Trauma Team offers a lot of gameplay for the price. Gameplay is split between six medical disciplines - Surgeon, EMT, Orthopedics, Endoscope Tech, Diagnostician, and Forensics Examiner. Though some modes, like Orthopedics and EMT are a bit on the short side, others, like Forensics (
CSI without sunglasses or bad jokes) or Diagnostics (
House without Vicodin or snark), offer nearly 10 - 12 hours of play in one section. Atlus could have easily spilt the game into 2 - 3 smaller games and it would have been just as compelling a buy.
All six sections feature their own unique stories, though there is some overlap. Patients encountered in the EMT section will often show up in either Orthopedics or Surgery. There's no fixed structure, allowing you to jump between jobs whenever the mood strikes, but the overlapping plots still manage to tell a complete story without seeing one part or the other. Characters will also pop-up between plotlines. For instance, a drug dealer encountered during an Event in one section shows up as an Endoscopy patient where you're asked to remove bags of drugs. As with past games, Trauma Team doesn't shy away from "grown-up" issues. In addition to the drug dealer, it tackles bio-terrorism, suicide and depression. There's even some non-patient partial nudity. The visuals may suggest kid-friendly, but Trauma Team earns its "T" rating.
For the most part, procedures flow nicely and follow a good pace for what you're doing. Surgeries feel pressing, but without feeling too rushed, while EMT work will likely pull you out of your seat and have you leaning forward. Even in co-op games, where players are essentially able to split duties, every operation is intense and incredibly exhilarating. In single-player, the adrenalin comes from performing everything yourself; in co-op it's a matter of trying to manage a kitchen full of cooks. Some matches force you to split the tools and work in tandem, while others split the workload but not the time limit. The only time pacing slows is when characters decide to talk, tossing up a screen-obscuring thought bubble and a mandatory "Press 'A' to continue" button prompt. It's not bad in slower procedures, but can absolutely kill faster-paced EMT actions.