Kameo: Elements of Power Retrospective and Review (Part 2 - Narrative and Gameplay)
Simplistic and typical of fantasy tropes is how I would describe the story of Kameo. Kameo is a princess whom has just inherited greatness granted to her by the Element of Power, a mystical artefact capable of gifting those who wield it with the ability to transform into powerful elemental warriors. However, Kameo’s aptly named sister, Kalus, betrayed their family and resurrected the Troll King Thorn, whom had been petrified long ago by King Solon, Kameo and Kalus’ father.
The ability to morph into these warriors is one of the core concepts of Kameo alongside world interactivity. Each of Kameo’s warriors are supposed to interact with their environment and their enemies in unique ways, and as I mentioned in the previous part of the retrospective, many Warriors were cut to maintain these principles. I can gladly say that these warriors do so, and a few examples before I go into the plot and narrative are: Chinchilla’s ability to climb ice walls, Major Ruin’s ability to move up ramps, Flex's long-reaching arms able to reach specific platforms, Snare can spit trolls towards environmental hazards ,and Ash is able to light fuses to detonate explosives, and many more. What’s more is that there is some synergy between the abilities of the warriors. For example, you can use 40-Below’s frost breath to freeze a troll which can then be completely shattered by charging into it using Major Ruin. However, synergy is limited to an extent as not many warriors are supported to work in conjunction and instead are designed to more so to work independently, which was quite disappointing.
The game opens with a reckless rescue attempt by Kameo to rescue her family from the clutches of the dynamic duo of Thorn and Kalus using what limited elemental warriors she has. After the opening cinematic, you are assaulted with cannonballs whilst climbing an ice-wall along Thorn’s castle using the warrior, Chinchilla. You are introduced to the 3 warriors Kameo immediately, a chilly gorilla (chinchilla), a boxing weed (Pummel Weed), and a rolly boi (Major Ruin). The tutorial is handled very appropriately as you are introduced to the applications both in combat and in traversal of the level individually. For example, right off the bat, you are using Chinchilla to climb ice walls, Pummel Weed to smack Trolls into oblivion, and Major Ruin to move up conveniently placed ramps. Further on throughout the level, more advanced techniques of your warriors are introduced to you for practice. For example, Pummel Weed’s creeping ability, or exploiting the physics engine as Major Ruin to take out trolls with the environment. Environmental interactivity is a pillar of Kameo’s gameplay and is present throughout all levels of the game; knocking trolls into lava, into explosives, and off the map are all examples of how the environment can be brought into effect in combat.
At the end of the opening, you are greeted with your first boss. A giant armoured troll awakens to guard the doorway to room wherein Kameo’s family lies. Honestly, they needed a better troll. It can be easily dispensed by either interacting with the environment, dropping a chandelier on its head, or using the standard method of uppercutting him in his exposed jaw and shoving a ridiculous number of icicles into his chin to knock him out cold. Permanently. Pushing forward through the door, a cutscene plays showing Kalus torturing her family, and upon realising what she is doing, Kameo rushes forward, only to realise that Thorn, King of the Trolls, is towering behind her. He smacks Kameo across the room slamming her against a pillar causing her to lose her warriors somehow. Kameo herself is only just saved.
As Kameo lost her warriors, a narrative device known as ‘Lost Power’ has been used. Lost Power is designed to provide a psychological incentive to continue playing by providing with some of, or all of, the powers you can obtain throughout the game at the beginning. Kameo only has limited power at the beginning in the form of 3 un-upgraded warriors out of 10. In doing so, it provides players with a small taste of the power and gameplay that they can hope to experience and leaves them wanting to continue playing so that they can see what else the game has to offer. However, had you been given all of the warriors from the get-go, it would not have been nearly as impactful. This is because the contrast in power-scaling after the opener would have been jarring and the player is left waiting to reach the point at which they can regain their full power, and if they find out that there were no upgrades beyond that, even worse. Thankfully, this is not the case, and you don’t even receive those warriors you previously had in order, so players are always excited to see what warrior is next to retrieve.
