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Fat Princess Beta Impressions



Fat Princess (PSN) boxart.bmp
Platform: PS3  
Category: Action Games

This past week I had the opportunity to give the Fat Princess Beta on the PlayStation Network a spin. Developed by Titan Studios, and published by Sony Computer Entertainment, Fat Princess does not try to be politically correct or hold back in the blood department. Instead you get a game where part of the objective is to feed a princess that you have taken hostage as many cakes as possible in order to fatten her up. Rescuing her becomes a much more daunting task the bigger she becomes. This seems so wrong in so many ways but at the same time I have to admit it is an enjoyable game.

The Fat Princess Beta is primarily a multiplayer game and although it does have a single player practice mode of sorts, it was clearly intended for the online arena. Fat Princess puts you on a team consisting of up to 32-male and female cartoonish-like characters where the main goal is to rescue your princess who is being held captive by the opposing team. For the beta a couple of online modes are available including Team Deathmatch and Capture the Princess and one map was playable, Black Forrest. My understanding at this time is that the full version will apparently include in the neighborhood of 10 maps.

When you first jump into a game the setting appears chaotic with little characters running around everywhere. It took me sometime before I got my bearings straight and I actually figured out what was going on, but eventually I started to get the hang of things. When a game starts each of the teams will already have the other teams princess held hostage. She is usually held inside your castle-like structure behind some gates that run up and down. As I indicated at the top, feeding your princess yummy looking cakes keeps her plump. Keep feeding her and she basically becomes a somewhat pleasant looking ‘Jabba the Hut’; however, rescuing the Princess becomes more difficult the bigger she gets. Sometime it takes more than one player to rescue the princess depending on her size. Think of a Capture the Flag like match with much more strategy. That is what you get in Fat Princess.

Getting to the princess is not an easy task. As you can imagine, 32-player multiplayer games can get a little crazy. For the first few games, every time I stepped even near the enemy castle I would be quickly taken out. But killing the enemy is lots of fun especially with the different types of abilities available at your disposal.

One of the most intriguing elements to the game is the five mechanical machines which are placed throughout your own team’s castle. These act like hat making machines which pump out hats one after the other. Each hat represents a different abilities that your character can perform. Each of the available hats has their own class assigned to it. The five classes include: the mage, priest, warrior, worker and ranger. You start out as a villager but once you grab a hat and you transform into one of the character classes.

The Warrior starts out with a sword and shield, the Ranger a bow and arrow, the Mage a fireball casting spell and the Priest has the ability to heal teammates. The Worker can gather resources by chopping down trees as well as mine ore to carry back to the castle or an outpost. Using resources allows you to build your castles defenses and upgrade your hat machine to give your player some much needed stopping power. You are not stuck with one class either as all you need to do is pick up another hat to change classes. The class system certainly keeps the game fresh and emphasizes team work. I should also mention, there are some additional advanced moves at your disposal in the game.

Visually Fat Princess is decent looking. I have to be honest and tell you that I went in thinking this was a game for the younger crowd, especially given the title. Yet, once I stepped onto the battlefield and engaged in some player combat I quickly realized this was a title for more mature audiences as there is literally blood everywhere. The games environments are colorful and bright as well. Overall, it is a good looking game. The game did suffer from some clipping issues; however a bit more time in the shop to fix the glitches should take care of some of these issues. As for the sound, nothing is incredibly original or innovative but the game did sound good in 5.1 surround sound.

Overall my time with the Fat Princess Beta was enjoyable experience. It is a deeper multiplayer game than I expected as all the classes play a critical role in the outcome. Playing on the one map did get old in a hurry but as for gameplay mechanics and strategy, Fat Princess delivers. As we publish this preview I did not have a price for the game yet; however if this falls in the $10.00 to $15.00 range there is no question Fat Princess would be a solid buy with approximately 10 different maps from the get go. For those that love large multiplayer games with many elements of strategy, Fat Princess is likely a game for you.

- Trevor H











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