Fun, unique, and diverse but it's lacking something quite a few things.
The game play is pretty much basic by jogging through quite-wide maps and using your Tokobots to get through obstacles. Timing is the key to surviving/getting through the game. You start with 6 Tokobots but as you progress, you get your hands on more. Also, you unlock new moves and transformations by beating bosses. The bosses are fun and interesting but their character design is quite plain. Some bosses, you just hit, others need a certain formation to damage them. There are 3 formations, which you could arrange your Tokobots to be in. Circle formations makes the Tokobots surround you. It also allows you to enables you to jump-and-stomp on buttons or enemies and use the Tokobots as a boost to jump into high places. The second formation is the V formation. Other than positioning in the shape of a letter “V”, they get in a row behind Bolt. In this formation, you could toss them onto magnets to swing, climb, and destroy obstacles in your way. The last is the U formation. Just like the V formation, they don’t form a “U”, but a line from side-to-side with Bolt. Using this, you could spin to glide through long jumps and “spin attack” enemies. To pull off the formation moves, you must joint together. With this, the Tokobots hold on to each other, including Bolt, and perform the moves. There is many more action, not formations, like pushing, pulling, lifting, stamping, etc. There are many frustrating times, which impatient people might notice very fast but you’ll eventually pass it. Like I said before, timing is the key to get through. Sounds a bit hard but there are save points almost every time you succeed in passing a difficult area.
You could also use combinations, combining your Tokobots to make vehicles that are needed to get through certain parts. There are some transformations that help you fight bosses and/or enemies. To use combinations, you need a certain amount of parts. You find the parts when you break boxes/jars or defeat enemies.
The loading times are very good for a game like this. You load once and never again which speeds the game up a bit.
The graphics are good but the environments looks like it’s lacking detail. You don’t see any gorgeous scenes but overall it’s enough to make you satisfied. The maps are wide and long with basic surroundings, which sometimes really look quite dull. The Tokobots are plain and simple but it gives them a unique style. The drawings of the characters look very nice though, once again; they look plain and a lack of detail. But the character has different facial expressions, which makes it a bit nicer and gives them more feeling. In the lab, the background is drawn out which looks pretty nice.
The sounds in the game are so-so. You’ll hear a lot of “Ya!” as Bolt uses the Tokobots. The background music is quite catchy but whenever a boss fight comes, it’s the same track, or at least sounds like it, every time. There aren’t any voices as the character’s talk but text that you read instead. The minor enemies have sounds that remind you of Super Mario 64. Pretty much the rest of the sounds are basic like the sounds of smashing boxes/jars, a “smacking” sound when you hit magnets or walls, and a “low pitch” pushing sound. It seems like they should have the basic sound but it doesn’t make the sound different from some other games.
Tokobot does have a new game mode, which I won’t spoil, once you beat the whole game. Other than that, there’s not really much you could do once your done with the game unless you enjoyed some of the puzzles, like the times where you need to train, which you want to replay.
Overall, Tokobot is an excellent game that performs greatly but may get frustrating at times. If there were a bit more features and things you could do, this game would be better. I would recommend it to anyone who has time on his or her hand enjoys wondering around and getting through obstacles, enjoys new stories, and cute little robots. For the only PSP game at $29.99, what more could you lose?