The final chapter of the Dot Hack series has now arrived. We're going to take a look at this final chapter as well as the whole series. There's not much else to say other then let's just dive in. By now for those that are reading this review, you should be familiar with this game or series. If you're new to the series then please read the Hack Infection review.
STORY
Preparing for final battle.
Phase 7: Tarvos
Since this is the last chapter in the four part story, let's recap what the whole story is about. Somewhere in the distant future in the land of Japan, online gaming has entered a new age where players can virtually enter an rpg game to explore dungeons, trade with other players, and fight bosses. One of the biggest of these online rpg games is a game called, "The World". Here at the beginning of the story, we are introduce to the main character, a player by the name of Kite. Kite is playing "The World" for the first time with his friend Orca. During Kite's first trip inside a dungeon, Orca and Kite ran into a mysterious girl called, Aura. Immediately after their encounter with Aura, the duo was attacked by what appears to be a virus infected being called Skeith. The preceding battle left Orca in a coma in real life outside of the game. Immediately after that, news of other coma victims from the game started to surface in the news. Kite feeling loyalty to his friend, Orca, has decided to re-enter "The World", to find out more on what could possibly be the cause of the comas that has been happening to various members around the country. What follows is another encounter with Aura who left him a bracelet that will allow him to Data Drain infected virus monsters and curing them of any infection, meeting with other players that share his common goals, and players that have the same burden of having a love one in a coma. In the four chapters ahead, we are witnesses to an unfolding story where Kite and his friend race against time and across different servers to save the game, "The World", from being brought down due to a virus infection. That should sum up the plot for the whole story. Let's look at the last chapter.
Chapter 4 starts off where Chapter 3 left off. Phase 5 Gorre has been defeated and you are preparing for the coming counter attack from the Cursed Wave, the cause of the infections in the server, for the last battle. Of course preparing for the last fight isn't as easy as it seems as Kite and his friends soon found out that the Cursed Wave has a mind of its own. The team came up with a plan in which they will guide the Cursed Wave into an area that they will choose to fight where the advantage is toward them and where the Cursed Wave can't escape. However the plan didn't come together as they had hoped as outside forces such as Cubia, Aura, and Phase 6 interfered with their strategy. But no matter what sort of interference may pop up, the end battle with the Cursed Wave is sure to come. Quarantine story is pretty much all about the last battle. These so called interferences that pop up during the story is nothing more than mini sub-plots to help extend the story a little bit more before the end battle. At this point late in the storyline, there's not much development in the progress in the story since we are near its end other than the Elk and Mia sub plot that need to be resolve. And it wasn't really resolved to the best conclusion. The story still fails to show the reason or reasons behind their strong relationship and what importance Mia has to the overall storyline. You will need to look outside the games for a source to those answers. That's pretty much the underline of the whole four part story.
By the end of it all, I wasn't too satisfied with the whole Hack storyline. I guess the problem was that it was too confusing for me to follow. And you're looking at a grown adult here. The problem lies in the fact that the story itself doesn't really bother to reach out to the gaming audience out there that don't follow the Hack anime series or DVD series. The Hack game story plays a very important part in the whole Hack universe. As much as how the game story is an important part of the Hack universe, it's only a part of that universe and not the whole part. For one to fully grasp and understand the whole storyline, you have to follow the anime and DVD series to get the overall Hack story. And that's the sad thing. You have no idea just how much you have missed out on from the whole story since the game story only tell a small fraction of the story unless you can get info on someone that's totally into the whole Hack universe to fill you in on the missing pieces. Unfortunately I'm not into the whole Hack universe so the game storyline didn't grab me at all. The Hack game series is really for Hack fans and not for rpg fans. Well maybe Hack fans that are rpg fans.
Score 7/10
CHARACTERS
Friends help one another.
No new introduction of characters in this game. And I have to say it's about time. Previously, every single new Hack game would introduce a new set of characters. That's surprising since each game doesn't take the time to really develop any of the new characters that it introduces or at the least, the players playing these characters. There are a total of 19 characters in this game. By now you should know who they are. The characters that are consider important and vital to the story are Kite (main character), BlackRose (Kite's partner), Helba (the famous hacker), Lios (the system administrator), Balmung (a famous player), and Wiseman (a player with knowledge of the Epitaph of Twilight). In terms of character development, there's not much here as before. The game pretty much tend to focus on the players inside the game and the characters they portray in that virtual world called, "The World". But in terms of the players themselves, we still don't know much about them and who they are. This kind of information is left in small bits and pieces in interaction between the players during e-mail conversation. And due to the lack of not knowing much about these characters, it's hard to form an opinion on whether or not you like a character cause there's so little that you don't know about them. You're left to deciding which character you like the best base on their look, class, and online personalities. That may be okay for 13 year old out there but for those of us who are older gamers; we prefer to like a character base on their depth. But too bad these characters don't have much depth to them. Bottom line: too many characters and just not enough development.
