Inazuma Eleven

Genre: Sports (Soccer) / Action-RPG

Players: 1-2 Competitive (Local Wireless)

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Review:

The Inazuma Eleven franchise (named for the eleven players on a soccer team), is a series that focuses on an underdog school club of soccer players (or football players, for those outside the US). This franchise, which has largely skipped over the United States in its releases over the years, has produced a variety of mangas and animes, as well as six videogames starting with 2008’s Inazuma Eleven for the Nintendo DS. However, US players would only see the release of that first game, and not in its original form. While the series largely remained in Japan and occasionally Europe, Americans would finally get their chance to play the series with the release of an upgraded and enhanced version of Inazuma Eleven on the 3DS eShop in 2014.

That’s a shame too, because what we have here is something refreshingly original, and I’d venture to say there’s not really anything else like this out on the market. Inazuma Eleven is an anime-style, story-focused Soccer game with strong RPG elements. What’s more, this game makes strong use of the Nintendo 3DS’s touchscreen controls to allow players to direct characters by drawing paths for them, at least in theory allowing them to coordinate their entire team’s movements all at once.

In practice… well, the reality is a bit more messy than that. Your pixel art characters on the small screen are tiny enough that it’s sometimes hard to select them, especially when they’re close to another character. In addition, the shifting screen means that you’ll be unable to directly control any players who have wandered too far from your central point of focus. Want to set up a pass for a shot on the goal? You’d better hope that you have a player already in position to take the shot, because you won’t really be able to direct them to do it.

The tiny size of the players contributes to another issue this game has – it is often difficult to distinguish your own players from those on the opponent’s team. In some situations you’ll be competing with characters who are in your same school, meaning that everyone is more or less wearing the same uniform, and all you have to go on to distinguish them is their tiny little heads.

All of this is going on while a field full of players are scrambling around, and you’re tasked with trying to process everything, along with other RPG mechanics like a rock-paper-scissors elemental system, a wide array of stats, and so on. At times, it can definitely feel like you’re expected to be following a lot more information than seems realistic for a player to process in real-time.

Despite all these issues, Inazuma Eleven still works. It’s fun, fast-paced, and refreshingly original. Leveling up your team via RPG mechanics is a clever way to involve players in the process of assembling their own “dream team”, directing players using the touchscreen is wonderfully immersive (when it works), and the focus on story helps to set this apart from most other games in the genre.

Graphically, Inazuma Eleven is an odd mix of new and old elements. On your bottom screen, you’ll have the aforementioned dated-looking pixel art visuals on slightly 3D backgrounds (It’s so subtle you could be forgiven for not noticing), while the top screen alternates between an area map and occasional 3D cutscenes depicting attempts to steal or score a goal. And all of these are interspersed with some really nice quality anime-style animated cutscenes to punctuate the game’s story, complete with voice acting and orchestrated anime-style music. So much of this is top-notch that the archaic visuals depicting the actual gameplay seem out-of-place.

All things considered, Inazuma Eleven is a game with a lot of flaws, but it’s also something that’s truly unique and original, and it’s easier to forgive those flaws when it’s doing something so creative. This is not likely to be a game for everyone, but if you’re a Nintendo 3DS owner who’s a fan of soccer and/or anime and don’t mind videogames that feel a bit experimental, you should definitely give Inazuma Eleven a chance before its only US release becomes unavailable again when the Nintendo 3DS eShop shuts down.

tl;dr – Inazuma Eleven is technically a remake of a Nintendo DS game that originally never made it to the US. This is a pretty experimental take on a Soccer game that combines touchscreen mechanics, a heavy focus on anime-style story, and strong RPG elements into a unique title that has its fair share of flaws, but is such an original game that it’s still well worth playing despite those flaws. If this game’s odd blend of elements sounds interesting to you, I’d recommend you give it a shot!

Grade: C+

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