Lost in Blue 3, Reviewed [DS]

Lost in Blue 3 is my introduction to the series. I have played Lost in Blue briefly, but that was a while back. Since I loved the Sims 2: Castaway so much, I had hoped that Lost in Blue 3 would be a similar game and help solve my craving for a new game with a storyline to play through (currently I’ve been playing Brain Age 2 non-stop and that does get rather old). It does have an actual storyline, it’s not quick and easy to get through, and I was accidentally up until two this morning playing it. Addictive? Yes. Like Sims 2: Castaways? No. The only similarity is that you’re stuck on a deserted island and have to try to get off. The graphics are even better! (They aren’t better than the Wii version of Sims 2, obviously, but they definitely beat the socks off of the DS version!)

This game goes into much more depth of trying to survive on a desert island. There are quite a few more mini games than Sims 2, and some I haven’t even gotten to yet according to the guide I’m using. There aren’t really any puzzles like Professor Layton had, there are some things you have to figure out, but not the sort of thing that makes you feel like an idiot when you can’t solve it (or when you solve it after minutes/hours of deliberation). Not only do you need to make sure that your character stays nourished and hydrated, but you also need to take care of the other characters that you come across, the other castaways. You need to gather food, water, wood for fires, and learn how to cook. Once the other castaways get to know you and like you better, you can ask them to help you with the chores, such as gathering wood or food which helps a great deal.

You start out as one of two characters, I chose the girl, Claire, and as you go through and find other castaways from the ship you were on, you discover secrets from your past as well as from the others. The mission is simple: get off the island. But before you can do that, you must explore! The island is HUGE, especially compared to Sims 2. I still haven’t discovered all of it yet. One thing I was happy to find though was a series of shortcuts (I won’t tell you where, you’ll have to check out a walkthrough for that ), because it can get sooo tedious to travel really far in a day and then have to walk allllllll the way back to your base camp when you’re tired and hungry and your partner is complaining. One thing I like better about Sims 2 is that you can open up a map of the entire island and touch the place where you’d like to go, so you don’t have to walk the whole way. It takes time off your clock, like it would if you walked it, but that’s a small price to pay. With Lost in Blue 3 (and the other two I would imagine), you walk/run. The whole time. Yeah, that part wasn’t too cool.

For those not familiar with the Lost in Blue series, you can have several base camps scattered throughout the island. When you sleep in one, you get a message saying that you’ve switched home bases and that’s where your other companions will be, but switching is as easy as sleeping in another base. If you run out of storage space, simply head on over to your other home base and store things there. I’ve found three so far and I’m not sure if there will be more. I haven’t found the last castaway yet, another girl apparently.

When you get to the second base camp, you can start building furniture for the cave. That was fun, I like building things. It opens up a mini game where you have to align the pieces just right so you can hammer them together. So far, I’ve built shelves, a table and chairs, and a couple of rafts for the various rivers on the island. Apparently you can also tame a goat and chicken but I have yet to capture either animal. I have yet to hunt altogether actually, aside from spearfishing, which leads me into the disappointing part of Lost in Blue 3…

This is THE most sexist game I have ever played. I started as Claire, because whenever I can play a girl I take that opportunity. I didn’t start to notice it until farther in, then I started noticing it little by little. Then, when I looked up how to use the fishing rod and found out people, who had started as Sam, were having no trouble with the fishing rod, it hit me. They don’t let that girl do anything. She can’t build furniture without one of the guys, I didn’t notice this as anything at first because the other two castaways right now are male and she says “I need one of the boys to help me”, so I figured maybe the furniture or rafts are heavy and she just needs someone to help. Apparently, she doesn’t need someone to help because they’re heavy, she needs someone to help because she’s a girl. She can’t/won’t use the fishing rod, and from what I’ve read, only females can make baskets which is not something you can do yourself as the girl, noooo you have to wait until you find the other female castaway, and also, only the female characters can care for the animals if you have any. Those animals would rather die of thirst than let the boys take care of them if the girls are out.

Why don’t I just switch characters and play as one of the boys for the things that the girl can’t do? Simple. YOU CAN’T. You are stuck with the character you start with and if you picked Claire, you are just SOL until you find the other girl.

Aside from the sexism, this game is very good. Which is like saying, aside from the burned bits and the fat, the half of this steak that I can eat is very good. If you play was the boy, Sam, you’ll hardly notice the sexism, because you’ll be able to do just about everything yourself anyway. Except make baskets. You’ll have to ask Claire to do that for you. Both of the boys refuse to do it if you ask them, “that’s not my thing” they reply. How hard is it to make a basket, seriously? Sorry, </rant>. Putting all that aside, I really am enjoying this game. I’ve played more than twenty hours easily, six of those were today after work, and I’m still nowhere near being done with the storyline. Whereas with Sims 2: Castaway, I was done the story in a day or two, there were still some things left to do after that, but it was just collecting stuff. This game is just what I’ve been looking for in an addictive story-based game and I can’t put it down. For less than $30, depending on where you go, it’s not a bad price either.

…At least Claire is hot. She’s the hour-glass shaped blonde with a tight/low cut tank top, which we have all come to know and love from Japanese imports. (I realize that I’m saying this after complaining about the sexism of the game, but I appreciate a hot girl when I see one. The boys aren’t bad looking either )

[rating: 3/5]

Overall I was satisfied, but I just can’t shake the sexism thing…