Along with their Harvest Moon titles, Natsume also displayed CIMA: The Enemy for the Game Boy Advance at E3. The game is the first in what is supposed to be a three-part series, and, according to the company's Director of Operations, Graham Markay, they are hoping to turn it into a full-blown multimedia franchise.

The setting of the story is a world inhabited by two races: humans, and the CIMA, semi-human creatures who are--as the title would suggest--the game's antagonists. The real draw of the game, however, is the innovative constitution of your party. You take full control of main character Arc J, a Gate Guardian, who is followed wherever he goes by Elly. There are four other characters who only move where you tell them to move. You can select each of the four so-called "Active Player Characters" (APCs) individually, or all together, and then you have three markers that direct exactly where the characters will move. They will only follow straight lines between each set of points, meaning that if there is obstructing material, they'll get stuck.

The main meat of the game is puzzle solving, using your APCs to get through the levels that have various gates, weight-sensitive triggers and floating platforms. Enemies are dispatched by Ark in a purely hack-n-slash manner. The whole experience is surprisingly fun, with each of the puzzles posing at least a semblance of a challenge.

The game was playable via the Game Boy Player, though I suspect that this harmed the visuals more than it helped. The colors look washed out, and the sprites don't scale all that well. I suspect that the graphics will look a lot better on the Game Boy Advance proper.

CIMA: The Enemy provides a breath of fresh air on the Game Boy Advance, providing an experience that is innovative and entertaining. Gamers ready to try something different should keep an eye out for the game when it is released later this year.