BY VALERIO ROSSI
PRODUCED BY SOFTWARE SCULPTORS
CD-ROM ON TWO DISKS

I hate Anime.

Don't ask me to explain the scream lines and the big eyes and the bad translations and the giant robots and the talking dogs and the half-naked female soldiers and the flying rugs and the mutant spider babies and the... well you get the idea. It's part 18 of the Muguchigu Trilogy and Neo-Tokyo has been destroyed for the seventh time in the series, and as the people try to rebuild a civilization from out of the rubble, giant mechanized monkey robots (as part of some New Socialist Regime of Militia Defense Robotic Initiatives - NSRMDRI) are patrolling the wastelands stopping other renegade robot simians from taking over the world and destroying the still struggling villages.

Takeru: Letter of the Law ain't that.

Takeru is a Myst-like Anime CD-ROM game set in the fantastic land of Yamato. The game is compatible for Windows 3.x, Windows 95, and Mac. You play Takeru, a bounty hunter, with a talking turtle companion (ugh). Your mission: find the bad guys and bring them to justice. Not the thickest of plots, but Takeru's wanderings do get him caught up in a bigger threat (don't they always). And that's when the game really takes off.

Takeru is equiped with so much chi power -- they call it Kanji -- that he kills people with a thought and a wave of his hands. What does that mean in the game? It means, when you want someone dead, they get that way. In the game world, you have an objective though. You're tracking down a criminal when you become embroiled in a sinister plot against a beautiful princess (Mario?). The nemesis in the story is a sorceress (I can never remember Anime names), and her legion of demons.

Takeru, can attack oppenents in the game with a variety of powers. Each attack form has a different icon that represents its use. And when you flame a guy in half on the screen with your Kanji powers, each power-symbol will have a different effect. Buici Terasawa (of Cobra, and Midnight Eye fame) beautifully renders the action scenes that dominate this game. Letter of the Law is an apt name for a guy that leaves Japanese characters scored into the foreheads of his dead victims, and players are encouraged to try new ways to kill each opponent as I understand that later in the game it can affect your outcome.

After you make a decision it takes about 40 seconds to sometimes a few minutes to watch the computer go through the paces of the story. A lot of these scenes (the opening motorcycle chase) are really cool, but after a while I got a little tired of watching the game play itself - but I'm sure most fans of Anime are used to sitting back and letting the action take it's course, so this game should feel like an interactive movie or comic book. At that level it works very well.

The scenes are cut with some incredible art in comic book panels that appear (get this) right to left. I enjoyed the quality of the sounds as the footage scrolled before me, and the stills cut out the problem of having to pace the sound with the mumbling lips of the screen. And even though I hate speed lines, I have to admit that they helped present the action perfectly. Again, I'll mention the motorcycle chase scene (mostly to fill space), but it was that good.

Takeru is not my usual computer gaming fair, but some guys twisted my arm and told me to play it until I was finished. I cheated all the way through the game, so I wasn't allowed into the hallowed temple/shrine at the game's completion - I didn't want to go into their crummy temple anyway!

The World of Yamato is similar to many new PC games out there now. A 3-D environment that unfolds as you click a cursor and walk around aimlessly looking for... something. Takeru adds people and a companion to talk to so gaming in Yarnato isn't so lonely.

Like I said. I don't like Anime. But this game kept me occupied long enough to get my arm splinted and put into a cast, so I could type this review. Ow!