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Last Topic's Ratings:
Aero Fighters Assault - AAABB - 30% (5)
BattleTanx - GGGAAG - 83% (6)
Micro Machines 64 Turbo - GAAGG - 80% (5)
Nushi Tsuri 64 - BGGG - 75% (4)
South Park - ABAABABAA - 33% (9)
WCW Nitro - BBGBBBB - 14% (7)
I realize upon looking over the list of games again that pretty much every game in this topic can be seen as somewhat divisive, so I'm actually a bit surprised that some of them rated as well as they did.
Games for this topic:
Aidyn Chronicles: The First Mage
F1 Racing Championship
NBA Jam 2000
Pokemon Snap
Rugrats in Paris: The Movie
Star Wars Episode 1 Racer
I'm looking forward to finally trying out Aidyn Chronicles after hearing a lot about it over the years.
Aidyn Chronicles: The First Mage - A
ReplyDeleteF1 Racing Championship - G
NBA Jam 2000 - G
Pokemon Snap - G
Rugrats in Paris: The Movie - B
Star Wars Episode 1 Racer - G
Aidyn Chronicles: The First Mage is the very definition of a mixed bag. By far the most impressive thing about the game are its large, open area maps, which cover a massive area and with no loading zones, which is a definite rarity for this generation. It also features a fairly cool progression system, characters have many skills, stats, and spells, and you can use the exp you gain after battle to upgrade them in any way you see fit. Combined with the fact that you have a choice of many different characters to recruit, this gives you quite a lot of freedom in terms of how you want to construct your party. It also features visible encounters which can be avoided, which is another rarity for this gen. Unfortunately, there are a number of bad things about it as well. The biggest problem is that the entire game feels quite slow. The game's large area maps somewhat work against it here, as you do not run very fast, so getting from one area to another takes quite a while. Battles are also long, the game features a strategy battle system somewhat akin to Quest 64 (though with no real time aspects) where each character has a certain movement radius, which basically means that unless you're using magic (which requires reagents and reduces your HP, so it must be used sparingly, at least early on) or ranged weapons, you'll be spending a few turns closing in on the enemies before any combat happens. Attack animations are long and evasion is common, and low health enemies will often try to flee battle, which only serves to make even simple battles even more drawn out. The game's presentation is also generally quite bad, obviously character models are very primative given the era, but the game also features a very amateurish soundtrack and a truly awful framerate. In many ways, the game kind of strikes me as a vastly more ambitious version of Quest 64. Like that game, it definitely doesn't feel like the kind of RPG you'd see on PS1, but compared to Quest some aspects are more impressive but I think the moment to moment gameplay in Quest is generally more fun, owing largely to the better battle system in Quest.
F1 Racing Championship is a pretty solid F1 game. It controls well and has good graphics, the tracks look and feel distinct from each other and it has a solid framerate. The thing I appreciate most about the game is the car tuning feature, which strikes a good balance between depth and accessibility, I quite like how the game instantly displays the way the settings changes you make will affect your car's performance. I often ignore tuning options in racing games but here I was able to tweak my car to my liking quite quickly and it performed noticeably better. I also like the variety of options available and general ease of navigation of the menus. One issue people might have with it is that there's only 8 tracks, but they're all decently long so it doesn't really feel like it's not enough. The game is also pretty muted from an audio perspective, with basically nothing other than engine noises (there's no in-race commentary or music), but it boasts superior technical performance and controls to a lot of other games that beat it in that department and I think it's probably worth the tradeoff.