After the failed rescue and Kameo is almost killed at the hands of Thorn, she is saved by the Royal advisor, the ever-so trustworthy Mystic, and returned to her home in the Enchanted Kingdom. She provides you with your main quest throughout the game; save the elemental warriors reduced to their sprite forms from the Shadow Trolls and rescue your family. But first, a misplaced tutorial to prove yourself to Ortho, a wizard contained in the Wotnot book. The Wotnot book provides the wielder with the ability to harness the full power of the elemental warriors (as well as DLC and bonuses). During Kameo’s brash rescue, the Wotnot was still being prepared after some elusive accident which is never brought up in the story again, explaining why she stormed the castle without it. Now, she must prove herself worthy by going through a basic tutorial of moving and looking around. Very odd placement since you were doing all that and more at an evil castle not 5 minutes ago. Regardless, you prove yourself and are given the Wotnot. Now, the first warrior, your recently lost boxing friend, Pummel Weed is in the Enchanted Kingdom and being held by a Shadow Troll.
The Shadow Trolls are the bosses holding the elemental sprites, and to defeat them, you must find their respective wells providing the entrance to the Shadow realm in which they reside. Usually, you must first solve a simple puzzle/riddle to unlock the entrance to the well using your previously attained warriors, but for the first well, there are no trials and tribulations, you merely hop into the well and face off against the Shadow Troll. Whilst it is the first encounter with a Shadow Troll, it is far to easy. Shadow Trolls can only be killed firing the soul energy obtained by flip-kicking the lost souls also found in the realm. In this first encounter, there are next to no mechanics and all it takes is one blast of soul energy for the dramatic and ceremonial music to blare and for you to be rewarded with Pummel Weed. It leaves a lot to be desired. As for the later trolls, they do thankfully get progressively harder; requiring more soul blasts to kill and demonstrating more attacks against you. For example, shockwaves, streams of bats, and giant spikes are all attacks you will have to be aware of when fighting these later Shadow Trolls. Some of these attacks are telegraphed very well and keep you on your toes as you try to avoid them and positin yourself to blast the Troll to kingdom come. However, some of the others are not telegraphed as well because the Shadow Troll’s animations are responsible for these ,which are heavily obscured by the bat ‘particles’ and the dark contrast of the arena. Concerning the puzzles locking the entrance to the wells, these are never difficult and require little cognitive ability, making me ponder as to what the point even was at to them being there other than to give the illusion of being tested of your abiltiies. Nevertheless, the Shadow Trolls can be fun bosses, but I think they are overdone. Some of the sprites should’ve been trapped with other Trolls, like maybe a ‘light troll’ or something of the sort to mix things up.
The sprites and your family members are located in and near the various villages found throughout the world. First, to reach them, you must traverse the war-torn badlands; where legions of Trolls and Elfin Soldiers battle it out until the war is won. Within the Badlands, the narrative events that happen are implemented in a way that is entirely harmful to the story’s pacing. The Elemental Shrines that protect the Enchanted Kingdom are placed under siege during various stages of the narrative. They are placed to occur when you are either on your way to a new village, or for the last siege, whilst you are in a village about to rescue a sprite, forcing you to retreat back to the badlands. These ‘pace-breakers’ could’ve easily been rectified had Kameo been given info something was happening in the badlands, then the siege occuring after you’ve rescued a family member, and the Mystic informing you where to go following the siege rather than before. Therefore, the sieges don’t feel as if they are interrupting the narrative of Kameo’s quest.
As for the villages you can reach through the badlands, there are 3 of them, and whilst they don’t serve any particular plot purpose, they do add some nice flavour to the world and reflect the nature theme of the game. These villages are:
Ancient Forest Glade for Plants - This autumnal forest is home to a botanical people with a penchant for pumpkin farming, making them very good neighbours for Halloween. At the Ancient forest, you can find the warrior Rubble and (in the late game) Thermite, as well as the Ancient Forest Temple.
Rocky Falls for Water - Pristine beaches and luminescent waters can be found throughout this small tropical paradise. The falls are home to a cephlapod like people that look as if they spawned from one of H.P Lovecraft’s nicer dreams. You can find Major Ruin and Deep Blue within the falls, as well as the water temple.
Snow-Point Village for Ice - Lastly, the village in the mountains. Constructed atop a great tree, Snow-Point village is mostly vertical in design and requires extensive use of your elemental warriors, such as Major Ruin, Chinchilla, Flex, and 40-below to traverse around. Flex and 40-Below can be found here, as well as the Ice Temple.
I’ve seen arguments expressing annoyance towards exploration in Kameo as there is little emphasis or incentive to do so, and I am inclined to agree to an extent. In the badlands, it often feels very spare in areas that you can explore with no means of allowing your warriors to interact with the world. No shredders, no ice-walls, nothing. Nor can you interact with the various set pieces found within the area, which makes the war in the badlands feel entirely superficial. However, the same does not apply to the villages.
