Is this more than just WarioWare Paramedic Edition?
Live the life of a rookie paramedic through frantic minigame action and a wild, funny story. Juggle waves of patients with a battle-like triage system; master dozens of treatment minigames; and win the city’s recognition from the rival fire department!
I didn’t really know what to expect from Neo Harbor Rescue Squad, but it definitely wasn’t what I had in mind when I started playing. It’s a cross between a visual novel and a collection of rapid mini-games that you’d expect to find in a WarioWare game.
The story itself is full of humour and just plain random madness such as a talking dolphin! Mini-games vary from singular ones or multiple in a row, depending on the injury you are healing. You will need to look at the health bars around each patient as they all dwindle at the same time, so you need to work out which is the most urgent so you don’t miss out on saving them all.
The mini-games can vary from applying bandages by rotating the right-stick in time from left to right or vice versa, using a defibrillator using the triggers in sync, removing glass shards using the left stick and right trigger or aiming a line for an injection. There are others of course, but you will be repeating them a considerable amount. You are also ranked at the end of each chapter depending on how well you’ve done.
The visuals are anime-inspired and there are a few clichés thrown in to double-down on this look, but overall it’s a decent looking game for what it is. The voice-acting is typical too, so could be nice or irritating depending on your own taste. The music is pretty good though with a decent soundtrack throughout.
The Verdict
Neo Harbor Rescue Squad provides some interesting mini-games and an amusing story, but it does tend to repeat injuries so you’ll end up redoing the same mini-games quite a bit. Other than that, there’s not much to complain about. If you are looking for your fix of rapid mini-games, then you can’t go too wrong here.