Last July 2016, Niantic released a small mobile cock-fighting simulator
called Pokémon GO. By minimizing Nintendo's famous franchise and putting it into
mobile devices, the title did the most un-video game thing a video game could
do by forcing its players to go outside and socialize. The fad lasted a couple
of months, and with users crowding national monuments and getting hit by Pokémon GO users in vehicles, it isn't
hard to see why.
Fast forward to
2017 where a brand new free-to-play mobile game called MoKai Adventure wants to make itself known in this world of Pokémon
and Digimon. Created by Taiwanese indie studio Werold, the game has you
collecting and raising over 150 kinds of MoKai before pitting them against each
other like a modern day Julius Caesar.
In order to be the very best like no one ever was, you need to
utilize MoKai Adventure's Promote,
Evolution, and Enhance systems which allow you to upgrade your feeble creatures
into muscle-bound psychopaths that will obliterate the little animals you find
in the wild.
Promote
This allows you
to stuff your low-level weaklings with so much food and veterinary steroids
that either they die from obesity or man up and burn all that in the gym.
Different types of food will increase different attributes, so make sure that
you're feeding your MoKai a healthy diet instead of just Cheetos and Coke.
Evolution
Over the course
of your adventure, you will no doubt come across more than one of a single kind
of MoKai. Now this may suck by traditional video game standards, but MoKai Adventure lets your stronger
monster consume the weaker one in order to drain it of its life force and
increase its overall stats by 5%. You can do this for up to five times with a
single MoKai, thereby turning him into a very powerful cannibal.
Enhance
If cannibalism wasn't enough for you, then the Enhance feature lets your creepy companions move out of their comfort zone and consume different types of MoKai. Just like Evolution, Enhance lets you increase your monsters' stats but is completely dependent on which species of monster you eat. Beast-type monsters increase your physical attack, zombie types increase your defense, and so on.
If you manage to do all these things and your MoKai resembles a miniature Hulk Hogan with a five-star rating, then you can use special items which will help it Awaken. But instead of the traditional awakening where you're normally cranky after an hour-long nap, Awakening increases your MoKai's overall power level and gives him a slightly cooler appearance.
As soon as you assemble your A-Team of overpowered MoKai that look more like heavyweight bodybuilders than cute critters, the question then becomes how you go about pitting them against the rabid creatures you come across.
The game's battle system involves organizing six MoKai into rows of two. The ones in the front row, the vanguard, are usually the toughest looking and most used monsters you have while the rearguard is composed of those three which you bear a slight resentment towards. You can switch the positions of your team in real-time and use physical, magic, and ultimate attacks to get the drop on the AI that thinks Bulbasaur is a cool starting Pokémon.
But enough about
that! You want to take a look at how the folks at Werold managed to create and
name monsters that look drastically different from over a thousand other
fictional Japanese pets!
Gremlin
Unlike the monsters in the 1984 comedy horror film Gremlins, this gremlin does not turn into a temperamental lizard
when exposed to sunlight but rather enjoys hoarding weird things like an
overzealous raven. Quite possibly the flagship MoKai of the franchise, the fact
that its silhouette looks like a horned Pikachu will help newcomers remember
this monster's name.
Angel Float
With a name that could be shared with a tasty summer beverage, the Angel
Float literally carries a bag full of marshmallows on its back as it flies
around dropping diabetes on its foes. While by no means intimidating, this sky
blue-colored menace's treats grant luck to anyone who eats them, making Mokai Adventure's worlda prime advertisement site for
Hershey's products.
Skeleton Bat
Unlike Pokémon's Cubone, whose skull helmet had
a pretty depressing backstory, Skeleton Bat does not wear the remains of its
mother's head as a grim reminder of the past. Instead, this mouthless creature
likes to hang upside down near a cave's entrance and watch the sunset. It isn't
known if the Skeleton Bat likes long walks on the beach, but this MoKai seems
to be one of those hopeless romantic types that loves fruit and handwritten
poetry.
