It's no secret that the PS2 will indeed be the most powerful system ever; the Emotion Engine will produce the most unrivaled visuals to be ever witnessed. The 32MB of RAM is an enormous number, for a videogame console that is. But with all that, it makes you wonder if the PS2 ever be challenged by a videogame company or will there be whole left as the PS2 progresses further on in its life. Sony hopes to be the first publisher on line to challenge the PS2's technical power with their game Dark Cloud.

      Dark Cloud takes you out on journey of a young boy who is set to return a floating portion of land back to its place. In order to do that, he has to travel back and forth (into sky and on land) making allies and acquiring information. The game's main aspect is its feature that lets you edit the world you are in. You basically pause the game, the camera soars up about 75% and lets you see the world to change it around. When you finish editing the world, without any slight loading time the game immediately returns to the gameplay and you encounter the elements that were edited in real-time.

      Judging by what you may have read so far you can predict that Dark Cloud's environments will definitely be interactive. The gameplay factor can be mostly compared to the gameplay many witnessed in Zelda: Ocarina of Time. You don't have any allies to help you fight with, you don't fight in different dimensions or have complicated menus. Dark Cloud's gameplay should be inspiring as well as very stimulating for any gamer.

      Sony's first PS2 game will be a launch title meaning it will ship along with the console, which is March 4 in Japan. The game looks to be a top contender for best launch game and is also one of my most anticipated.

02/15/00  SolidSnake

Playstation 2

Scheduled release date:
March 4th, 2000

Publisher:
SCEA

Developer:
SCEA

Genre:
RPG/Adventure

Number of Players:
1