Chulip Review

Locking lips has never been so deadly! Definitely not for everyone, the premise behind Chulip, as well as almost everything conceivable about this game is rather odd and, frankly quite disturbing. For those of us that like their games full of nonsense and with a blatant injection of Japanese quirkiness, Chulip hits you right in the kisser.



Story
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Not much to it, as a young boy who has just moved into town with his father, you have a dream concerning a particular girl. Lo and behold, this particular girl lives in the town you just moved into, and your goal is to kiss the girl of your dreams, literally!

However, things never work out so easily in real life, and the moment you attempt to kiss her, she repels you instantaneously with a slap. Okay, so you have to kiss her...and it has to be mutual. Thus, in order to build up to this goal, you must strengthen your heart by kissing almost everyone else within the town, as well as expressing your sincere love for the girl of your dreams through a love letter. The town's insane residents won't make this any easier, as many of them require just as much effort as it would take to kiss the girl of your dreams, and only through perseverance and hard work can you ever hope to reach your ultimate goal.



Gameplay
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Every morning, you wake up in your house and subsequently work your way around the town in an attempt to kiss it's eccentric residents to increase your heart total, which acts as your hp. It is important to note how Chulip is more of an adventure/puzzle game. Think Myst or D with a different kind of unsettling atmosphere.

Kissing residents almost always requires a series of events to be triggered beforehand, which is one of the reasons why it is not an easy game by a long shot. Many events are not intuitive or simply random links in the chain. For example, kissing a certain merchant requires you to sneak in after hours, where he gives you a vague clue about a long lost item that is in a highly unlikely and well hidden place. Retrieving said item nets you your kiss, although the hint he gives you is far from obvious.

Kissing underground residents is of varying difficulty, although this brings up another point. Chulip uses a gameplay mechanism of a clock that keeps track of what time of day it is. Approximately less than a minute in real life time equals one hour of game time (not on the same scale as Radiata Stories). Thus, this may prove to be either too fast or too slow for different people's tastes. A lot of the underground residents surface at unhealthy hours of the night such as 2 am, and only stick around for a couple of hours at best. As a result, you aren't getting your kiss unless you wait for a decent amount of time in real life.

Another main annoyance of the game is that almost everything can be lethal. This is very unforgiving, considering your heart total at the beginning is pitifully low, so trying new things can lead to your death many times. For example, examining the trash in an attempt to find a beneficial item can make you lose life if your character finds the "Poopie" item. Even later in the game, you may find the "Big Poopie" item which makes you lose almost triple the amount of hearts! Even things that wouldn't normally make you lose life are fatal, such as playing on the spinning globe in the park, or reading bad comic books. While it is hilarious to experience the hard way, it can be frustrating and make you play ultra-conservatively. Considering the only save point you have until later in the game is in your home, you don't want to be restarting each day fresh due to checking out new things.



Atmosphere
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While Chulip may sound like it has its fair share of frustration and hardship, the reason you bother to play is due to the utterly bizarre atmosphere. Okage Shadow King portrays a distinctly Tim Burtonesque environment. Katamari Damacy displays a clearly light-hearted, yet off-kilter setting. Chulip is just straight up "WTF!?"

The characters are a critical component of the ambience. You'll meet a variety of horrifying townsfolk all of which you may attempt to eventually kiss. Michelle is the cleaning lady of the town, and gives you a menacing and evil grin that the game makes a point to zoom the camera in on within the early stages of the game. Dr. Plum appears to be a normal person, but see if you can say that later when you see him roaming around at 4 in the morning. The train station vendor runs frantically and flips his head upside-down 180 degrees when you switch stores. The list of characters and their own quirks really adds a definitely macabre vibe to the game.

While you only have access to certain parts of town at first, later on you are able to explore more divisions, as well as even stranger locales such as the scarecrow field and the worldly desire temple. Until a certain more free-ended part of the game, the game paces the scope of exploration nicely.




Graphics
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They're not bad, but then again I can stomach almost any kind of graphics so I might not be the best judge of this. The world is full of nice characters with round edges that would probably look bad on HD. They're not the best 3D quality, but I really think they are far from the worst. I'd say early-middle generation PS2 since the full potential is definitely not being utilized here. Actually, the visuals are perfectly suited this way, because any more realism would detract from the atmosphere and any less would make it messy and abstract. The back cover art doesn't quite do the game justice.



Difficulty
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The residents are never easy to kiss with exception of underground residents that merely require you to wait until a certain time of day. It gets pretty hard later on. When the game splits into 3 different objectives, you'll have to try many things at various times to progress. Fortunately, the game's instruction manual acts as a walkthrough, with this in mind. Make sure you get the game with the manual, as Gamefaqs doesn't appear to have a faq for the game, and the manual tells you what you need to know.



Control
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Clunky to some, fine to others. Triangle is kiss, X is speak, Square is the item menu, and analog stick to move. If your character gets stuck amidst the walking of npcs, he'll trip and fall. He walks somewhat slowly and you can't do anything about it which may bother some people.



Closing Thoughts
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Not for those who like their games cookie cutter, or the close minded. Only try it if you have an open mind and would like to see something refreshing and unusual.

Jam it back in, in the dark.