by Danny Bivens
Here to help.
Buddy Mission Bond, the new IP for the Nintendo Switch developed by Koei Tecmo and published by Nintendo, has a demo available on the Japanese eShop right now that you can try out. As things stand right now, there is absolutely no English whatsoever, so if you don’t speak or read Japanese, you might have some issues. Don’t worry. We are here to help you at least get started on the right foot.
I’ll reiterate - Buddy Mission Bond has no English whatsoever as of the time of this writing [recording], so if you’re not familiar with Japanese, you will likely have a tough time with the game (or demo). This article is meant to help you get through some of the gameplay portions of the game/demo. This is NOT a complete step by step guide or translation by any means, but it should get you started so you can at least experience the game and have some fun.
Conversation Choices
Throughout the game (and given the adventure genre tag), Buddy Mission Bonds contains a lot of dialog, most of which is fully voiced. From time to time, you will have different dialog choices to make. These can have an effect on something called the “Hero Gauge” from time to time. For example, early on in episode 0, the main character Luke is given a handful of information via a police briefing. After he kind of spaces out for a minute, the speaker drills Luke to see if he has been paying attention. If you choose correctly here, you get a boost on your gauge. This isn’t the case with every dialog choice, but it will behoove you to pay attention to the highlighted red text and remember what has been said in conversations so you can get net yourself a better score at the end of the mission. There are times where you can also press the R button to bring up past conversations to help point you in the right direction if you’re forgetful.
Search Mode
There will be times when you have to analyze a picture or image for clues in Buddy Mission Bond. These images contain at least two or more items that you can select that will help you progress in the game. You do this by moving the cursor and pressing A on the targeted items. Once you’re finished, you simply need to press B. The game also does a little bit more to help you out. If you didn’t find all of the relevant clues, the game will prompt you to look a little bit harder before being able to exit out of the mode. At that point, all you need to do is press B to close the mode. Just taking a look at one of the first one of these in the game, all you need to do here is find these two items (which, in a nice touch, are highlighted once you hover the cursor over them), check out the information and then press B to continue on with the story.
Quick Time Events
Occasionally, you will have to be on point to make buttons presses in the game to perform some kind of action. These range from attacking thugs, shooting people to running down some criminals. The timing here is pretty forgiving, too, so even if you’re not fully paying attention, you’ll probably be able to make it past these segments.
Map
The map serves as a passageway to finding out valuable information to enable you to progress in the missions. Each map has a variety of different locations that you will need to visit to find out more about your investigations. Talking to the workers or others milling around these locations will net you some valuable clues that you need to successfully make it to your goal. You are limited on how many moves you can make on the map. With just one character, you can only make three moves, however, with two characters, you’ll be able to make up to six moves, even sometimes with more than on round of moves (for a total of twelve).
While traveling the map and talking to people, you’ll get information that will help you set up your plan for completing the mission. You have a list of goals for each of these choices that get ticked off every time you gather info. In the first mission, you need to formulate a plan to get into a building to rescue a kidnapped girl. There are two paths that can be taken, one that’s pretty direct but requires a key, and another that has you go straight in, but gives you an option of trying to shut off the power to get the element of surprise. The game is pretty free in the fact that you can choose which locations that you want to check out, each of which will move you toward one of the available paths.
Buddy Choice
Being called “Buddy Mission,” part of the draw of this game is to choose which character, or buddy, you want to take on the task at hand. This is used quite a bit while investigating areas on the map. In the early part of the game, for example, you’ll need to choose between Luke or Aaron. Some situations call for a more level headed way of decision making, so in these cases you would choose Luke. Other times, you’ll need someone who is a bit more crass, or someone to knock some heads in. In that case, the meat head Aaron will work perfectly. There doesn’t seem to be much of a penalty for choosing “wrong,” but it does effect your “Hero Gauge.” Choose wisely.
Direct Control
At certain points in the missions, you will be given direct control of one of the characters. The environments themselves are a bit small, but there are various points that can be interacted with and sometimes enemies that need to be taken out in order to progress. Exploration is encouraged here to some extent, and interactive elements are clearly highlighted to make things easier for the player. If you find yourself hitting a wall (figuratively), be sure to do a bit more exploring.
Conclusion
To fully enjoy Buddy Mission Bond, I think having some kind of base knowledge of the Japanese language is necessary. While i don’t recommend this game to those of you out there that don’t speak or read Japanese, hopefully these tips can at least help you make some progress in the demo or full version of the game. But what do you think? Are you enjoying the game? Did this video inspire you to check out the demo on the Japanese eShop to give Buddy Mission Bond a shot? Sound off in the comments below, we’d love to hear from you.
No comments:
Post a Comment