Visuals / Audio
The visuals in Kameo are jaw dropping. Given that this was a launch title, it still makes present X360 games - one year onwards look tame and ancient. It has a very cartoonish feel to them, and they’re not cell shaded. The lighting and glorious use of colour enriches your surroundings making for a stunning game if you’re playing it on a large screen because the colours positively glow. The engine maintains a solid 60fps with zero, and I mean this - zero slowdown given some of the later scenes…
Rare have come up with an awesome engine that makes full use of the 360’s immense power. The sheer amount of enemies that are thrown on-screen at once in some places will make your jaw drop. The opening prologue level for example has Kameo climbing up a wall with Chilla to reach Thorn’s castle, once you reach the top kill the trolls there and then just look upwards at the sky for an incredible sight. The sky is filled with hundreds of flying dragons, bats and fiery projectiles being spewed out by nearby ground based catapults. Later on you’ll traverse the Badlands and actually stumble into the Elves vs Trolls war. This is like something out of Lord of The Rings: Return of the King. At one point there are literally thousands of trolls and elves waging a war against each other, and each troll is independently controlled too. Seeing this battle is a breathtaking sight and to be honest I was stunned for sometime.
Sections like the Elves vs Troll war just make you appreciate how much work Rare put into this title. They could have just ported over whatever code they had from the Nintendo GameCube, but it looks like they’ve started from scratch to harness the 360’s power. Graphics aren’t everything however, but the visuals help you get absorbed into this game by a great deal.
The detail is carried onto the Elemental Warriors. Ash for instance, leaving black steaming footprints behind as he traverses the icy kingdom. Chilla for example breathes out a cold mist in some levels. It just goes on. The detail and animations for your warriors and surroundings is of an extremely high standard
The audio just carries on where the visuals have left off. The beautiful background music is pleasing to the ears and the battle music during the Elves vs Troll war is memorable and so professionally done that it wouldn’t be out of place if used in Lord of The Rings itself. Rare succeeded for both audio and visual work here, and it’s impossible to fault any of these aspects on the game. To listen to a sample of the background track, listen to the latter section of Chapter 8 on the Story of Kameo website around 2mins 10secs from the start.