Review #798: CIMA - The Enemy

 This game is the enemy of all mankind.

 CIMA: The Enemy looks pretty cool, I mean, just look at the game's cover, or search for footage or screenshots, and this game looks like a pretty decent JRPG, even the game's back-cover calls it an RPG. But it isn't. This game is a lemmings ripoff, a route coordinator simulator, a do the Macarena game if you will. You don't level up, you don't make choices and you don't save the world, you just set routes for people to follow. This is not an RPG, but this is one of the worst games I've ever played on the system. And the cherry on top? It's one of the GBA's uncommon games, often fetching undeservedly high prices.

 The game pits you as Ark, a 'Gate Guardian' that fights CIMA, human-looking villains that live off the despair of humans. While en route to their base on a train, the entire vehicle gets transported into a CIMA realm, and now Ark and Ivy, his partner, must reunite all 14 civilians and get them out of the CIMA dungeon. The game is 13 excruciating hours long, probably more if you decide to farm for items on previous dungeons. Every 'dungeon', of which there are about 15 or 16 is more or less the same, following the same exact formula: An introductory floor, you meet a civilian, and must rescue him or her on the next floor, then the party gets separated and you play a short bit as another civilian, then you play as Ark again and reunite the party, and it's usually on one of these segments that you find the key to the boss' door, and if you don't, tough luck, go up the dungeon until you find it. If you ask me, they were pretty hard to miss, I only missed the key on the first dungeon since I actually didn't know it was something I had to find, but I had no trouble afterwards.

 The gameplay is so bad because the entire game is an escort mission for an ever growing amount of idiots. Ark slashes with his sword with the A button, although other playable civilians have different weapons, as well as a charge attack. Each character has their own inventory, even the characters you don't get to play as, as well as a 5 item B-button item palette. NPCs, as well as playable characters that you aren't playing as at the moment, will automatically use this items if needed, while when characters are under your direct control you need to press B to access them. Heck, during boss fights you can't access your inventory, so these 5 items is all you get.

 Civilians can be freely allocated between four groups of up to four persons, although there are only 14 civilians, so one or two groups will be missing people. The L button is to swap between groups, because you can only issue orders by one group at a time, and the R button is used to set their walking routes, with up to three different 'stops'. You can either direct the entire group or issue commands one by one. Most of the time you'll be issuing commands to the entire group, but there are a lot of puzzles that involve pressure plates, so you might need to find the correct amount of people needed to step on a switch while other characters, or yourself, do something through a bridge said pressure plate activates. There are also two kid characters that are the only characters that can walk on brittle bridges.

 Some characters have special abilities. Emerle can heal anyone's poison if they stand next to her for a short while, and, supposedly, the Priest makes it so that enemies don't get close to him.... which is a bold faced lie, since enemies went after him and his group anyways. Also, most characters can't defend themselves, so try to put each group with at least one characters that can fight back. Not that that helps, because they are useless and they will get hurt anyways. Heck, a few puzzles are impossible to complete without getting someone hurt, which is completely stupid. Particularly because there's a garbage affinity system at play. As you slay enemies from endless enemy generators they may drop any of four gems which can then be used to craft consumable items. But only characters that "like" you will let you craft items. Every time they get hurt you'll lose affinity points, while if you kill an enemy close to them they MAY get a few affinity points. Oh, and most characters start off hating you. Truth be told, you only need Emerle and her husband to like you, since they can craft potions, but still. Even though characters may sometimes NEED to take damage to clear a puzzle, the affinity system is broken because you can just stick all civilians next to an enemy generator and pummel enemies ad-infinitum until they like you. I hate this game. Oh! And if ANYBODY dies it's game over, no ifs or buts.

 So, let me tell you how the game works. You move a group of people to a spot, and while they slowly make their way there, you spam the A button on top of the enemy generator/s that is/are on their way. Once they finally get to where you need them, now you press L and pick another group and do the exact same thing. Then the third group. Then the fourth. Initially it's not too bad, but every dungeon adds a new civilian, so the process becomes slower and slower. It's an incredibly boring game. Oh, and be careful with diagonals, characters love getting stuck on those, so you might need to alter their route on the fly. It sucks when you have to send NPCs through routes you can't access, because enemies WILL spawn, and even if these characters can fight back, they will still get hurt because they suck, and it will cost you affinity points because screw you. Speaking on that, sometimes you might not get a pressure-plate puzzle to open a door, but instead you have to defeat a number of enemies.... and they spawn out of thin air. It's very possible, and annoyingly common, that they will appear right on top of you, costing you a few health points, because that's how this poorly made game rolls. Oh, and sometimes you'll have to defeat an X amount of enemy generator enemies in order to proceed. The game doesn't change the music or give you any hint that this is what you need to do, you'll be aimlessly walking around, searching for a switch while battling endless enemies until the jingle sounds and the the way opens up. One time near the end of the game I was stuck for the longest time and I didn't know what I was supposed to..... turns out I had to hit an enemy into a pit. Maybe the game had other puzzles like this that I accidentally cleared, I've no idea, but it was so incredibly dumb and no hint to what the solution was.

 Oh, and I haven't started with Ivy yet. She's yet another handicap, but unlike the rest of the NPCs, she's always following you, occasionally shooting at enemies, but getting hit most of the time. Which, y'know, sucks a lot because if she dies you die and it's game over. The thing is.... she has trouble following you at times, so she might get stuck behind you, and while she's busy trying to walk through an invisible wall, she'll get hit by enemies endlessly spawning behind her. The parts with moving platforms are SO bad, because, as I implied, these platforms move, so if she gets stuck behind... she'll have no way to reach you anytime soon. And getting her on this platforms is SO finicky, if she doesn't get stuck trying to get on the bridge, you might not have walked far enough on the platform for her to hop on. And that's finicky as well, because if you move too far you may fall and lose health. IT'S SO DUMB!! This game is horrible, I can't understand how it got such decent reviews.

 And the bosses, oh god the bosses, each one has a very annoying pattern that is sure to kill you a few times. And the best part about it? You can't skip the lengthy cutscenes before each fight, so they are extra vexing. That said, bosses do get easier as you go down the later levels, not because you get stronger, not because you understand the game better, but because their patterns become fairer. It's like the developers slowly became better at designing fair bosses. But still, I wouldn't blame you if you dropped the game after the first boss. I had to had my hand held by a boss guide on the first 8-10 floors because having to endure the same cutscenes over and over again became intolerable.

 I have played a lot of bad games on the Gameboy Advance, I mean, just look at all the licensed games I've played this year, but CIMA: The Enemy is worse than most of them. The gameplay is SO slow and the mechanics are so poorly thought out and implemented that it won't be too soon if I never see this game again.
 2.0 out of 10