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Last Topic's Ratings:
American Pool - AAB - 33% (3)
Mega Man 8 - AGGGGGGGGGAGGGGA - 91% (16)
Ninku - AA - 50% (2)
Persona - GAGGGGGG - 94% (8)
Racing Lagoon - AGGAG - 80% (5)
Robo Pit - AAA - 50% (3)
Wow, Mega Man really turns out the vote, I think this is the first time the PS1 topic has outdrawn the N64 one since it launched. Interesting how even what's considered to be a lesser Megaman title still rates so highly.
Games for this topic:
Ark of Time
Cool Boarders 2
Dune 2000
Hugo
Sports Car GT
Tobal No 1
An interesting collection of games this time. I think this is the first Hugo game, but the release dates on GF are all over the place so it's almost impossible to be sure.
Ark of Time - A
ReplyDeleteCool Boarders 2 - A
Dune 2000 - A
Hugo - B
Sports Car GT - A
Tobal No 1 - B
Ark of Time is a globe-trotting point and click adventure game that reminds me a lot of Broken Sword, though in most ways it's clearly not quite as good. Unlike Broken Sword's gorgeous animated backdrops, this game uses prerendered scenes, though they are nowhere near the quality of those found in Grim Fandango (and the game doesn't have nearly the sense of style, either). The game is also fully voice acted, but the writing is merely serviceable and rarely particularly humourous. That being said, the core game is fine and I appreciate the fact that most of the puzzles aren't especially obtuse, it just doesn't really do a ton to stand out from its contemporaries.
Cool Boarders 2 is a significant expansion to the first game, but I don't actually feel like the gameplay has been improved all that much, as most of the issues from the original game save for the lack of content remain. Most particularly, the game's trick system sucks, not only are tricks locked behind obscure combinations of directions and shoulder buttons, they are also extremely unresponsive, with inputs frequently failing to register entirely, especially when you attempt to combine grabs with spins or flips. The racing action feels fine, but it's really only half the game, particularly in the competition mode where failing to perform well on the big air section effectively makes winning the race impossible. On the plus side, compared to the first game there is way more to do and you can actually race against the AI this time, so that's a plus, though I feel like the soundtrack is inferior to the first game. With a little more refinement this could definitely be decent but it's not quite there yet.
Dune 2000 is functionally a remake of Dune 2, which carries most of the pros and cons you'd expect. For starters, obviously Dune 2 is a classic and was quite advanced for its time. The core gameplay has not seen many changes, but remains solid nonetheless. Graphically, the game is decently upgraded, with the units and buildings looking much better and the addition of cutscenes inbetween missions with full voice acting. Something that hasn't really been improved unfortunately is the interface, which now feels somewhat dated. In particular, combat in this game is fairly cumbersome, with the game lacking a proper attack move command and units generally not having very good combat AI (for example, if assigned to attack an enemy group, units will destroy enemy units within their range, then stop attacking rather than targetting long range units in the back, especially if they are not personally being attacked), which makes the game fairly heavy on micro and obviously microing is awkward with the PS1 controller. Also don't expect unit queues or anything like that, you have to order each unit individually, so there's a lot of menu navigation as well. If you can get used to the controls it's a solid game with a lot of content, though obviously PC would be the most optimal way to play it. If you specifically want an RTS for PS1, I'd probably go with Warcraft 2 over this, as its PS1 port just generally feels more polished.
Hugo is a very weird experience to play. I suppose, in a certain sense, Hugo was one of the first "mobile" games, and it's still very evident in the Playstation port, having very simple gameplay where you just press a few buttons and try to get a high score. It can be entertaining for a few minutes, but very quickly grows repetitive and dull across the kind of longer play sessions that you'd probably expect from a Playstation game. While I'm sure the show was novel in its day, the novelty doesn't really last long when removed from the contest atmosphere, leaving the home port as somewhat of a historical curiousity but probably not one people would want to spend much time playing.
DeleteSports Car GT is another racing game in the same vein as Gran Turismo, though I feel it does little to really stand out. Compared to Ford Racing and Advan Racing, it is clearly worse and more generic, in particular its customization options are very lacking (there's a single upgrade you can get per car class per category), which kills much of the feeling of progression, and while the game is divided into seasons like in Ford Racing, you can simply restart the season at any time so this barely matters. Despite this, the physics and graphics are both decent so it's not a bad game by any means, and on a system with less GT-like games this might actually be a low G, but the competition in the genre is simply too strong on PS1 for a game like this to really stand out.
I tried to give Tobal No 1 a chance, but yeah, this game is clearly bad. For starters, the fighting is incredibly generic, it's a very basic string fighter with a block and jump button (why?) whose only interesting feature is its grapple system, but it's not nearly enough to keep the core tournament mode interesting beyond a couple fights. The quest mode should be the game's standout feature, but far too much of it is wasted on awful platforming, with actual fighting occupying maybe 20% of your time at best. The one good thing you can say about this game is that the framerate is very good, but that's not really that impressive when the core game offers almost nothing interesting.