Welcome to another Flashback folks. I dug deep into the original Xbox’s launch to pull out a title that seems eerily similar to an Xbox 360 launch title.  Is Kameo: Elements of Power what Azurik: Rise of Perathia set out to be when it launched with the Xbox? It (Azurik) had all the promises of lush worlds and fantastic creatures but fell so incredibly short on delivery. It sounds so similar to Kameo, which just so happens to have done all of the things that Azurik failed to do and did them all right. In fact let’s look at a description of both titles.Â
Azurik: Rise of Perathia
“Travel the vast realms of Perathia as Azurik, a young apprentice sworn to protect the sacred elements: fire, water, earth, and air. Stop an apocalyptic prophecy already taking place in an extremely immersive, 3-D action-adventure game.”
Kameo: Elements of Power
“The future of the world depends on Kameo, who must master her new ability to transform into various warriors and harness their elemental powers to save her family from Thorn, the evil troll king.”
Hmmmm. Kameo and Azurik both focus on elements and highlight a single, colorful hero who must protect or master those elements in order to save something.  You can see the connection can’t you? Yeah, welcome to the Twilight Zone. It almost feels like Kameo was Microsof’ts little “do-over” once you look at the uncanny similarities in both titles. Could it be that they gave us Kameo to make up for a launch title that they failed so miserably on four years earlier?Â
I’m putting the Next-Gen Meter for Azurik on Low but I wonder if we’ve seen the Azurik of this generation in Kameo. It’s not too far-fetched to think is it?Â
Flashback Game: Azurik: Rise of Perathia
Released: November 1 2001
Platform: Xbox
Next-Gen Meter: Low
 
May 15th, 2008 at 1:29 pm
I’m surprised that there has been a sequel to Kameo yet.
May 15th, 2008 at 2:01 pm
well Rare’s too busy working on Viva 2 and Banjo but there absolutely should be a sequel to Kameo!
May 15th, 2008 at 5:27 pm
Actually Deac, Kameo was being planned for the Gamecube before Microsoft bought out Rare: http://www.gametrailers.com/player/usermovies/34552.html
AND Kameo was originally going to come out on the original XBOX (http://www.gametrailers.com/player/usermovies/167114.html) but Microsoft needed some good launch game for the 360 and while developing the console, asked Rare if they’d make it work for the new console.
As you can see from the footage, the Gamecube version is a lot different from what we got on the 360, but the Original Xbox footage is basically the same as the 360 version, with worse textures.
But… back to the story at hand here… I remember playing the Azurik demo that came with one of the OXM magazines (I think). And if I remember correctly I thought it was okay at the time. I don’t think it really wowed me, so I never ended up getting it.
May 15th, 2008 at 5:32 pm
whoa..nice find CPT!
May 15th, 2008 at 5:37 pm
It’s way far-fetched… Kameo was in production since the Gamecube, so they *RARE* had no ties to Microsoft then… Azurik: Rise of Perathia is a game developed by Adrenium Games and published by Microsoft, so it was a bought 3rd party game.
lol Deac, zero correlation between the two.
May 15th, 2008 at 5:46 pm
uhhh i wasn’t THAT serious about it Mike LOL. it’s just food for thought
May 15th, 2008 at 5:54 pm
lol, I know… Just giving you a hard time
You still haven’t played CONAN or Condemned 2 yet, huh?
Let the hard times roll!
May 15th, 2008 at 6:01 pm
dude i’ve been meaning to. i do have both games if that means anything. it’s just that they’re at my little brother’s place
May 15th, 2008 at 6:03 pm
Oh yeah, sure…lol
May 15th, 2008 at 10:10 pm
never played either… partially cuz i wasn’t into xbox before the 360 came out