get that much press on this side of the pond. So while he�s been rendered in video game

format a bajillion times, he�s still perfect fodder for Strange Anime License Friday, brought

to you as usual by Felicity in Worcestershire. Unfortunately, from my own experiences with

video games in the Doraemon franchise... they�ve been hit-or-miss at best, and miss at worst.

Hudson�s take on the robotic cat�s adventures served as the precursor to Mickey Mousecapades,

the title that famously solidified Disney�s relationship... with Capcom. Could Epoch do

any better with this RPG version? Well, they actually did... if you�re willing to wade

through enough text to make that B-Daman game I did a few weeks back look terse and concise.

Playing as a dude (or dudette) who happens to live in Doraemon�s corner of town, you�re

in a panic following the apparent theft of your cat (by the town�s infamous PET THIEVES)

and it�s up to you and the cast of Doraemon to get to the bottom of it. And I�m willing

to guess you have no idea who they are anyway. Fine enough. After an eternity of plot - okay,

so it was probably only an hour but still, AN HOUR OF PLOT AND THIS ISN�T EVEN FREAKING

PERSONA - you learn that the Pet Thieves are, in fact, ANIMAL-HEADED ALIENS FROM OUTER SPACE.

And while your initial attempt to ToeJam & Earl it onto their craft is unsuccessful, they

come back to abscond with three of your friends before departing to their homeworld. Fortunately,

as has been the case since 1969, Doraemon himself is nothing if not a Deus ex Machina

Elemental, managing to produce a spacecraft from his pouch and blast you off into actual

RPG gameplay. And, by �actual RPG gameplay,� I mean numbers and attacks and commands, not

just fulfilling fetch quests and being introduced to everyone all at once.

And here... the game actually redeems itself. The standard random-battle RPG mechanics are

augmented by the introduction of �Friendship points,� vis those little yellow face icons

below the characters� stats. These are awarded for heroism (or lucky criticals) in the face

of battle, and follow a quick exchange between your party members. Collect three points and

a new command becomes available, which powers up the user and a teammate of choice for the

duration of the battle. It�s a spiffy little wrinkle, but I don�t know if it�s enough

to offset the tedium of searching for a lost cat for the first hour. I mean, geez, I�ve

got a detective agency in Hong Kong that handles all of that for me. I pay �em in Bryson

travelogues and the occasional volume of Chaucer.