On paper, Aqua seems like an enticing prospect. With its appealing, comic book cutscenes telling the story of a kingdom under threat, and one captain (with one intelligent female engineer as a sidekick) who can turn the tide of war, all wrapped up in a crazy, steampunk, or "Neo-Victorian" world, if you'd believe the developers, the game certainly seemed original, if nothing less. With submarines popping up all over the place that looked suspiciously like the Nautilus of 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea fame, while huge towering contructions of riveted iron and, well, steam dotted the landscape, dwarfing your pitiful little boat, Aqua certainly had us interested - but sadly, it hasn't quite done enough to live up to the lofty expectations we had.
The cutscenes at least look nice, even if they are only illustrating a flat story.
Firstly, the story we were promised is a little bit flat. Voiced by actors that are cheesier than a pair of socks from Father Jack's underpants hamper, its next to impossible to actually feel interested in any of the characters, as the story's rather confusing, and the characters often just end up sounding ridiculous. On a more positive note, it does mean the game often ends up being legitimately funny, even if it is obviously unintentional. In fact, the aformentioned female engineer, named Polly Edison (yes, everyone's named after olden day inventors) is practically the only exception to the rule, as she's the only character who actually shows any, well, character - but when your game's epic story's voiced by characters who seem to pronounce the name of the bad guys around a hundred different ways (is "Gothean" pronounced Go-fee-ann, Gof-ee-ann, or Go-fean?), it's hard to really get involved in the story.
But put the disappointing story aside, and what you're left with is a fairly straightforward, and entertaining dual analogue shooter. Using the left stick to move your little boat, and the right stick to aim your various weapons, you basically have to navigate the various straits and channels, firing at the enemies, whilst being sure not to get hit yourself. Colliding with cliffs and other structures won't do you any damage, so, at least here the game's fairly forgiving, but it's a shame more hasn't been done to make the game stay that way throughout. But we'll get to that later.
You'll be up against overwhelming odds throughout the entireity of the campaign. Luckily, that little boat can take a beating.
Of course, if the whole game were simply driving around blowing stuff up, it'd get boring pretty quickly, but thankfully Aqua does have some variety. As the game takes place at sea, you'll be attacked by a variety of units, and each of these will make use of the big blue wet thing in different ways. From the logical - submarines which dive underwater, where they can only be hit by torpedos, to the somewhat more illogical - strange bio-boats, that seem to explode when you sink them, causing a weird green oil slick that'll damage your ship if you get too close.
And it's not just the enemies that show variety, either, as the missions themselves (thankfully) involve more than just blowing up countless waves of bad guys. There's a fair amount of exploring to be done, and blasting your way through the giant icebergs of one of the game's levels, to find hidden passages, and the game's hidden collectibles and upgrades is certainly an entertaining distraction.
The levels are fairly easy to navigate, so you'll rarely find yourself feeling lost. It's just a shame the checkpoints aren't more forgiving.
But the problem is, there are one too many times that Aqua really feels like it's working against you. The checkpoints are either far too far apart, or non-existent for some levels, and when you've got to defend a fleet, or an outpost against wave after wave of enemy attack (the game's bread and butter - but also one of the most frustrating game ideas out there), only to have whatever you're looking after die when you've only got two seconds left on the clock, three times in a row, you start to wonder why you're bothering - or why the difficulty couldn't just realise you're rubbish and throw less enemies at you.
With a bit more exploration, fairer checkpoints, and a better story tying things together, Aqua could have been a lot better. That's not to say it's bad at the moment - far from it, but it's one of those games that it's difficult to come to a conclusion about, because you can see all the elements that could have made it great, you can see all the effort that's been put into each part, but sadly, it's missing that something that holds it all together. Still, for 800 points, or £6.80, you can't go far wrong.
Format Reviewed: Xbox 360
