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LAGOON Company: Kemco/Seika Released: December 1991 Genre: Action RPG Graphics: 6.5 Control: 4.5 Sound/Music: 7.0 Storyline: 7.0 Review by: Corbie Dillard ©2008 SUPER-NES.COM

RPG fans know the Super Nintendo sports a lot of terrific rpgs. Unfortunately, Lagoon isn't one of them. It has a lot of potential that's all but destroyed by it's horendous gameplay and severely lacking visuals. It's basically an rpg that has an enjoyable storyline, an above average soundtrack, but somewhere along the lines the gameplay just goes terribly wrong, and I mean wrong to the point of the game being nearly unplayable. But for those of you who are still considering purchasing this rpg with the mindset that I'm being too harsh on the game, read on. Most areas of Lagoon honestly look like they came from an 8-bit NES game. In fact there are very few places in the game that actually look like they belong on the Super NES and even those could have been better. Villages just have a terribly bland and uninspired look to them, but it's in the dungeons that you'll notice just how plain the graphics in Lagoon really are. With the Super Nintendo's serious graphical power, there's just no excuse for a 16-bit game to look so average and plain. I think what makes looking at the graphics in Lagoon even more painful is the simple fact that every once in awhile you'll encounter an area that actually looks good, but normally this is short-lived and it's right back to the seriously below average visuals that you'll come to despise if you manage to stick with this game for any extended length of time. Graphically, Lagoon is just way below average in almost every location in the game. There are very few good points to be found in Lagoon, but the soundtrack is actually not too bad. In fact, I enjoyed many of the tunes found earlier in the game. Maybe it's because some of the music reminds me a lot of the music found in the Ys series of games, or maybe it's just because a few tunes are actually fairly good. Either way it at least gives something positive to talk about with what is otherwise a fairly poor Super NES effort. The sound effects, although there aren't many, are about as inspiring as the graphics and add little to nothing to the overall audio quality of the game. I wish as much time was spent on the visuals as was spent on the actual music. One shining point of the decent music is that it might at least help you forget about how average the game looks. I will never understand how any playtester worth anything could have actually played this game and yet still allowed it to be released this way. I've played games with shabby play control, but this goes way beyond that. Your sword is so short that when you swing it at enemies, 9 times out of 10 you'll end up running into the enemy and take a few hits. It's about as frustrating an occurance as I've ever encountered in any video game I've ever played. It makes doing any type of combat, especially with the stronger boss characters, a living nightmare. Trust me, you're gonna spend some serious time at the beginning of the game trying with all your might to stay alive long enough to level up your character. You'll die, and you'll die often. This annoying gameplay is also not complimented in any way with any type of innovation in the gameplay department. It's just standard hack and slash, or I should say, try to hack but get slashed, gameplay. What could have at least been a decent rpg is totally and thoroughly ruined by pitiful gameplay complimented by even worse hit detection. It's almost painful just to play this game. Any potential that Lagoon might have had with the storyline and soundtrack are quickly decimated by the inexcusable play control. Unless you just thrive on frustration, or will play absolutely any rpg made, then do yourself a favor and stay as far away from Lagoon as you can. I somehow managed to stay with this game long enough to beat it, but after playing it again for this review after 5 years, I now remember just how annoying this game really is. The best word I can use to sum up Lagoon is dissapointing.