Astro Boy: Omega Factor

Astro Boy: Omega Factor The Astro Boy franchise could have not being as good as this with the video game, and in a good way. Genre(s): Platform Action Platform(s): Game Boy Advance Release: JP: December 18, 2003 NA: August 17, 2004 EU: February 18, 2005 Developer(s): Hitmaker Treasure Publisher(s): WW: Sega EU: THQ Predecessor: Tetsuwan Atom (1993) Successor: Astro Boy (2004 video game)

Astro Boy: Omega Factor is a beat 'em up video game developed by Treasure and Hitmaker, and published by Sega (THQ in Europe). The game was released for the Game Boy Advance on December 18, 2003 in Japan; August 17, 2004 in North America; and February 18, 2005 in Europe. The game is based on Osamu Tezuka's manga and anime franchise Astro Boy. However, it also features characters and plotlines from the artist's entire canon of work.

Plot

Omega Factor features elements from Astro Boy's different incarnations. The concept of robot rights, Dr. Tenma's ultimate plan for Astro and the robot city of Robotonia in Antarctica are lifted from the Astro Boy 2003 TV series. Plotlines from other Tezuka series include a time travel plot lifted from Marine Express, a journey to the lost continent of Mu, and a subplot involving Duke Red's daughter and her role in the "Death Mask" orbital platform. The game is divided into two episodes: Birth and Rebirth. The Birth episode follows Astro's adventures and other characters he interacts with, and ends with robots being destroyed by a device called Death Mask, after it determines that the robots are too dangerous to be left alive, leaving Sharaku able to conquer the Earth. In Rebirth, Astro is revived by a being called Phoenix, and has Astro go back to the beginning of the story and try to stop the Death Mask, giving him the ability to go back and forward in time to do so.