I was expecting NBA Jam 2000 to mostly be the same thing as NBA Jam 99, but surprisingly, it's actually very significantly improved. For starters, it now actually feels like NBA Jam to some degree. The game now has two modes, the Sim mode, which is effectively the same as Jam 99, and the new Jam mode, which is a 2-on-2 game with Turbo, pushing, fire, and it actually feels somewhat like NBA Jam. They've also improved the commentary, which is more energetic, and just generally the entire package just feels much better overall. There's also a create-a-player feature, and while it feels more basic compared to hangtime, it's still appreciated to have it in the game. NBA Hangtime is clearly still a lot better for the core Jam experience, and NBA Showtime is Jam done better in 3D, but the fact that this is basically two games in one does give it decent value as an overall package. At the very least, I respect the developers for actually listening to feedback and trying to improve the game in a genre where many titles are just yearly rehashes.
DeleteI have to agree with pretty much everyone else that Pokemon Snap is an awesome concept that drastically needs a new game. Even before we get to the gameplay, I'd like to touch on the presentation, which is top notch. Besides looking great, the Pokemon also sport a pretty diverse set of animations and behaviours, and the use of actual voice acting rather than the digitized cries helps a lot (seriously, get on this mainline games). The high level of attention to detail in the Pokemon behaviour is a lot of what makes the core gameplay so enjoyable, there's a surprising amount of nuance to the scoring system and it's fun figuring out how to manipulate the pokemon to get a perfect shot. Unfortunately, the game doesn't really do a lot with the scoring system, your total points are used to unlock some upgrades for the cart, but it's not hard to get them all, so there's not a ton of incentive to go for the really great shots, which feels like a bit of a waste. The game is also pretty short and the final stage is very disappointing compared to the rest of the game, but it's still fun while it lasts. As many have noted, this is a game that drastically needs a sequel, there's so much unused potential here that it's no surprise people bring this game up every time a new Nintendo system comes out.
Rugrats in Paris has some interesting concepts, but its execution is so bland that it's basically impossible to care about them. The core idea is that you can explore a giant theme park and play mini-games, which should be fun, but it's so incredibly empty and bland that it gets boring almost immediately. The theme park, while large and detailed, is completely devoid of other people or enemies and feels extremely lifeless, not at all helped by the fact that the N64 version lacks the voice acting and most of the ambient sounds from the PS1 version. The minigames themselves are tolerable, with the mini golf game probably being the standout, I actually kind of like how you actually have to walk up to your ball to hit it, but many of the minigames can't be played until you buy a specific item from the gift shop, which requires either collecting a ton of red tickets from throughout the park or farming them through minigames, both of which take forever and are very tedious. Compared to Scavenger Hunt, I feel like this game is clearly worse, even if it is maybe slightly more thematically suited to the franchise, it feels like it has vastly less personality due to the lack of voice acting, and it's also significantly less fun. This one is a definite skip.
DeleteEveryone knows that Star Wars Episode 1 Racer was about the only good thing to come out of the prequel trilogy (well, maybe that and Darth Maul's double-bladed lightsaber). The game wisely stays away from any kind of narrative and instead focuses on pure racing action based on the one moment from Episode 1 that everyone liked, and it's made quite a good conversion to game form, too! The game sort of generally plays like Wipeout or F-Zero, but with vehicle upgrading. With each race, you'll earn money that you can use to buy better parts, which is actually a fairly nuanced process since parts have durability that wears down over time unless maintained by pit droids. It's fairly easy to cheese the system in various ways (buying high-rank but heavily worn parts from the junkyard and then having pit droids repair them during races can make you absurdly powerful in a hurry), though you can also screw yourself over if you don't know what you're doing because you can only earn money from races the first time. Actually, I feel the upgrading system is probably the worst part of the game, the game also has a ton of characters that you can unlock as you play, but they all have different base stats and share the same podracer, so your pod will probably only be a good fit for the character you start with, and I feel like the multiple characters might have otherwise given the game a lot of replay value, which is one of the areas where the game is most lacking, as with any character, you'll quickly just get good parts to patch up their weak points and then everyone starts to play the same. Still, this aside, this is a pretty awesome racing game with great controls and a lot of tracks. The framerate can be a bit questionable on a couple tracks and that awful swamp stage is the stuff of nightmares, but this still easily ranks among N64's best and most unique racers.