Review written by Jason Surguine

[Editor's note:  The Nutcracker, along with source code, is now completely free and available to download from Jacco's website.  Early versions of The Nutcracker 2 were previewed several years ago, but sadly Jacco chose not to continue development.]

The Nutcracker was a complete and total thrill ride from the beginning to the end. Probably the most ambitious title for the PPC platform so far, this game pulls out all the stops. The game has incredible graphics (and sound effects), great gameplay, a decent story, and even a great musical score to top it all off.

The story is pretty basic: there is a bomb in the building and a remote controlled machine (controlled by you) has been sent in to disarm the bomb. Of course, something goes wrong and the story expands from there. Nothing ground breaking, yet not too lame. Perfect for this type of game.

The gameplay is an overhead action game, with the element of stealth being important, similar to Konami's Metal Gear series. You venture through several complexes, trying not to get caught by the security bots or cameras. You pick up key items and weapons along the way, and you even get to fight some really cool bosses.

The graphics are some of the best on the PPC to date, especially when viewing some of the cool graphical effects that Phantom (a.k.a. Jacco Bikker) has implemented (e.g. the layer of fog in the sewers). However, many of the graphics throughout the game are very isometric looking and bland. At the same time, some scenes (especially the bosses) and items in the background (e.g. the air duct fans) look astounding, and make you wonder why the entire game wasn't done at that quality. I understand that this was a one-man job (aside from the music), but it couldn't have taken that much more effort to either hire another artist, or spend a bit more time on the mundane objects and backgrounds. Aside from that, though, the graphics and animations are phenomenal.

The play control of the game was so well implemented, it took me about two to three seconds to get the hang of it. I especially like the simple option of being able to map all of the buttons to whatever key you desire. The stylus control is okay, but I would highly recommend that you not use it if possible. It seems too awkward; use the d-pad instead. Even on the iPAQ, it shouldn't be a problem as I can't recall one time where I had to shoot and move at the same time in this game. Which brings me to my other complaint.

The play control of the Nutcracker vehicle is solid, but painfully slow at times, especially when compared to the pace of the game (which is super fast). It would have been nice to have an option to speed up all of the animations in the game. I just wanted to run sometimes, like in Metal Gear, but instead I felt like I was crawling. Still, the actual mechanics of the movements work well.

This is the first Pocket PC game ever to impress me in the sound department. The game's sound effects are top notch, and there is enough variety so that they never get too annoying. The music in the game is the second game to have actual music that doesn't repeat after two measures, the first being Turjah II. The difference is, the music is actually nice to listen to most of the time, and there is more than a few songs (six full songs, if I counted correctly). My main gripe with the music is that some tunes do tend to get on your nerves after a while (especially that 12-tone run of circus sounding music). Besides that, it's outstanding - great job on the sound!

Now the game as a whole was a little on the short side. The first time through, I beat the game in about an hour and thirty minutes. However, playing the entire way through the game, was a complete blast from beginning to end. I wouldn't mind spending that collective hour and a half (or less) again, playing through a second or third time. But wait... there’s more?

That's right kids, there are tons of extra hidden goodies in this game that gives it an actual replay value, which most PPC games lack these days. At the end of the game, you are given a final score, which is based on your performance in the game. This is determined by the time it took you to finish, the number of shots you fired, the number of times you were spotted, the number of secrets found and the number of times that you saved the game (during that run through).

The secrets are super cool. I don't want to give anything away, but I can guarantee that they add a lot of things to the game that I hadn't even thought of my first time through. You'll be happy when you find them. :) As you can imagine, this adds tons of replay value to the game and also inserts the element of competition into the game. I wonder if there are plans for a high score list/competition?

In summary, all I can say is wow. This is the first Pocket PC game to truly impress me on many levels. I believe, in my opinion, that this is the first true game for the PPC and that this has set a precedent for all other games to follow. Hopefully, this will start an oncoming trend of top-notch games to come out.
 

Pros:

• Some of the best graphics for the PPC to date.

• The best game sound track to date.

• Fast paced game and storyline.

• Incredible replay value.

• Solid overall game.

Cons:

• Some very bland graphics mixed in with the good visuals.

• Character movement is slow.

• A bit too short; I would've liked at least another 30 minutes of story.

Overall Score: 9/10

Many thanks to Jacco Bikker for providing us with our review copy.

You may wish to search for more reviews of games from Jacco Bikker. Alternatively, you can view all the reviews written by Jason Surguine.