero30: This is the game's centerpiece, it's the most in-depth and longest game. For instance, the other modes have 30 stages(or 'quests'), this one has alternate routes for a total of 50, there's even alternate endings! While the other modes would take, at most, an hour and a half to complete, Hero30 can easily take up, as a whole, more than 5 hours of your time. As Hero, you walk around an overworld, usually, filled with random encounters, which play out automatically with the hero running towards the enemies, dealing and taking damage, and winning a fight earns you XP and money. Towns may have equipment pieces on sale, as well as healing herbs or on-the-spot healing food. 30 seconds is too little time, most of the time, to grind for experience, get better equipment, solve the quest's puzzle and slay the Evil Lord, which is why the Goddess of Time will rewind time, for a small fee that increases as the more you use her services, if you find any of her statues in towns.
 You start each 'Quest' in level 1, a side effect of the Time Goddess using time in your favor to hasten the grind, but you keep the equipment you bought on previous quests. That said, you can't use equipment earned in later stages while replaying old ones. Each quest is more than just slaying monsters until you are strong enough to defeat the Boss, stages usually have some kind of issue or gimmick, there's a stage that has no monsters, for example, or another one in which you must find a hammer so that a bridge can be rebuilt. As previously mentioned, depending on what you do, you may open up alternate routes depending on how you finish a stage. All in all, it's extremely fun to play, it's very simple and requires little of the player, but it's very engaging. The only blemish on this game is an alternate stage that requires killing 108 Evil Bosses in order to play... which means grinding the stage you can beat the fastest, even if you go around each route, you'll only end up with 50+ bosses defeated on your first time through the game. A better alternative would've been requiring you to earn both titles in every stage, since these titles are virtually useless, and it would've been a good incentive to replay levels in different ways to earn them.

 Evil Lord30: This is the game I cared for the least. As the Beautiful Evil Lord, you must summon monsters to defeat humans. The game follows a rock-paper-scissors system when it comes to battles. This time around, the Goddess will take up all the money you're carrying in order to rewind time, so you can pay her as little as 10G. The thing is, whatever money you've got after finishing a level adds up, and it's then used to upgrade the Evil Lord, so you want to keep as much money as you can!
 The reason I didn't like it as much as the others, is that, while it is fast-paced as the others, it feels slower, mostly since you have to wait in order to summon the strongest monsters, which was a bit boring. It has the best soundtrack though!

 Princess30: This one is a blast. It's a bit of an on rail-shooter, as 30(notice a trend?) knights carry the arrow-shooting Princess to her goal, an item of sorts, and then back to the castle. The Princess has a 30 second curfew or her mother will shut the castle gates, so your objective is to have your knights go as fast as they can, while avoiding obstacles and killing enemies, since losing Knights means losing speed until other knights come and take their place. You can earn more time by walking over the Time Goddess' carpet, which will slowly spend your money for more seconds.

 Knight30: This one is a bit slow-paced, but it's fun. As the Knight, you have to protect the Sage so that he can cast the Spell of Destruction, which takes him 30 seconds, and destroy all enemies. The Knight is fairly incompetent, so while he can wield the weapons or objects throw on the ground, he can't kill the enemies, only dizzy them. Most of the time, your weapon will be your body, as you dash into enemies in order to slow them down. It's OK if you die, just walk your ghost back to the Sage, and he'll revive you!
 You can also carry the Sage in order to take it out of harm's way, or throw enemies into other enemies as well. Before each stage you are also allowed to take items with you to aid you in buying the Sage time.

 Hero300: Finishing the other four modes opens up Hero300. As it takes place in Goddess Era 500, the Time Godess is gone, so five minutes is all you get. This one is pretty exciting and fun, it's like an extended version of Hero30, with everything that made it so good in the first place.

 Hero3: There's no story to this one, the Time Goddess just felt like challenging you, so you only have 3 seconds to save the world. Naturally, the Time Goddess is available in this mode, not that it will help much. The hardest mode in the game, it unlocks the Music Player, but it's a fitting end to the game!

 Half-Minute Hero employs a pseudo 16-bit look, sprites definitely have as much, if not more, colors as most SNES games, but they aren't as detailed as, say, Final Fantasy IV sprites. It's also done on purpose to make fun of RPG character designs, just look at the official art(Which is unlockable in-game) and compare the intricate character designs with the simple sprites! Even then, the characters manage to be impossibly charming, and everything single piece of equipment is reflected on the Hero's sprite, which is pretty darn neat. The Soundtrack is a bit small, but it sounds pretty good, particularly the Evil Lord30 music, which features heavier-sounding tunes.

 Half-Minute Hero is a phenomenal game, and an excellent reason to own a PSP... or would've been. An updated re-remake is available on Steam, as well as its sequel, which was actually released on PSP too... only in Japan. Regardless, as a PSP game it's an excellent game that lends itself to playing on the go or during short breaks, and it brought me back to the 'Just one more stage' empty promises we all make ourselves when playing an addicting game.
 9.5 out of 10