Awesomely Underrated #4: Kameo- Elements of Power

Poor Rare. They had such acclaim in their Nintendo days and seem to have become a joke
on their formal self like many other companies. Perfect Dark failed to have any long term
staying power for the 360, Viva Pinata didn't sell quite as well as they wanted to. 360
owners would prefer the world of brown found in many shooters like Gears or War and Halo
3. What may of them have missed out on is a little gem made by Rare called Kameo:
Elements of Power.

The game has a long history of development. The title was originally conceived as a
Nintendo 64 title before Rare was bought by Microsoft. Then it was ported to the gamecube
before moving to the XBox, and finally the XBox-360. It was a launch title, so while the
graphics are nice, they don't hold a candle to more recent games. The hardware is new so
perhaps the developers couldn't take advantage of it the way they can now. This may be a
reason why Kameo may have been vastly ignored after launch.

While the game is essentially an action/platformer it has some neat ideas. Kameo has the
power to transform into Elemental Warriors with various abilities. While she starts with only
three, she collects a total of ten over the course of the game. Their skill sets are different
and each Elemental Warrior has certain skills needed to progress through the game. If
you're smart and remember to travel back to earlier worlds with later Elemental Warriors
you may find yourself uncovering some extras to make Kameo stronger. There is some
limitations; Kameo can only summon one of three different Elemental Warriors at a time, so
some strategy needs to be put into it.

The game is quite beautiful for a launch title. So many XBox 360 games are shooters that
embrace the "Real is brown" motif. Kameo is quite the opposite. The world is bright and
colorful which is a nice change of pace. The story is pretty trite: Kameo has to rescue her
ancestors and defeat the Troll King, but the npc's are least nice to look at and the dialogue
isn't too bad either. The focus on a game like this afterall isn't a deep story but the
adventuring.

It may be a case of "great game on the wrong system" but Kameo isn't that bad of a game.
It got decent reviews from most sites. It's not a shooter which is a nice change of pace for
a 360 owner. Acheivement whores will be happy to know that at least 600 of the points can
be earned by merely going through the game. It's also pretty inexpensive and worth
picking up for people with extra cash wanting to play an underrated game. Sure it's not a
Zelda or a Mario, but it's well done. Rare should be pleased with themselves, and I'm sure
they would be even more, if more people noticed.