It’s October! And for me, that means only one thing: Halloween! Those who know me, know that I have a deep love for this holiday. There are many reasons why, but as this is a game critique, I won’t go into them here. But, seeing as it is October, I figured I’d do an analysis on Costume Quest, a delightful, yet flawed, little RPG from Double Fine Productions.
In Costume Quest you take on the role of one of two twins (Reynold and Wren) who are new in town and want to go trick or treating on Halloween. However, unbeknownst to them, their world has been invaded by candy craving monsters. Your choice of character starts out dressed as a cardboard robot. And of course, the twin that you don’t play as, is wearing a candy corn costume, which leads to them being kidnapped. For example, in my playthrough, I chose to play as Reynold, so Wren was kidnapped. Chasing after the monster that took her, Reynold is forced to face him in combat. Suddenly, Reynold transforms into the very thing he is dressed as (in this case, a giant robot that looks suspiciously like the Decepticon Shockwave, from Transformers) and fights the monster.
After disposing of the monster, the plot is revealed pretty quickly. You find out that a human witch, Dorsilla, is ordering the monsters to steal all the candy in the human world to give it to their ruler, “Cadaverous Big Bones” (a fat grim reaper with an aloha print robe, peppermint eyes, and a pixie stick scythe). And the only way you can chase after the monsters that stole Wren is to clear every house of candy (in other words, go door to door trick-or-treating). The trick behind trick-or-treating, however, is that you never know what might be on the other side of the door, an adult human that’s oblivious to what’s happening, and just happily gives you candy, or a monster lying in wait to attack you.
As far as gameplay goals go, that’s the game at it’s most basic level. On occasion, you’ll run into monsters, wandering around out in the open, but most will be hiding behind a door, waiting for you to come knocking.
Of course, you aren’t alone on this quest. Shortly after losing Wren, Reynold stumbles upon Everett, a nerdy, DnD obsessed kid wearing a knight costume. After helping him deal with the local bully, and explaining your situation, he joins you, saying, “You had me at “quest.” A little later on you meet Lucy, a girl obsessed with finding a scientific explanation of the appearance of these monsters. So, in summary, a new kid, a DnD kid, and a science kid…
There are three levels in the game, Auburn Pines (The kid’s home neighborhood, which is the very definition of suburbia. Plenty of kids roaming about including the local bully and his gang, the friendly cop, the mean principal that somehow knows every kid’s name, etc.), Autumn Haven Mall (Your basic indoor mall, which is holding a trick-or-treat event and a costume contest), and Fall Valley (An idyllic country town with a travelling carnival). The goal of the game is to “trick-or-treat” at each house (or store, in the Mall’s case) before the gate to the next area will open up.
Each area also has a number of sidequests to complete, giving the short game a little extra life for completionists. You can bob for apples in a minigame that has less than ideal controls. You can play hide and seek, which nets you a bigger candy pail to hold more candy (the game’s currency). You can collect trading cards (mostly by defeating enemies) and trade duplicates with certain kids to get special cards that you can’t obtain anywhere else. And you can explore the areas for secrets, finding extra candy and costume pieces to make new costumes.
Seeing as the game is called “Costume Quest,” you’d think costumes play a rather important role. In a way they do, but in other ways, they don’t. Costumes are critical to the game for a variety of reasons. Each costume plays differently in combat situations, as they each have one special move. The robot has a heavy AOE attack, the knight can block, the unicorn can heal/resurrect, etc. They also have varying stats, which play up the classes (the knight has a lot of health, the robot has high attack rating, and so on).
Some, but not all, of the costumes also have uses outside of combat, when exploring. The robot can use its roller skate shoes to move more quickly (which was invaluable), the ninja could stealth past enemies, the knight could use his shield to block falling overhead debris, and so on (I will say that the french fry costume’s environmental ability never fails to get me craving fries; whoever did the sound effects for that costume, kudos to you). All of these abilities usually were used to solve specific environmental puzzles. The problem though, was that I found little to no use for any of the costumes’ out of combat abilities, aside from being able to move faster with the robot. Once the puzzle was solved, I switched back to the robot costume, and continued on my way.