Within the villages, you can find ‘puzzles’ found all throughout the areas each requiring a different warrior to use. The rewards being the likes of fruit, skins, and crystal eyes, as I mentioned in the previous part of the retrospective. Also, some puzzles will require warriors from later in the game, so its good to return to some areas and see what you can uncover
Each village also plays home to an elemental temple. These temples were constructed ages ago to hold ancient elemental demons capable of extracting the warriors from their hosts. Thus, within these temples, you will find Kameo’s relatives.
The temples, whilst reminiscent of the Legend of Zelda temples, they are so in name only. Whilst there are very few puzzles, it instead has you utilising what warriors you have recently acquired to their full extent in terms of both combat and world interactivity. For the Forest Temple, you will have acquired Pummel Weed and Rubble and you will be using them and all of their abilities. To even enter the temple glade, you have to use Rubble’s Gravel blast ability on the weird cyclopean guardian trees (of which I wish there was an official backstory too). Throughout the glade, there are various environmental traps, such as hanging vines and spike traps, that can be exploited by both Rubble and Pummel Weed to both impale the trolls as well as leave them hanging. I should also mention that through ought every Temple, you are introduced to a couple more enemy types for you to deal with. In the case of the forest glade, it’s Ranger Trolls and Shield Wall trolls. The former can be dealt with however you please, but know that their AI is programmed to get away from you and stay behind cover, which is surprisingly advanced considering that this is mainly considered a kid’s adventure game from 2005. As for the latter, you will first have to stun them with Rubble’s ‘chip’ ability and then give him a good jab in the face to take ‘em out. Traversing throughout the temple glade is where the disappointment comes in. You have to rescue villagers from cages by chucking a bit of Rubble into the mouth of the statue holding the cage, and had this been the solution for just the first rescue, I would be fine, but it isn’t. It’s the same solution another two times. It requires zero cognitive, perceptive, nor combat skill. Had there been some progression in difficulty within any one of these areas, then I would be content, but there isn’t, and this is an issue throughout the game. Every ‘puzzle’ introduced I would consider an insult to the word due to their lack of difficulty. Once a villager is free, they will summon an explosive plant shell for Pummel Weed to launch into a gate to progress through the glade until you reach the Temple and confront the Demon within.
The first Elemental Demon you are faced with is Old Ma’Wood, an ancient and malevolent oak tree with dental issues. He is a relatively simple boss and the method to defeat him will seem very familiar. Launch explosive shells into him and chip rocks into his mouth to give him a killer stomach ache. Watch out for the Trolls and tremors he summons though. Defeating Ma’Wood requires using the exact same skills you learnt throughout the level, except this time, you need to watch out for being damaged. My issues arise with this boss when concerning how little damage this boss does when he hits you. It’s so insignifcant that it’s more of an annoyance than a worry when your health drops a bit. The trolls that he summons are a greater threat than the boss itself at times. Nevertheless, I do think that’s it’s a decent boss, but needs some tweaking in terms of difficulty. Once you have turned the Demon into kindling, Kameo’s Uncle Halis is rescued and you are both returned to the Ancient Forest Glade. He thanks you for your efforts and grants you with another warrior; Ash, a flightless red dragon capable of turning trolls into his namesake.
Next up, you are informed that Kameo’s aunt, Lenya, is trapped within the water temple with the Demon, Corallis. Rocky Falls is the next destination on the map, but not before being rudely interrupted by the first elemental shrine siege. Once dealt with, and you arrive in Rocky Falls, the entrance to the village is blocked and there appears to be an explosive weed waiting to be lit. Ash’s fiery breath can be used to detonate the plant. As only Ash can unblock the way, this does demonstrate that player choice is limited in terms of how you want to approach the narrative. Personally, I do have some contrivance with not being able to choose which warriors I can go after next as opposed to be told which ones are next. However, I do understand that in doing so, it adds extra complexity on the level designers for ensuring that the principle of unique world interactivity is met within each area and feels ever-present in the narrative. Regardless, the village of Rocky falls is pristine with sandy beaches and gorgeous water. It’s here that you will be acquring Major Ruin and Deep Blue.
