This topic is now closed
Gamefaqs Link
Last Topic's Ratings:
Bust-A-Move 2 - GGGGAG - 92% (6) (1 SR)
Castlevania - GGGAAGBGAGBGAAGGB - 68% (17) (1 SR)
Mario Party - GGGGGGGGGGGAAGGG - 94% (16)
Off Road Challenge - AAAAA - 50% (5)
Power League 64 - BAAA - 38% (4)
Ready 2 Rumble Boxing - BABBGB - 25% (6)
I definitely did not expect the original Mario Party to rate that high, especially given the reception to certain other games that have some flaws, like Castlevania. Also, it looks like Ready 2 Rumble didn't deserve to be in the topic title after all.
Games for this topic:
Buck Bumble
FIFA Soccer 64
Hot Wheels Turbo Racing
Mischief Makers
Shin Nippon Pro Wrestling: Toukon Road - Brave Spirits
Vigilante 8
This is another one of those topics where I'm not sure if Buck Bumble or FIFA should be the third game in the topic title. I'll be interested to see how the votes play out.
Buck Bumble - A
ReplyDeleteFIFA Soccer 64 - A
Hot Wheels Turbo Racing - B
Mischief Makers - G
Shin Nippon Pro Wrestling: Toukon Road - Brave Spirits - A
Vigilante 8 - G
Buck Bumble is a lot more average than I remembered. In general, it's a fairly simple flight game with decent controls and a unique concept, but that's about all you can say about it. It suffers from most of the same problems as most other N64 games, namely a somewhat suspect frame rate and a lot of fog, though thankfully they do give you a radar. I feel like the game is actually surprisingly drab from a visual standpoint, which largely squanders its unique premise, the areas are very blocky and look very similar to each other, and the enemy designs are also rarely inspired either. I also think it needs to be pointed out how lousy this game's sound direction is, besides having very generic music there's also far too much buzzing and explosions are way too loud as well, frequently resulting in an audio cacophany that sounds terrible to listen to. The gameplay is serviceable, but this isn't really a title that gives you a lot of reason to come back to it.
FIFA Soccer 64's biggest issue is that International Superstar Soccer 64 exists. They released around the same time, and ISS 64 is just better in every way. For starters, the graphics in FIFA are oddly bad. The players are very low poly and the animations are also fairly lame, which might be excusable given its age if ISS 64 didn't look significantly better. The gameplay is also decent, but lacks ISS 64's depth, and there are some weird issues with pacing, for example the after goal celebrations take a long time and so do things like setting up a corner kick, which, given the frequency with which they occur, quickly becomes grating. The goalies are also kind of oddly bad in this game, which astute readers might notice is something I've praised in hockey games, but in this game it almost feels like every decent shot on net goes in, again I feel this is something ISS handles better. The one thing about this game that is pretty solid is the commentary, but even then ISS has no problems in that regard either. It really just is a clear cut answer of which game was better if you wanted a Soccer game in 97.
Hot Wheels Turbo Racing is pretty much the exact same game as on PS1, so I have all of the same complaints. The handling kind of sucks, the races last way too long, and the thin nature of the tracks makes them all feel the same and also makes turning feel kind of pointless. It's basically just a stunt and turbo simulator, but with no real nuance to where to use the turbos or how to do the stunts it just gets old really fast.
I feel like there's not much I can say about Mischief Makers that hasn't already been said, the game is clearly really fun and unique, I particularly agree with the comment about how varied it is. It's a pretty long game for a 2D platformer, with 52 levels, but it never feels repetitive, in fact it kind of makes you want to keep playing just to see what comes next. One of the areas where I don't agree with the rest of the posters is that I didn't have any issue with the controls, after not playing the game for a long time and seeing everyone talking about them I figured they might be a problem, but I never had any issue. The game does a fairly good job of telling you the controls in the first few levels (which are also definitely on the easy side), and honestly I don't find them to be particularly unintuitive anyway. The one thing I did find however that didn't give with my recollection is that the yellow gems are often not as cleverly hidden as I remembered, with many of them being so obscure that a guide is almost mandatory for them (though IIRC, I did find most of them with no guide the first time I played by just shaking absolutely every object in every stage). Lastly, I'd also like to draw attention to how destructive the game allows you to be to the npc characters. It always kind of makes me laugh that you can toss them around or into spikes / fire with no reprocussions whatsoever.
DeleteBrave Spirits has a fair bit in common with WWF No Mercy, in that it's another fairly simple wrestling game with intuitive controls and solid animations. The biggest difference here is you're getting Japanese wrestlers and I feel the commentary isn't quite as energetic. One thing I do like is that when someone does a move, the game shows you the inputs for that move, which helps you learn how to play, though it still took me a while to figure out how to pin (it's Z + C Up). Generally this game is pretty solid, though I don't feel it's quite on No Mercy's level, in particular I wish there were health bars, the way No Mercy handled them worked really well. It is still a pretty fun time though and I considered G, there's just probably a bit too much competition for wrestling games here.
Vigilante 8 is a car combat game in a very similar vein to Twisted Metal, but the gameplay between them is actually surprisingly different. Compared to Twisted Metal, Vigilante 8 is a much slower game where the cars are much easier to control. Instead of flying around the arena taking occasional potshots at your rivals inbetween looking for health packs as you do in Twisted Metal, there's much more direct dogfighting here, circle strafing to damage each other while occasionally breaking away to look for powerups. It's also substantially easier, in the single player mode you seemingly have a lot more health than your rivals, which makes sense considering there's only one of you and a bunch of them. Overall, the gameplay feels somewhat less nuanced compared to Twisted Metal, but it's also vastly more accessible, which probably makes it a better choice if you're mainly interested in multiplayer.