I wish I could say costumes played a more important role in combat, but the case was the same as in environmental situations. You start with the robot (dps), then you get Everett the knight (tank), and shortly after getting Lucy, you get the unicorn costume (healer). With those three, you can pretty much beat the game without issue. The dozen or so other costumes are purely filler. Even the costume you unlock at the very end of the game by collecting every single trading card, isn’t any better (or as good) as the robot costume that you get by default at the start of the game.
The combat, in and of itself, is also incredibly simplistic. You face off against no more than three enemies in any given fight. The enemies take one of three races (Grubbins, the goblin like basic grunt; Trowbog, the much larger monster; and Crestwailer, anthropomorphic crows), and one of three types (the basic fighter, the high damage low defense magic user, or the healer). Again, nothing more than the simplistic dps/tank/healer trope.
All fighting is turn based. You select an action (usually attack or special move), select an opponent, and then perform some menial quicktime event to see if you hit for more or less damage. Then the enemy attacks, and you press a random button in another quicktime event to block. I truly dislike QTE’s. I don’t know of anyone, personally, that does like them. And in this context, they’re even more dull.
What’s worse, is that the camera during combat is one of the most random things I’ve ever seen. It is constantly changing it’s angle and zoom during combat. And this is very, very detrimental to a player trying to time a proper QTE that is displayed on the screen. Couple this with the fact that the game can suffer from random frame rate issues at any given time, and you can have a very bad experience.
After combat is concluded (assuming you won, which is a safe bet), you are awarded candy, random trading cards, and XP (which is displayed by what looks to me like constantly refilling roll of Necco wafers. To quote American Dad’s Roger, disguised as Abigail Lemonparty, “Those people at Necco sure know how to make a disgusting candy.”)
Seeing as almost all combat is forced upon the player by way of door knocking, XP almost seemed like a pointless addition. Yes, you get more powerful and get more health with each level, but so do the monsters. And as there is little grinding possible in the game, XP almost seemed like something that wasn’t really needed. But I guess it’s good to actually see the progress as opposed to just assuming you’re progressing. Leveling up also unlocks more battle stamps, which is the one thing that can make combat slightly more interesting.
Throughout the game, you collect candy. Lots and lots of candy. The only use for that candy is to buy battle stamps from an entrepreneurial kid in a chicken costume named Sadie. Battle stamps apply one special bonus to a character of your choice (each character can only have one stamp at any time). These bonuses come in a wide variety. Some will increase attack power, some will give health each turn, some will give the character a second special attack, etc. These battle stamps gave the dull combat a smidgen of strategy and fun.
So far, I’ve been harping on this game pretty hard. And from a critical, mechanical perspective, I’ve every right to do so. The game is far from perfect. But all that said, I really do love this game. The game doesn’t shine from a gameplay perspective, but it does in its presentation, its aesthetic, its narrative, and its undeniable charm.
The game perfectly captures the child-like innocence and wonder of Halloween. The kids fulfill the ultimate childhood fantasy of actually becoming their costumes. Reynold is more concerned with losing out on getting candy, and being grounded for losing his sister, than he is about the fact that he’s fighting monsters. The game is full of clever writing and quirky charm. It still looks gorgeous to this day, making use of an art style that I can only describe as adorable. The environments are immersive. And the characters are fun, be they the playable characters, the invading monsters, or any of the dozens of npcs that you can interact with.
If you’re looking for a deep, engrossing, 50+ hour RPG, look elsewhere. But if you love Halloween, and are looking for a short, cute, mostly fun game to get you in the Halloween spirit, then Costume Quest is definitely worth playing.
BONUS ANALYSIS!!!
The fine, fine folks at Double Fine Productions (see what I did there?) made a DLC expansion for Costume Quest, called Grubbins on Ice. And I figured I’d critique it here.
Essentially, it’s just an extra level, an extra bit of narrative, and three more costumes. This time, Lucy gets kidnapped, and it’s up to Reynold, Everett, and Wren to save her, by going through a portal to the monsters’ home world of Repugia. Aside from the fact that there are now friendly and unfriendly monsters instead of humans and monsters, it plays pretty much the same as Costume Quest. So, if you want an analysis of the gameplay, see above.
Happy Halloween everybody!