Major Ruin is the easiest to acquire and you only need to solve a simple riddle by lighting the torches with Ash to unlock the shadow well. Once you have Major Ruin, you can now ascend ramps to reach brand new areas, so make sure to look out for any of those throughout the other areas. Using Major Ruin to ascend the now unlocked gate to the Mountain Falls, you can now ascend to reach Deep Blue, whom is needed for underwater traversal in the Water Temple. Within the Mountain falls, you make full utilisation of both Major Ruin and Ash as they are the most useful in taking out the new plant trolls, rock trolls, and archer towers found throughout the level. Environmental interactivity is once again made incredibly useful as, other than turning the Rock trolls into soot, knock them over with Major ruin off cliffs, into explosives, or into rock grinders, is very satisfying. To progress through the level and ascend the falls, you need to light the torches with Ash to unlock the gates. These torches are a true test of perception as if I had a nickel for every time I walked straight past one, I would have two nickels, which isn’t much but its strange that it happened twice. I should also mention that there are these strange ‘crystal-ore’ minibosses which bear some resemblance to your warrior, Rubble, in their structure and abilities. Unfortunately, the ‘mini’ takes precedence over the ‘boss’ as they can easily be defeated by knocking one lit explosive weed into them. Their rocky corpse is then used to form a bridge up to the next section of the level. Once you reach the shadow well, solve the next mundane riddle, and free Deep Blue. Once you have acquired him, you are immediatly asked to practice using him underwater as the cave has flooded, which will come in handy when we enter the water temple.
Once we enter the water temple, the Dreaded water level begins, and it is just as bad as I remember. The underwater controls are awful. Holding LT to accelerate whilst directing yourself using the analog stick at the same time feels clunky and annoying. You simply don’t want to stop accelerating as otherwise, you’re a sitting fish for the torpedos, bombs, and harpoons being fired upon you by Trolls. Furthermore, as the camera determines what direction you move, trying to look around whilst moving is imppossible underwater, and as I just explained, no moving leaves you vulnerable. Progression through the level requires eliminating the troll boats and submarines to unlock access to a tower that can elevate the water level to point at which you can reach the interior of the temple. Once you have eliminated the trolls and entered the tower, you are presented with a new enemy type before you can bring up the water level; the fire trolls. These fire trolls can be extinguished using deep blue and then finished off with any warrior that isn’t Ash for obvious reasons. Upon reaching the interior of the temple, the time has come to free Lenya from the clasps of Corallis.
Corallis is a strange luminescent cerulean jellyfish creature with a pompadour. Arguably, this is one of the hardest fights in the game, mainly because of the translucency of the puddles throughout the arena as well as the speed of the Demon’s lightning beam. This lightning beam electrocutes all the puddles in its path which can deal lingering damage to you should you move over them, and as they are so difficult to see in contrast to the rest of the arena, they will be dealing substantial damage over time. Furthermore, should you be hit by the lightning beam, this can deal considerable damage that can kill you in 3 hits. To defeat Corallis, much Like Ma’Wood, you have to use your most recently acquired Warriors and the skills you used thus far to reach the boss. Use Major Ruin to launch an explosive weed into the Demon’s face and blast the lightning orbs with Deep Blue as it retreats underwater. Thankfully, this only need be done 3 times, so the fight can over rather quickly, but regardless, you still need to be careful. That lightning beam has a shockingly low cooldown.
Once that big stupid jellyfish has been deflated and destroyed, Lenya is free and she will reward you with a friendly ape, Chinchilla. Now you can climb ice walls and reach the Ice village. One of the biggest plot beats happens in the conversation between Kameo and Lenya as the latter reveals that Kameo was in fact adopted. She states that on the day King Solon disappeared, his elemental sprites returned to the Kingdom with a baby in tow, a baby that would become known as Kameo. The plot threads of Kameo’s origins and what exactly happened to Solon remain unresolved throughout the game and are left to speculation. I can only presume that they would have been resolved in the anticipated sequel. However, I would be remiss to mention what implications this has Kalus’ actions. Kalus knew Kameo was adopted and was not heir to the throne and the Element of Power, but yet she got it anyway. it’s frustrating that this was not made explicit in dialogue as it adds some much needed depth to Kalus’ character in the game itself, rather than external media; of which I will get back to towards the end of the story part of the retrospective.
This section has gotten long enough, and so, I will continue to discuss the narrative and gameplay in the next part. Thank you for reading thus far, and I hope you enjoy the next part.