BlueSmoke - Review : Black & White : Creature Isle

		Date	: Apr 9th, 2002
		Genre	: Strategy
		Developer	: Lionhead Studios
		Author	: Jin-Ning Tioh

After successfully defeating the evil god Nemesis in one of last year's most intriguing, most talked about games, this year sees the return of gamers to the mystical world of miracles and giant creatures in Black & White : Creature Isle. As no doubt you've heard, reactions from both the press and gamers towards Black & White have been far from unanimous. Just as many gamers have been put off by the bizarre combination of elements and strategy as those impressed by the distinctive theme and artificial intelligence. Black & White is a creative and unusual game, and if nothing else, Creature Isle is no cut-and-dried level pack either. Instead, the expansion junks the tedious micro-management necessary to challenge rival gods and focuses mainly on one of the best aspects of the original Black & White - Creatures. For the uninitiated, each god has a creature who learns from your examples and often mimics them. If you decide to be evil and maliciously throw or fry your worshippers, your creature will learn from your example. If you often heal and help your worshippers in their daily lives, your creature will soon begin doing the same. The sophisticated behavioral artificial intelligence makes it both fascinating and possible for players to discipline and teach miracles to their creature. So dig in, and find out more about the mysterious Creature Isle...

All this takes place on several lone islands populated by three tribes, dozens of inhabitants, and of course, the Brotherhood. The Brotherhood is an exclusive club of godless creatures, led by an ancient and wise crocodile known as Mercurio, as well as his assistant Rufus, a kindly lion. After a band of your faithful singing missionaries crash near a village on these islands, both you and your creature are summoned to these lone islands when the local inhabitants begin praying to you. Once there, you will soon discover the dojo of the Brotherhood. After an account of the Brotherhood's founding by Rufus, your creature will be informed that in order to join the Brotherhood, he must first complete a series of trials set by each of the Brotherhood's members. Another reason to complete the trials and join the Brotherhood is to impress and perhaps mate with Eve, a female creature under Mercurio's care. Eve is a tad shy and plenty picky - Your creature only gets to meet her after you complete all the trials and defeat Mercurio in single combat.

Perhaps the most noticeable thing in Creature Isle is the lack of rival gods. The original Black & White often centered on a strategic game in which you, as a god, had to battle against other rival gods by vying for the belief of the world's mortal inhabitants. Although the strategic game was truly inspired, it had a couple of problems - A great deal of micromanagement was necessary to maintain villages and a fruitless game of tug-of-war often occurred when the belief of a village was in contention between two or more gods. Fortunately, the archipelago where the expansion pack takes place is a land devoid of gods other than yourself. Players are free to explore the land at their own leisure, for better or for worse.

So instead, the focus in the expansion is on your creature. In order to join the Brotherhood, a band of godless creatures, your creature must first complete all the trials set by the members of the Brotherhood. These trials are pretty diverse, ranging from racing against a crafty tortoise to playing hide-and-seek with an invisible wolf. However, not all the trials are available at the start of the game, but as you continue to complete the many crafty trials, more of them will appear. All in all, most of the trials are both entertaining and challenging. To say the least, the variety of trials will have you eager to complete each trial just to see what's next. An especially funny trial involves a giant zebra, a ballista, a mule-headed man and some herbs scattered around the island. As the herbs are located in locations inaccessible by foot, it will be your joy to launch the mule-headed man from the ballista at the general location of each of the herbs. Enjoy!

Not too long into the game, the villagers will request your help in hatching a giant egg. After tossing it into a hot volcanic basin, the egg soon hatches, and out pops a small, yellow and furry bundle of joy. In other words, a young baby chicken named Tyke. Although Tyke is relatively small compared to your creature, he still stands many times taller than a villager. It falls to your creature to train Tyke, much the same way that you trained your creature - With a little help from the head of the village, vital statistics in the creature room and a useful nursery of course.

Rearing Tyke is a fascinating process in itself, and possibly one of the most challenging aspects of Creature Isle, as players are only able to affect Tyke's training indirectly. Teach your creature to help and care for the villagers, and it's likely your creature will teach Tyke the same thing. Tyke is a bright creature - He'll learn miracles and other skills much faster than your creature ever did. You'll see Tyke frequently gazing up at your creature, looking for approval after performing something. In turn, your creature will teach Tyke the tricks of the trade, from dancing to entertain villagers to casting miracles. Your creature will also sometimes "discipline" Tyke if he has done something wrong. The AI involved in getting your creature to become a parent is a wonderful yet sometimes scary thing to watch. Pretty soon, both your creature and Tyke will learn to perform all sorts of miracles, even eventually learning to build buildings for the villagers.

In addition to the usual assortment of creatures, which includes cows, bears, tigers and lions, several new creatures are featured in Creature Isle - A chicken, a rhino and a crocodile. As you complete each creature's trial, that creature becomes available at the Dojo, located at the center of the island close to your temple. Once there, your creature can either challenge that particular creature to a duel or switch your creature's body type to that creature's body type. It's a nice, new feature, allowing players to conveniently change to the creature of your choice or engage in a good old fashioned melee. Also, switching creatures is now at least, thankfully less troublesome and frustrating.

The three years of development on the original Black & White did not go wasted. Even after nearly a year, Black & White still looks as gorgeous as ever. Zoom in to see your individual villagers' faces or zoom all the way out until your island is just a small spot in the vast ocean. From any distance, the game looks great. The colorful, attractive and well-rendered environments are still a real pleasure to behold. Creatures still look incredibly lifelike, with a vast array of different facial expressions. The completely mouse-driven yet hidden interface is also great. And of course, several new creatures have been included, such as a chicken, a rhino and a crocodile. If you liked all the eye-candy in the original Black & White, you'll like what you see now.

Like the graphics, both the music and sound effects found within Creature Isle is still great. Important creature fights also have a cool music track to help set the mood. The ambient music switches with your alignment, and never overwhelms the sound effects. A few new tracks can also be heard during cinematic cut-scenes. The sound effects in turn, are still great. Villagers will still sing, applaud, dance or worship you. Also, all the speech in Creature Isle is new, including voices for your conscience, members of the Brotherhood as well as other characters found throughout the game.

The removal of the tedious micro-management and rival gods, as well as the focus on your creature and later his young apprentice Tyke certainly puts a whole new spin on this expansion. Players who enjoyed training and disciplining their creature in the original Black & White will more than likely take an immediate liking to Creature Isle. And with the dozens of mini-games and the indirect training of Tyke, players will have their hands full even without rival gods. All in all, an original and fresh concept with tons of entertaining trials and great sounds and visuals. Go to this Creature Isle you must!