Galleon: Dawn (Mobile)

CNET editors' rating: 3.5 stars Very good
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Overall score: 7.2 (3.5 stars)
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Gamespot editors' review

• Reviewed by: Mike Mearls
• Reviewed on: 08/26/2004

Galleon: Dawn combines a platformer's obstacles, a fighting game's strategy and timing, and the story elements of a role-playing game to create a satisfying, though sometimes shallow, experience. You must battle thugs and sword-wielding pirates, leap over pools of lava and other obstacles, and swim through water-filled caves to track down a powerful, magical ship before it falls into your enemy's hands. The game draws from the Xbox game Galleon, but this story comes across as muddled and difficult to follow. Nevertheless, Galleon: Dawn offers a challenging combination of jumping, climbing, and swordfighting.

Battle pirates and other baddies on your quest.

Galleon: Dawn presents a 2D side-scrolling environment. You use your phone's number pad to move, jump, kick, punch, and attack with a sword, should you find one. You have a health bar that dwindles when you suffer injuries, though healing items seeded throughout the levels keep you going. You can climb vines and leap onto platforms, jump to grasp and climb ledges, and even leap high enough to jump over your enemies. In some sections, you must dive into water to continue through a level. While underwater, your health meter is replaced with an air meter that measures how much longer you can swim without air. If it dwindles to zero, you drown.

The combat mechanics in Galleon: Dawn are sometimes frustrating. When you use a kick, punch, or sword blow, your attack remains extended for a second or two. If an opponent makes contact with your outstretched attack, you score a hit. Your foes employ a similar attack, leading to some strange-looking moments as you extend an attack and watch an opponent blunder into it. If you make a mistake in timing a strike, you remain in the extended pose while your enemy moves in for a counterattack. Reach is a critical component of your attacks. The sword-armed pirates are deadly enemies, as they can slice at you from beyond the range of your kicks and punches. You have two different unarmed strikes, and the punch is almost useless compared to a kick. A punch inflicts more damage than a kick, but it requires you to move so close to a foe that you almost invariably draw an attack. The sword is the ultimate weapon, but you must find one during the course of exploring a level in order to use it.

The varied terrain in Galleon: Dawn also adds to its challenge. In some of the more hazardous areas, falling victim to an attack can send you into a downward spiral. When you sustain a hit, you stumble backward. If you happen to stand on a ledge, you can plummet down a cliff or into a bubbling pool of lava. In either case, you must climb back up to your opponent, and while doing so you might sustain an additional injury. In several cases, you must defeat an enemy who waits just at the edge of a difficult-to-reach platform. At other times, you have no way of viewing the area at the base of a cliff or a platform from which you must jump. In these cases, whether you land safely or you suffer damage after leaping into a pool of lava is really all a matter of luck.

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