Why It Rocks

1. The gameplay here is extremely fun and has a surprising amount of variety in the combos of Astro since you can either punch, kick, or use lasers, and even have two special attacks. You can also upgrade Astro's stats when you find a character, which makes for a really good and enjoyable game that is considered to be one of the best of the entire Game Boy Advance library.
   • In fact, it's so fun to play that despite being a bit repetitive at times, it's still incredibly fun, and you will not even mind some of the repetitive levels and gameplay. It's also helpful that it's extremely varied.
   • The action levels in particular are really fun and have a lot of replay values (that will be explained later). Due to having a lot of moves to do along with the combos that are very fun to do, the special attacks are also great to execute, although you had to kill enemies to replish them.
2. The controls are extremely tight and responsive, as Astro's will never ever be unresponsive and will always respond to your actions. They are also barely any clunky or slippery, and it's also helpful that you can fly a bit faster, making the controls some of the best you will ever see in an Astro Boy game or even a GBA game in general.
   • Even the shot-up stages have extremely responsive controls that are really fast and move a lot better than the Nintendo DS game based on the movie, not to mention that even the special attacks and even your basic attacks respond well on these stages, making them much more beteable than if the controls were unresponsive.
   • Also, they are not only tight but also very simple to learn since you can know them either in 1 minute without the tutorial or you can go do the tutorial to learn them at the very beginning, but if you want to do it again, you will have to beat the game first to play it in the rebirth stages.
3. The story is absolutely amazing even by the standards of the Astro Boy franchise, since there's a lot of great dialogues that are really dark or heartwarming at times. It's also done a very good job at adapting the story of the 2003 anime to the point that it's the best story that an Astro Boy game could ever get, not to mention that it's got some funny moments (see WIR#15).
4. One of the best things about the gameplay is that if you find a character, you can upgrade your stats, which is very innovative and can also make the game easier and even more fun than it's already been due to how broken your stats might be. It's also made the game easier to speedrun.
   • Not to mention that it can help to make the game easier, as said before, if you had lifes, lasers, and punch stats completely upgraded, and it's especially true with the lasers that are even more powerful when you upgrade all of them. The jets can also help you a lot when upgraded.
5. The graphics are amazing and even look accurate to the show art style to the point that it's probably the best-looking Astro Boy game ever made considering how great the sprite work and the color palette are. It's also had many impressive-looking areas, as expected from a Treasure game.
   • Also, the sprite work is so good that it looks like it straight up came from the 2003 anime; they are also very detailed, even for a 2003 GBA game.
   • Not to mention that the backgrounds are not only great-looking, but some of them even look impressive for the console on which this game was released, such as the backgrounds from the Sun Boss fights and the entire chapter 8.
   • The graphics are also very colorful and make some of the areas even better-looking than they already are, not to mention that it's one of the reasons why the backgrounds look so good in the first place.
6. The hit detection, as you might expect, except from a Treasure game, is flawless and will never ever be poor. Even in the shoot 'em up phases, the action levels even had a powerful hit detection, which means that killing enemies is very simple to do and you even do get some advantages, such as when you might not hit the enemies but you still hit them.
7. The soundtrack is very good and contains many songs that are very catchy, or some will even make you listen to them for a long or even dance to some of the music. Some of them also range from happy to dark or even heartwarming at times, especially in the cutscenes.
   • The boss fight music in particular is so good that it is some of the best music in the entire game and even the entire Astro Boy video game franchise, since most of them had a good soundtrack but not as amazing as this game. The boss fights mostly had intense music that sounded very catchy and made them epic.
   • The sound effects are also awesome and feel badass at times since they sound very crisp, and some of the boss sound effects, such as when they got taken down, are also intense and feel great to listen to. Even your attacks had great sound effects that will never sound annoying at all.
8. Decent voice acting, despite not having many voices since only Astro is voiced in the game when he does some moves, such as special attacks or even being hurt by enemies,  is the only voice acting in the game.
9. The level design, while mostly linear, is pretty great, with many creative levels or some that had some bits of Metroidvania elements in some of them, such as 2-3. The levels are also carefully designed in order to not have too much fake difficulty and have good platform placements.
   • The levels 2-1 to 2-6 are especially creative due to their Metroidvania elements that make them feel unique in this game and even for an action game in general, not to mention that they are some of the best levels of the game due to this and how fun they are to play.
10. The characters for the most parts in the cutscenes are very likable and also help Astro's to do his missions at times, but some of the villains and some characters are really unlikable due to being somewhat mean to Astro (in a bad way).
11. There's two special attacks: shoot and laser; they are very great and sometimes make some levels and bosses much easier.
    • The shoot can stun the enemies and do kill some enemies that are very weak and don't have too much energy, or this serves for when you have trouble in a boss fight.
    • There's the laser that is very powerful and can kill a lot of enemies due to how powerful it is.
12. The boss fights are really amazing and extremely fun to fight due to how their paths are fun to learn, and they are also very challenging, despite being very unbalanced at times.
13. It is extremely faithful to the 2003 series, with the graphics looking very accurate to the show, as said before, and most of the 2003 series story is on this game, although it did have some changes to fit this game story and overall nature.
14. The box art for both versions is very good and appealing to look at, especially the Japanese version since it is detailed and colorful. They are also very faithful to the 2003 series art style.
    • The North America, while not as good as the Japanese version, is still pretty decent since it's got a detailed background along with Astro appearing on the box art. Although it isn't really detailed like the Japanese version, it is still colorful too.
    • The Japanese version had the best box art of the two, as it had an extremely detailed background and was also full of details. It's also got a lot of characters on it, not just Astro like the North American version; it's colorful to look at, and much like the North American version, the style of the box art is extremely faithful to the 2003 series art style, even more than the North American box art.
15. The combat, as you would expect from a game made by Treasure, is amazing and very fun since it is very responsive and feels satisfying when you take down an enemy or beat a boss.
16. As usual with the Astro Boy franchise, there are some funny moments in the cutscenes, such as when Astro crushes on Nuka, but he does that when he is in the middle of a mission, despite the story being serious and quite dark.
17. There's two gameplay phases that are both amazing to play and are very well made; they also don't make the game too repetitive, despite being a bit repetitive at times, but due to how great they are, the game is barely repetitive.
    • First of all, there's the regular action stages, which are the best genre of the game, as they are extremely fun to play and are very well balanced despite being very hard at times, as expected from a Treasure game.
    • There are also shoot 'em up sections that are not as common as the action stages, but they still are great and feel like a real shoot 'em up game. It's also got flawless controls and hit detection, which makes these stages very fun, but they're still not as amazing as the action stages.
18. The game is decently long because it takes 5 to 7 hours to beat it with the true ending, although when you beat it for the first time, it feels like the game can be beaten in just 1 hour, but no. The long length also helps with the replay values that are big for this game.
19. The replay values are quite high since the game is so fun to play that you would likely replay it over and over if you wanted. The real replay values, however, are when you didn't find some characters and you want to find them to discover who they are that you forgot. The replay values would also count for the difficulty since every difficulty mode is different, or at least a bit different.
20. There's three difficulty modes that are well balanced and feel different: easy mode is where you get a lot of special attack gauges that are much easier to replish and get more than 70 at the same time. It's recommended to play on easy if you had a hard time with the normal mode; normal mode is where there's only 5 times we can get a special attack; hard mode is where the enemies are way stronger and can kill you extremely easily; it's also harder to replish your gauges of special attacks.
21. The difficulty is challenging and not too unbalanced for most parts, especially in the hard mode, where you will have to train to beat the hard mode, as expected from a treasure game.
22. The North America version is even better than the original Japanese version of the game since it's got some improvements that, while minor, feel like great improvements to make the game even better, such as:
    • Adding a health meter for the bosses, which is a very great change considering that some of the bosses take a long time to get down, would give you an idea of when the boss will die.
    • It's also added more polish to the difficulty setting since, since the original Japanese version only had two difficulty modes called normal and difficult, the NA version also had easy, normal, and extra difficulty modes to balance it much more.
    • It's added some couple enemies that weren't in the Japanese version; this makes for more variety in the game.
    • It's fixed some of the slowdown of the original Japanese version, despite still having some slowdown but not as much as before.
    • It's an add-languages section that has over six languages.
    • And finally, it's adjusted some of the level layout to be much better and less unbalanced. This is an awesome change since it's made some levels even better than the Japanese version.
23. The upgrades are very good and fun to use, especially the lasers and the jets upgrade, which is the best of them all. The punches are also great to use as an upgrade.
24. The final boss is extremely epic and one of the best of the entire game due to having a cool-looking background, and the boss also had a very cool design that made him one of the best bosses of the entire game, although he can kill you very easily and make you get.
25. Due to how amazing this game is, it's ended up being not only the best Astro Boy game but also one of the best games on the Game Boy Advance and even one of the best games ever in general.
26. Great ending. Spoiler: After Astro beat the final boss, he did sacrifice himself to save the world, and he saved Nuka from danger.