Score: 6/10
GRAPHICS
The Player Killer
At this point, you can expect the same type of graphics as in the previous games. If there were any brushing up to help improve it a little since the release of Hack Outbreak then you won't notice it at all. You're on a new different server in the game, but it's still the same design overall. Dungeons look the same. So do the fields. In game character designs still look like the way they do before. 3-D figures look like they were carve out of wood. There are not much details or attention to details when designing the close up of the character faces. The background of course is done in a 3-D polygon texture. However the overall sceneries aren't very good in terms of designing it to the point where every single background looks smooth and rich. You're not going to be awing or wowing at the settings in this game that's for sure. Part of it can be due to the fact that the color used in this game does not compliment this game very well. It comes off either as too dark, too red, or too green. It's not a very rich design where the colors are shown off in this game. The colors may very well make the game look worst then it should. The CG movies used in the game aren't too bad but fall short in comparison to those used in other more heavily branded rpgs like the Final Fantasy games. Still I think the movies sequence is what keeps this game graphics from falling totally off the charts. Graphics are kind of stuck between good and average.
Score: 7/10
MUSIC
You hear anything?
By now the music of the entire series is revealed. You are looking at over 50 different tunes and sound from this game. That's quite a lot of variety in tunes. However to be perfectly honest, most of them don't really stand out too much. The music is pretty much broken into three different categories, Fields, Dungeons, and Servers themes. There are a few character themes but the game music really focus on those three categories. I have to admit that some of the dungeons and fields music are pretty good. Not earth shattering but enough for you to enjoy while you are traveling through those areas. But the music itself lacks an identity where it can stand alone outside of the game. There are some games like say the Final Fantasy series where you want to listen to certain tunes featured in the game even when you aren't playing the game anymore because the music is so good. This is where the Hack series lack. None of the musical tunes are that good that you would want to listen to it outside of playing the game. The music doesn't grab you and get a hold of you. It's there for you to enjoy but not to the point where you can't play the game without it. And that's where we are left at when finishing this series.
Score: 6/10
GAMEPLAY
Cubia must fall or all is lost.
Prepare to be Data Drain.
Game Information
Genre: Action Rpg
Publisher: Bandai
Disc:1 DVD Disc
Memory:683 KB
Players: 1 Player Mode
Vibration:Yes
Dual Analog:Yes
Rating: Teen
Release:January 2004
What's different in the gameplay? Nothing at all. If you're memory is fresh then just jump right in and start playing Quarantine. And even if it's not fresh then you shouldn't have any problems remember how the game is played once you get in the motion of things. Here are the key features of Quarantine. All Hack fans should be pretty much familiar with by now.
Data Drain: Data Draining is a concept created for the Hack games where you are require to data drain an infected monster with a virus bug into a lower level monster so you can kill it. Infected monsters cannot be killed at all without data draining it. Each new Hack game introduces a new type of Data Drain. In the case of Quarantine, we are introduced to the final form of Data Drain called Drain Heart. This gives you the ability to Data Drain multiple enemies at once with a high probability of getting a rare item back. Gate Hacking: In order for you to access certain restricted areas, you are require to gate hack into them. Each restricted area have a set number of virus cores that you are require to input in order to properly hack them. Not a really easy tacks when you are missing some virus cores and have to search for monsters and dungeons in order to acquire the virus cores that you need and the right amount of virus cores to boot. Virus Cores: The key essential components that you will need to gate hack. Without virus cores, you can't gate hack at all. Virus Cores comes in different types of alphabet cores, from A to L. There are two ways in getting virus cores, inside a dungeon or from data draining a monster. Data draining a monster will be the main way for you in getting various virus cores. Of course finding the right monster that contains the virus cores that you need is the main problem in getting virus cores. Infection Level: Kite, himself is infected with a virus. Each time he uses Data Drain, a small percentage of his infection level goes up. The infection level is done through different degrees of colors. Blue for low infection and Red for high infection. If his infection level reaches red then it's game over. So try to balance out using Data Drain. Servers: Unlike other rpgs, this game doesn't use towns, villages, or cities. It uses servers as your towns. Each game introduces us to a new server. In the case of Quarantine, we are introduced to the last and final server called Omega. Like before, Omega consists of one area where you can walk around and shop, trade, and save your game. You can still access and move to other servers as well. Keywords: Now there are two things to note. To explore a dungeon, you will need to open up a field. This is done by entering various different keywords at the gate. The game itself will provide the keywords for you to use in order to advance the storyline so you don't have to worry about figuring out which keywords to use. However to explore non storyline random areas then you can input any different types of keywords you want. Each keyword will affect the environment of the fields, the level of difficulty of the fields, and of course the monsters in the fields. Desktop: Since this game is base on an online rpg, you have a virtual desktop to play around with. You can access e-mails from your party members, get news around the internet, message boards, and even desktop themes for your virtual desktop before logging into "The World" to play. It's a nice little thing to have to make the game look like a real online rpg game. Dungeons: Dungeons are nothing more than a maze. Each dungeon various with a set number of floors and each dungeon items. The goal in the dungeon is simple, make it to the bottom to get a story event going, or fight a boss, or collect the treasures in the gott statue. Pretty simple stuff. Battle System: The battle system is action base with party members. You have 100% free controls of Kite in terms of attacking and using skills, and magic. But for your other two members, you will have to assign them duties on how you want them to fight. At that point, the CPU takes over the reign and controls them the best it can. And I have to say that the CPU does a pretty good job in controlling them. I have no complaint there. This is a fast action pace battle system and once you get the hang of assigning the right actions for your party members to be doing, the battles can be pretty fun. I have no complaint about it. The battle system is very similar to the Tales of Destiny games from the Playstation.
