The Ape Escape series' main antagonist, Spectre, has once again ascended to the forefront of monkey leadership, and has (once again) established a new plan to enslave mankind, and claim rule over Earth for monkey kind. This time, Spectre has enlisted the help of a mad scientist, Dr. Tomoki to create a grand plan to create a host of mind numbingly stupid TV shows to reduce the brain capacity of humanity to nothing. Sounds a lot like Channel 10, doesn’t it? Even the Professor, Spike and Hikaru (the protagonists of the previous two games) have fallen to Spectre’s latest folly. It’s up to newcomers Satoru and Sayaka to round up the damn dirty apes and save mankind. The TV-centric premise of Ape Escape 3 allows for a lot of variation between stages, as well as providing a lot of pop culture references and homages to various popular movies and TV shows. The monkeys themselves will follow the theme of the level, so you’ll see simians dressed up as everything from cowboys to hockey mask-wearing, chainsaw-wielding horror movie clichés.
Good opportunity for a Shenmue joke
Ape Escape 3 is the first game in the series that lets you chose between a boy and a girl as your protagonist, though the difference is purely aesthetic. The game starts out much in the same way as its predecessors, arming the player with only the stun baton and a net, and setting you out into a fairly simple stage to catch a bunch of monkeys. As the game progresses, you will be introduced to new gadgets and given the opportunity to give them a test run in the training zone. Most of the gadgets from the previous games are retained for the latest sequel, but players will be relieved to know that Ape Escape 3 has introduced a quick selection tool for gadget selection, as well as the standard face button deal. The game retains the standard dual analogue control setup, which still works like a charm. The camera system is still a little iffy, but players will get used to it within a couple of stages. The pace of play seems to have been ramped up a bit from the second game, which gives Ape Escape 3 a different, if not slightly better feel than the second game.
There seems to have been a lot more progression from Ape Escape 2 to 3 than from the original game to the first sequel, both in the more advanced design of stages, additional gadgets, secrets, extras and greater level of polish. The major addition to the third game are the transformations, whereby Satoru or Sayaka can transform into various different characters, such as a knight or cowboy, with each character having a variety of advantages over the standard form as well as some special techniques. The fights against the five boss monkeys take these costumes into consideration, which makes the boss fights far more interesting than they were in Ape Escape 2. The other noticeable improvement in the game is in the AI. The monkeys are a heck of a lot cheekier in Ape Escape 3 – they’ll hop over your attempts to sweep them, run for backup from various standard enemies and go into a rage if you hit them too much with your stun baton. If a monkey goes into a rage, he’ll knock your gadget out of your hand, steal it and use it against you. Should you lose your net, there will be a delightful twist of fate - you’ll have to escape from the monkeys.
SNAAAAAAAAAAAAKE!
Ape Escape 3 features a lot of those standard platform game extras – vehicle sections where the player controls either a car or a mech, as well as the typical puzzle sections. There’s also a lot of stuff that’s unique to the game, such as the Monkey Cinema, where players can watch movies that they capture on the cameras situated in key spots around the level. The monkeys will be in full costume, and will act out scenes from a range of classic movies. Not necessarily a huge addition to the game, but it does add a bit of extra fun into the mix. The other unlockables are quite typical of the Ape Escape series – Monkey Horoscopes, novels about monkey adventures, concept art, music and a few different types of mini-games featuring monkeys. Sony has gone one step further with Ape Escape 3’s mini-games, with the inclusion of Mesaru Gear Solid, where players take on the role of a monkey who thinks he is Solid Snake. The extra game is actually surprisingly good, and certainly a good role reversal from the Snake vs. Monkey game we saw in Metal Gear Solid 3.
There’s quite a bit of gameplay in Ape Escape 3, with over 400 monkeys to catch. There is a bit of a snag though, since players are still forced to exit a level after catching the initially-prescribed number of monkeys – you have to go back in your own time to catch the remainder. It’s just one of those little inconveniences you have to live with. With the large number of critters to catch, and the wealth of extra content, you should get about 15-20 hours out of Ape Escape 3.
Aha! The tables have turned!
Ape Escape 3 retains the vibrant colours and cartoonish designs of its predecessors. While some textures look a little low-quality, and some models are polygon-deficient, the game has a real oddball style of presentation which makes up for the lack of cutting edge graphical technology. The monkeys themselves still look the same as they always have, but there’s a wealth of different costumes and appearances, giving many of the monkeys their own distinct style and personality. The human characters in the game fit into that typical manga/anime subset, but are once again voiced by painstakingly British actors. Fortunately, it’s not as bad as the vocal track from the first game in the series, but it’s still an area of concern. The soundtrack and monkey shrieks stand out as always.
The third entry into Sony’s Ape Escape series is very solid, but we can’t help but feel that the game won’t receive all of the recognition it deserves. The game has significant progression over the second game – one could say that this is the game that the second one should have been, but it seems like it has come out too late in the PlayStation 2’s life cycle to have the impact it could have. Nevertheless, anyone looking for a solid platforming action title can’t go wrong with Ape Escape 3.
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