Bad Qualities

1. The Western title is misleading since Omega Factor is actually a hazardous device that gives an evil mind to a robot or even deprives it of its mind. It's also the screen where you can see all the characters you have to talk with.
2. Having the true ending and especially doing 100% is an absolute nightmare since you have to look everywhere to see the characters, even in the places where you might think that they aren't here. In fact, it's nearly impossible to beat the game at 100% without watching a longplay or a guide to the game.
   • Finding clues for unlocking Chapter 8 is extremely confusing and one of, if not the worst, parts of the entire game since you had to do a lot of backtraking to get them, and this can last horribly long. In fact, you will need a guide to do this more easily or watch a longplay.
   • Finding the characters is very hard too since you have to look out everywhere in order to find them more easily. Also,  some of them are nearly impossible to know where they are, such as the character in the 2-3 level, not to mention that you need to find them to get your stats to be better and stronger.
   • Sometime you had to fight or find secret characters, but the problem is that you can only do it when you finish all of the rebirth stages, and after you do that, you can do it, most notably Blue Knight.
3. While the difficulty is challenging and decently balanced, it can sometimes be extremely frustrating and very unbalanced, especially in hard mode, which is almost as hard as Dark Soul, and no, this is not a joke.
   • The boss fights, despite being awesome, are notable too, as some of them do an incredible amount of damage that makes you die in only 3 or 4 hits, or some of them even have instant kill attacks that make you die in only one hit, making them very frustrating and unbalanced.
   • The chapter 8 is also notable for being extremely hard and likely the hardest chapter of the entire game as it is a big level with a really hard shoot-em up section and a boss rush that if you die in it you had to restart the entire boss rush all over again. This is a major problem because there's not a heart that can give you life, and as said before, there are no checkpoints because if you die you had to restart the entire boss rush again at the beginning.
     • At the end of the chapter, you had to escape and survive 47 seconds without getting hit in order to not die, but the problem is that the obstacles are way too big, and you can easily be hit by them if you're not careful or if you had a hard time escaping them, so it's easier said than done.
     • In fact, the fact that you restart the entire boss rush if you die makes the level drag on for horribly long and can make it take two hours if you die over and over just to pad the game length. While the boss rush itself is decent, it is ruined by the lack of checkpoints that make this level one of the hardest of the entire game.
     • Not to mention that the two last bosses have instant kill attacks, as said before, and that can make these fights extremely hard. Not to mention that it's even worse in the hardest difficulty of the game since they do a ridiculous amount of damage and you can easily die in 3 hits or a bit more.
   • The level 6-3 had an awful lot of big circles that are very hard to dodge and are almost impossible due to their big hitbox. They also do a horrible amount of damage that makes you die in only 4 hits if you get hit by them a lot. This is even more of a problem in the rebirth stages since there's no checkpoints for that part until chapter 8.
4. In the first part of the game before going to the rebirth stages, when you beat the game and have a bad ending, if you lose a character to unlock and find, then you have to restart all over again just to find that specific character. This is a problem when you don't know that you can find them in the rebirth stages too.
5. Not all of the games that use the gameplay style of this game are good, such as the awful DS port of Astro Boy: The Video Game that is much more clunky and boring than this game and is overall a massive downgrade from this game.
6. Some levels lack checkpoints, which makes some of the levels even harder than they already are due to how many checkpoints there are, especially in comparison to most of the levels that had checkpoints, even if they sometimes lack a lot of them.
   • This is especially horrible for Chapter 8, which is one of the hardest for this reason, along with some other reasons, as the boss rush doesn't have any checkpoints, even if you die in the last boss of it. When you die, you go back to the very first boss of the boss rush.
   • The rebirth stages also completely lack checkpoints since when you die, you can continue, but that makes you go back to the stage select screen instead of continuing in the stage.
7. At times, the game doesn't tell you what you had to do to do the objectives correctly, such as when Astro had to get his sensors to the LV3 to know what Dr. Black Jak said to his sidekick for getting a clue, or when you had to find clues, it was extremely confusing to do so due to that.
8. The Japanese version, while still an awesome game, is less polished because it was rushed to be released there before Treasure made some improvements to the game before releasing it. This would include the fact that there's only two difficulty modes, more slowdown, and some level layouts that are not so great compared to the American version.

