The Best, Most Unique Game You've Never Played
Phantom Dust is the best, most unique game you've never played.
OVERVIEW
So what is Phantom Dust?
Essentially, Majesco's Xbox exclusive title (backwards compatible with the Xbox 360) perfectly melds a card-turn-based game (think Magic: the Gathering) with a real-time action title.
There is a basic story to Phantom Dust. It's a post apocalyptic world where a mysterious dust has covered the surface o the earth. Humans now live underground in order to survive. When they surface, they can use different powers to battle each other, but only for 15 minutes at a time. Any longer, and your memories are wiped forever.
If that sounds forgetable, it's because it is. Here's all you need to know about Phantom Dust: It's a game where players face off in various arenas and the rules are Mad-Max-Beyond-Thunderdome simple - two men enter, one man leaves (okay, the title actually supports up to four player matches, but you get the gist. The last man standing wins).
Anyone who has ever played a third-person shooter will feel right at home with Phantom Dust's control scheme. But instead of guns, uzis and shotguns, your character faces off against other players by using various skills.
And therein lies the beauty of Phatom Dust. There are so many skills that no one game is ever the same. And because you can only "load" up to four skills at any given time (mapped to the face buttons on the controller - X,Y,A,B), smart players will always have a balanced mix of skills ever at the ready.
MAD SKILLS
So what kind of skills?
The offensive skills let you shoot lasers from your fingertips; rain rocks down on your opponent's head; call forth a laser sword to fell your foes; plant explosive mines; shoot fireballs; hurl ice and more.
And distance from your opponent matters. There are three levels of distance when it comes to your attacks - short, medium and long. Yes, you may be able to fire off a powerful laser that reaches your opponent all the way across the map. But if he or she loads up on up-close and personal skills, that long-distance attack of yours will do zero good.
Of course, defensive skills are just as varied. You can block attacks of course. But you can also turn some attacks back against your attacker; or strip them of their powers; or absorb their powers; or freeze their ability to cast anything for a few seconds.
While a healthy mix of offensive and defensive powers alone would make for interesting matches, Phantom Dust doesn't stop there.
In addition, the game introduces special player-centered skills (such as temporary levitation; health regeneration; super jump; burst of speed; etc); skills that change the wider environment (scrambling all skills on the board; removing all offensive or defensive skills available); and skills that tweak other skills just enough that they can quickly shift the outcome of a battle if played properly (I won't ruin any surprises for these).
With destructible environments and super powers, playing Phantom Dust gives the player a feeling of being in an epic-to-the-death superhero battle.
Well, sort of.
Recall the battle between Superman and General Zod in Superman II (if you've never seen the movie, imagine any superhero/supervillian battle. This is just my go to reference whenever in need of an epic superhero battle royale). Now imagine for a moment that both have significantly more superpowers than just flight and super strength. They can hurl bombs, call down meteor showers, blast an eight laser volley, send shadow dragons forth to hurt the other guy.
Got the idea? Good. Now that you have a sense of what each can do, imagine that both of these characters are not only incredibly manic but also cursed. Why? Because in the world of Phantom Dust, you certainly have superpowers but there are some you can only use once, some you can't use until you're more powerful, some you can only use under certain circumstance and some that are completely useless unless your opponent attacks in a certain way.
And since you can only have four skills loaded at any given time, sometimes you have to make the painful decision to forgo a wonderful attack skill to judiciously have a defensive skill on hand, lest you find yourself completely exposed.
CONCLUSION
The end result of this deeply layered and textured game is an incredible and utterly unique gaming experience. It's a must try for any gamer.
