Pure Carnage in Ninety Nine Nights

Lumines creator Tetsuya Mizuguchi demonstrates state of the art one-on-10,000 carnage on the Xbox 360. Gamepro's Lunchbox immediately begins drooling.

Anytime you get a chance to destroy 285 enemy soldiers with a single attack, its bound to make you smile. Perhaps this explains why Tetsuya Mizuguchi is so happy these days. The designer  who became famous for the innovative and highly addictive PSP game Lumines as well as the innovative Space Channel 5  took the time out of his busy E3 schedule to walk us through a level of his latest opus, 99 Nights.

We came away craving the opportunity to wreak carnage en masse. In the game, you can choose to play as one of five human characters or a goblin character. Mizuguchi indicated that another secret character would also be available, but he wouldnt reveal who the creature was. If you play as the human characters, youll fight the goblins. If you play as the goblin character, youll fight the humans.

Either way, the battles are epic, pitting you against legions of enemy soldiers. Combat consists of rapidly executing combo moves. Its common to bust 19- or even 30-attack combos, which results in a delightful amount of mayhem. Throughout the course of each mission, youll encounter boss monsters. In our demo we fought a powerful soldier and a troll; these guys required more strategy and less button mashing to dispatch.

The game takes full advantage of the Xbox 360s powers. At times, the designers told us, the game will depict over 10,000 enemies on the screen at a time. Thats impressive.

Equally impressive is the frenzied pace of gameplay, which is enhanced by RPG elements that allow you to develop your characters skills. As you cut your way through the hordes, youll accumulate experience points that allow you to upgrade one of five character attributes.

Youll also accumulate two types of energy as you succeed in striking youre your opponents. One form is generate through conventional attacks. This fills up an orb attack that will damage or destroy a large number of enemies. Even better, as you execute orb attacks, youll accumulate points for the ultimate over attack. All by itself, this attack makes playing the game worthwhile. The visual effects are shocking; When we executed the attack, close to 300 soldiers  every enemy in our presence  was slain. And a massive mushroom cloud rose into the air. Thats what were talking about!

Recently released in Japan, 99 Nights is heading to the states this Fall. Its the kind of mindless, straight-ahead fun we love to play, so we cant wait for its arrival.

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