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Endless Ocean Luminous is a one-trick seahorse, but a pleasant one
01.05.2024 - 03:07 / videogameschronicle.com / Chris Scullion / Nintendo
Japanese developer Arika has enjoyed a close relationship with Nintendo over the years.
Originally founded in the ‘90s by former Capcom employees, the studio teamed up with Nintendo in the early Wii days for Endless Ocean, with Arika developing and Nintendo publishing.
The game’s success led to a partnership which continues to this day, resulting in a second Endless Ocean game on Wii, four download-only Dr Mario sequels, and the 3D Classics range of NES 3D remasters on the 3DS.
In recent years Arika was the studio behind Switch Online titles Tetris 99, Pac-Man 99 and the superb Super Mario Bros 35, but now it’s gone back to where its relationship with Nintendo started. Endless Ocean is back for a third game, but sadly, this time it’s lost some of its magic.
As in the previous two games, the general vibe of Endless Ocean Luminous is one of swimming around large bodies of water, exploring your surroundings while encountering a wide variety of underwater creatures.
Whereas the two Wii titles featured predesigned locations, however, Luminous instead focuses mainly on procedurally generated areas. The game’s main two single-player modes are Story and Solo Dives, and the latter is clearly the main focus by some distance (and it can also be played online with up to 30 players).
Choosing a Solo Dive puts you in a large body of water, and gives you an empty 10×10 grid for a map. Each of these 100 squares contains a smaller 5×5 area (meaning there are 2,500 squares in total), and as you swim over each of these small squares they’re filled in.
The aim, then, is to move around and explore the area to fill in the smaller squares and slowly reveal more of the map. Once 80% (2000) of the squares are filled, the rest of the map is automatically completed and you’re given an image showing that area’s ‘Dive-Site ID’, meaning other players can enter it to play the same map you did.
Although each dive site is procedurally generated, there are still some notable features that appear to be pre-built and randomly appear from time to time. We’ve stumbled on the same sunken ship a couple of times and some of the ancient ruins we’ve discovered have appeared again in subsequent dives. That said, each area is large enough that they each still feel distinct, and you’ll still end up finding dives that you favour over others.
Naturally, each body of water is also inhabited by a wide variety of aquatic creatures, and the areas are large enough to feature distinct biomes with different species in each. The bluer, warmer areas are more likely to generate schools of tropical fish, sea turtles and hammerhead sharks, while the caves and deeper, darker areas are where you’re more likely to find odder, less aesthetically pleasing beasts.
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