Cotton Fantasy

Last year, the Cotton series celebrated its 30th anniversary. Releasing a reboot of the original classic and ports of most of the other games (seriously – where’s Rainbow Cotton?) in the series, they capped it all off with the announcement of a new game: Cotton Rock ‘n’ Roll – or Cotton Fantasy over here in the west.

Will this be a worthy successor, or will tarnish a great series? 

Stay tuned and I’ll let you know witch (sorry).

Many thanks to the publishers for the review code. 

WITCH IN THE WILLOWS
Fairyland is in trouble: their delicious willows are disappearing and the Queen is at a loss with what to do. Oh-Baba, the wise hag, claims that the legends foretold of this day and that the Azure-Robed one would be the one who will fix things.

Silk, the small fairy with big … personality traits, seems rather miffed as she fears that Oh-Baba is referring to the insatiably hungry bratty witch known as Cotton. Alas, it seems to be true, so off Silk goes to ask for help – with the promise of a lifetime supply of willow (basically candy) to help tempt her. Naturally, Cotton agrees.

It’s a ridiculous story told in an over the top anime way that is equal parts endearing and obnoxious; oftentimes, cutscenes revolve around repeating the same joke repeatedly to underline how much of a spoilt child Cotton is and how much she loves to eat willows. I’m sure some people will love how over the top and nonsensically Japanese it all is, but I found myself tiring of the story rather quickly. What kept me watching, however, was the absolutely gorgeous visuals throughout. These cutscenes are really impressive – they did a great job with the aesthetics, and that alone makes them worth watching at least once. They can be skipped by holding the start button, and there’s even an option to remove them entirely should you desire (I did). It’s a nice touch for those that want to get straight into the action.

The narrative isn’t my biggest issue with the story, however. Despite having a vast array of characters to choose from, the story is told solely from Cotton’s perspective regardless of who you choose to be. It’s a little disappointing that things weren’t altered slightly to cater for the rest of the cast. I wasn’t expecting new storylines for each character, but having it changed a bit to acknowledge their existence would have been appreciated.

FANTASY NIGHT DREAMS
Story aside, the main focus is – and always has been – the gameplay with Cotton Fantasy. It plays as a horizontal shooter for the most part, with the base gameplay being slightly reminiscent of the original title – at least when it comes to the main protagonist – the titular Cotton.

Cotton has a standard shot, which can be fired manually or automatically – although the former needs to be used if you want to take advantage of your charge attack magic. Coloured crystals can be obtained to give your shots and magic an elemental typing; the powerful spreadshot gained from the fire typing is my favourite,  but each element has its own advantages depending on the situation you find yourself in. The power of the attacks can be levelled up by collecting yellow crystals, although that level will usually drop by one upon death – a much fairer trade when compared with the usual ‘lose everything’ approach of most games in the genre. The interesting twist is that shooting the crystals will change the colour, making it quite tricky to get the colours you want. It’s difficult to manage the magic crystals at first, but neither is it a real loss if you collect something you don’t want. Managing crystals is a skill that helps with game mastery, but novices probably won’t notice too much different. In addition to her magic, Cotton also has access to bombs that can transform both enemies and on-screen bullets into point bells. It deals hefty damage too, but the limited number at your disposal means that it serves far more use as a way to escape a sticky situation.

Cotton is only the tip of the iceberg, however, as the game as seven characters in total to play as (one of which is unlockable after beating the game once). Some of them only have minor differences, but others play quite differently. There are likely to be characters you’ll prefer over others, but it’s nice to see such a diverse cast that range from other characters in the series, to guest characters from other Success franchises. It’s important to note that there was an eighth character available as an Amazon preorder bonus in Japan, but I have been informed by the development team that it only acted as a Cotton palette swap, meaning that we aren’t missing out on that much. Regardless, hopefully they will be purchasable separately at a later date from the eshop, but that remains to be seen.

100% COTTON
The main thing that usually puts me off the genre, is that typically there is an over-reliance on bullet-hell mechanics that make the games seem slightly unfair to everyone except veterans. Thankfully, Cotton Fantasy is not like that – at least, not on the normal difficulty. Things start off relatively easy with the Castle Garden prologue stage: enemy numbers are low, and attacks are predictable and easy to avoid. Even the boss, a giant spider, has a simple attack pattern that can be easily avoided. It works well as a tutorial stage where you can play around with the tight responsive controls and  the magic system before the difficulty steps up a notch.

After the relaxing start, you’re given the option of five levels to choose from. Each are designated a letter to give you a general idea of difficulty, but some are certainly harder than others. These levels are tougher than the prologue, for sure, but they all seem fair too and you’ll rarely die from something that seems unavoidable. They all have their own theming, and some even offer a unique gimmick that distinguishes it from the rest. The Royal Tomb, for example, contains obstacles and areas that are almost puzzle-like as you destroy blocks to manipulate lasers. It’s a really charming stage, but also probably the toughest of the five. Completing two levels will throw you into a 3D bonus stage reminiscent of Panorama Cotton, where you need to collect point bonuses, and then you select three more levels before playing another bonus stage that takes you to the final couple of tough stages where things get really challenging.

Choosing the order of the levels seems mainly superficial at first, since your first playthrough has you playing through all five before you can progress; however, the genius of it becomes apparent after your first playthrough. Not only will you unlock the final character, but you’ll also unlock a new stage to play. The stage will depend on the character you beat the game with, as it will have some connection to the game they come from. For example, beating the game with Cotton will unlock a stage reminiscent of the original stage from the first game. Each of the main six characters has their own unlockable stage, meaning that you’ll eventually have eleven stages to choose from, making every subsequent playthrough potentially feel unique depending on what levels you want to play on that run. Almost every stage is really good too, so you’ll be eager to jump back into another playthrough just to check out what the next one has to offer.

EVERY WITCH WAY BUT LOOSE
The main thing that surprised me with the game was not how much fun it is (and it is very fun), but also how accessible it is too. It has infinite continues, sure, as it wants you to see the end – however, the difficulty options seem to be designed really well for all skill levels. Normal mode will be challenging for amateurs like myself, but things rarely get impossibly hectic. After spending a fair bit of time with the game, I feel like I could learn how to beat most of the levels without losing a life if I tried (in fact, I was able to do so with a couple!), but Extra mode features a crazy amount of stuff going on that will no doubt please genre veterans. Hard mode is comfortably somewhere in between, and I can see myself moving up to this difficulty once I feel like I’ve mastered normal. You can practice levels too in the practice mode, which has some other options to play around with to make things easier or harder for yourself.