Tak: The Great Juju Challenge Preview

E3 Preview 2005

Good action/adventuring is hard to come by these days. Sony’s got their leaders, but if you want something else, or if you don’t have a PSP or a PS2, you’re usually out of luck.

THQ turned our bad luck around with Tak and the Power of Juju. It was a fun, easy-to-learn, difficult-to-master action/adventure that felt very inspired. You could practically feel the Mario 64 influence flowing through it, as well as Jak & Daxter. Tak had interesting worlds and strangely appealing characters. The controls were rock-solid, the graphics were better than most, and while the worlds were fairly straightforward, they were also very unique.

Tak: The Great Juju Challenge is potentially his best journey yet. The graphics and character animation are absolutely stellar. Facial expressions are being animated by hand, not with a computer program, giving players the best and most beautiful effects possible. Each character has its own shadow that follows its every move. These are standard among the higher-quality console games, but you wouldn’t believe how many games there were at E3 that did not include these effects.

Tak and Lok are the two playable characters in this game. With a co-op mode now in place, you and a friend can take on the evil tribes together. Some of the strategies will be time based, so if your friends are slow, kindly remind them that if they don’t pick up the pace, you won’t invite them over to play next time. 

The Shamans are getting an upgrade, adding new ways to customize your characters. New spells and special abilities are being added to all four versions of the game, while the Nintendo DS version will feature exclusive touch screen and microphone capabilities. Does this mean we’ll finally get the chance to joke with the Jujus or talk trash to the tribes? Time will tell.