Reception

Astro Boy: Omega Factor reveived very positive reviews and is considered to be one of the best game of the Game Boy Advance and an underrated gem, on Metacritic, the game had a score of 85/100, which make it one of the highest rated game of the Game Boy Advance library and the highest rated game of the Astro Boy franchise.

Trivia

• The game was originally called Astro Boy Tetsuwan Atom: Heart no Himitsu (Astro Boy Tetsuwan Atom: The Heart's Secret).
• Kokoro was renamed to Omega Factor, despite the fact Omega Factor is the opposite in the series actual canon.
• The pictures of each stage resemble the covers of Osamu Tezuka Manga Complete Works edition manga books.
• The V3 robots that appear on Cruciform Island are from the Big X manga.
• Stage 4 is still named "Lord Deadcross" in Rebirth as well as him appearing on the cover, despite the fact that Rock doesn't appear as him at all. Similarly, Shadow still appears on the cover of Stage 7 despite being replaced by Blue Knight.
• During the Marine Express part of Stage 5, the music plays a few notes similar to the theme song of Undersea Super Train: Marine Express.
• Stage 6 is named after the "Lost World", one of Tezuka's manga. But in spite of this, the stage is based on the third part of Undersea Super Train: Marine Express taking place in Mu.
• The character profiles incorrectly state that Nuka was blown up in front of Astro in the 1980's anime instead of dismantled.
• Jetter Mars, Fumoon, Magma, Hecate, and Abercrombie also appear in the game. Abercrombie is automatically entered into the Omega Factor and in Rebirth he is required to be encountered again to find Duke Red and fight Blue Knight. Ambassador Magma is required in order to complete what happens on Fire Vase Island. The rest are really optional (along with Unico and Dr. Tenma), but Hecate foreshadows Prime Rose and Daichi's relationship.
• Even though many of Osamu Tezuka's characters appear in the game, there still some quite notable who are absent. Aside from the ones mentioned above, these include Chief Nakamura, Dr. Saruta, Marvelous Melmo, Sasaki Kojiro, Hyoutan-tsugi, Spider, and the avatar of Osamu Tezuka himself.
• The gameplay of the Nintendo DS game based on the American CGI film was based on this game.
• The combat of this game is very similar to that of Tiny Toon Adventure: Buster Bad Dream which was released in 2002, 1 year before this game.

Tips

• When there's too much projectiles coming at you or if you want to beat a boss more easily, use the shoot special attack to stun the ennemies boss or killing the projectiles before they hit you, this is especially recommended in the chapter 8 due to how hard it is without it.
• For finding all of the characters or the clues, it is recommended to watch either a video of the game on YouTube or having a guide of the game for helping you find them all.
• After finishing chapter 8, make sure you don't skip over the screen with "THE END" on it until you see one last conversation (it takes about 2 minutes of waiting), then you will get Sharaku for the final spot on your Omega Factor, if you do skip it then Sharaku doesn't appear on your Omega Factor.

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