The Hack games are pretty unique in their own way. It's set up like an online game but it really isn't an online game. I generally like the battle system. But the other stuff I'm not too fond off. I'm not a big dungeon crawling fan and this game is pretty much a dungeon crawling game. The virus cores are okay but can really be annoying when you have to search around and look for the various different kinds of virus cores. It's different; I'll give it points for that. But sometimes certain people like me don't like different. I prefer the more traditional approach where an rpg is heavily story base with a quest around the world in different towns. And this rpg game is not it. If you're into dungeon crawling rpg game then this game might hit the spot. If not then you best look somewhere else as the gameplay is all about dungeon crawling in the end.
Score: 7/10
EXTRAS/REPLAY
Item Completion Champion!
Extras feature in this game is pretty much the same as the previous all three games. There is some added stuff however and the returning extra stuff is bigger than before. What's back? First the return of the goblin challenge. By now there's not much challenge in the goblin challenges as you should be familiar with ways on defeating the goblins. Defeat each type of goblin and get the goblin equipment. Once you get them all you can then summon the biggest and baddest goblin in battle, not really great mind you. Completions of the Ryu Books are back. Complete each of the criteria set for each book to unlock movies, audios, and images for your Hack desktop in the game. Raising new grunties are also back. The game introduces two new grunties in this game. With grunties comes Flag Racing as well. But the main extra comes from after finishing the game. You will have access to some of the characters feature in Hack Sign as playable characters. Extra bonus dungeon is also available after finishing the game. But that's the case in previous games but this time around, the bonus dungeon is bigger and much harder. A new quest that becomes available is the Item Completion quest. Basically you need to collect over 600 items. Completion of these items will allow you to unlock more movies and Images. That's over 30 hours of the most painful boring gameplay there. Only the strong will want to truly finish the item quest. That should sum up the extras. As for the replay… well the game doesn't really end. It's more or less you can continue to play the game after finishing the storyline game. So basically the game doesn't really end, just the story. Not too shabby.
Score: 9/10
In terms of this game, Quarantine, it's a lot bigger then the other three previous games. It can even be said better but that's not by much seeing as all three previous games are the same. If you enjoy the previous games then I don't see why you won't enjoy this game. If you don't like the first Hack games or the games following Infection then you probably won't be going near this game. In terms of the overall Dot Hack series, I have to say that the series isn't anything special. I have to say that at first I expected the Hack series to be special simply cause of my own expectation in terms of the hype that this is a series that's being release in four parts. Normally and traditionally, games that have potential to become a series don't normally get release in various parts as planned ahead before the first game. After all it's always the sale figure of the first game before a decision is made on doing a sequel for a game. One can't simply gamble ahead and assume that a game will sell well. However when looking at the Dot Hack series, it's not so much as a series but more or less one big game that was chopped up into four different parts, which is why you don't see any real change from one game after another, unlike true game sequels where you see improvements on both the graphics and the gameplay. The problem I see is that I'm not so sure if the whole series warrant paying full prices for each of the four parts, especially with the fact that there aren't any real improvements from one game after the next. I think it would have been better to bundle the four games as a collection package and charge consumers by half of what the four games would cost individually. Who knows? Maybe Bandai plan on doing that in the future. But for now as the series go, it's an okay series but nothing that would make it special that you would say that this can be a classic series in the coming years.
Final Score: 7/10
Time to complete: 80+ hours (including Item Quest)
