A wonderful,spiritual journey marred by frustrating controls.
For the most part,NiGHTS: Journey of Dreams plays like a flying game and there's a few 3D platforming levels but for the most part,it's a flying game(if such a genre exists).The flying gameplay elements involve flying around 3D environments(but you're on rails when you do so)and you'll need to perform tasks such as catching giant bird guardsmen who carry the keys you'll need to progress further,or flying through rings or collecting other items plus the occasional boss fight.The challenge of the game comes from trying to complete the levels and boss fights within a time limit.Even though the flying levels are on rails,you'll still need to avoid obsticles which will cost you a lot of time and you'll need to interact with certain objects in certain ways to be able to manuever through the levels.The bird guardsmen can move up and down and in some places left and right when you're trying to catch them and narrowly failing to catch them by the time you reach a certain area can cost you a lot of time because there's some places you cannot catch the guardsmen,but the clock will keep ticking.You can fly through rings to gain extra speed boosts which make it easier to catch the guardsmen.
The flying levels are simple for the most part,because you can learn how to fly through them efficiently and you'll have plenty of time to perform the tasks.However,if you lose to a boss just one time,you'll need to redo the previous level before the boss fight and it means redoing 5-10 minutes worth of work.The 3D platforming levels are simplistic and feel a bit tacked on to add variety.
The controls for the game can make what sounds like should be very enjoyable gameplay very frustrating because doing something as simple as steering your character in the direction you want to go from a side-on view is a lot harder and more awkward than it needs to be.The rings can be directly in front of you as you're flying up to them but you can easily miss them.The controls makes the boss fights a lot more difficult than they should be because you're fighting against the controls more than you're fighting against the boss.I used the remote and nunchuck control scheme,but people have said using the motion controls or classic controller option is even worse.
The boss fights do a decent job of adding variety to the gameplay,because there's a boss battle that requires you to fly around and bounce the boss across an arena and past obsticles and make the boss hit a certain object(as if your character is a flipper for a pinball machine and the boss is a pinball)and there's a boss battle that involves cartwheel kicking an enormous fish that's chasing you or removing the platform the boss is on by tilting the platform so round objects can roll into holes on the platform to destroy the platform or by smashing up the platform with objects while avoiding lava that's spurting at you from below or taking on a giant samurai in space head on while avoiding it's powerful energy attacks.
The story is hard to explain without giving away spoilers,but I'll say it involves people's dreams being played out in a fantasy place named 'dreamword' and dreamworld is made up of 2 places named 'Nightopia' and 'Nightmare'.The evil ruler of Nightmare named 'Wizeman' is planning to take over Nightopia and eventually the real world.2 kids from the real world named Will and Helen come into the story because after a series of events they end up in dreamworld and meet a friendly talking owl named 'wise owl' and he will introduce them to the purple skinned character who you'll use for most of the flying levels named 'Jester Dreams'.The 4 of them try to stop Wizeman from taking over Nightopia and eventually the real world.
The game has 2 emotional side-stories for Will and Helen.You can play through the story as Will or Helen and both of them have different individual stories,although the main story for the game stays the same.Will feels alone because his father is often away because he works in another city,and even though Will's story sounds simplistic,it's shown in a delicate and emotional way with beautiful scenes.Helen's story is about how she's become distant from her mother because she's often away from her mother and spending a lot of time practicing playing the violin because she wants to be a professional violinist.
The game is quite short,even if you play through the stories of both characters,but it could last you a while if you're not very good at the game(such as myself).For replay value,the game offers secret endings if you receive a certain ranking or above for all of the missions for both characters.
The graphics for the game can be stunning at times.There's beautiful,grassy hills with waterfails,beautiful flowers and flower petals floating through the air and mountains that you can fly though.As well as beautiful tropical areas with beautiful sand,palm trees,beautiful light blue water,waterfalls and details such as the vegetation and sea creatures that grow on rocks near the ocean or rockpools.There's also lite up city buildings combined with a fantasy style environment as well as areas that have a more crazy,evil atmosphere.The cutscenes can be stunning too as you'll see beautiful footage of the city with sunrise in the background and hazey,rainy or dreary atmospheres to suit the depressed state Will and Helen are in.
The music does a good job to suit the environments,whether you're in a tropical area or amongst peaceful looking grassy hills and the music can have a very innocent sound to it or have beautiful piano music playing and for some of the levels, the music suits the feeling of being in a dream world.The music can sound very spiritual at times while combining with an electronic sound and I love how it sounds.The music can have an evil more heavier sound when you're fighting some of the bosses.
Overall,this game is a wonderful experience that is let down a bit by it's controls.