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Gamefaqs Link
Last Topic's Ratings:
Astal - GAAAAAGGAA - 65% (10)
Dark Legend - AGGA - 75% (4) (1 SR)
Hissatsu Pachinko Collection - AA - 50% (2)
Impact Racing - BAB - 17% (3)
Virtua Cop - AAGAGABG - 63% (8)
World Series Baseball - GGAGA - 80% (5)
I was pleasantly surprised by the huge number of ratings for Astal, which looked like an obscure game to me. A game that definitely needs more people to play it though is Dark Legend, that's one of my favourite GAB finds in a while.
Games for this topic:
Capcom Generation 2
Croc: Legend of the Gobbos
Funky Head Boxers
Need for Speed
NFL 97
Night Striker S
A quick note, there are two versions of Funky Head Boxers, Funky Head Boxers and Funky Head Boxers Plus. As far as I can tell, these are completely identical except that one boxer is swapped out, so you can treat them interchangeably. Funny enough, there's much more difference between the PS1 and Saturn versions of Croc and NFS.
Capcom Generation 2 - G
ReplyDeleteCroc: Legend of the Gobbos - A
Funky Head Boxers - G
Need for Speed - A
NFL 97 - B
Night Striker S - G
Capcom Generation 2 is a compilation of Ghouls n' Ghosts, Ghosts n' Goblins, and Super Ghouls and Ghosts. The first two are the Arcade versions, so if you've played the titles from the NES and Genesis, there are some upgrades here, and interestingly I feel like these versions actually feel slightly easier than the console games. There's not a ton to say here other than that this is a very solid collection. As with Capcom Generation 1, the emulation quality is excellent and Capcom has provided a nice gallery with promotional art, concept art, and some secrets for the games, which really helps flesh out the collection. There's pretty much no question that when it came to making digital collections of older games in this era, Capcom was the king.
Croc is pretty much the exact same game as on PS1. Compared to that version, the camera is a little more zoomed in, which has its pros and cons, and the texture work seems to be a touch better, but it's otherwise identical. As before, the game is a decent 3D platformer with not so great controls. Something I didn't touch upon before when we talked about it is that besides the tank controls, you also have the option for analog controls, though these are pretty bad, similar to those in Ninpen Manmaru, so the tank controls are generally the way to go. One thing this game does benefit from is that it doesn't have to go up against Mario 64 or Crash Bandicoot on Saturn, where it actually has some room to shine as one of the system's better 3D platformers, but I still don't think this is enough to elevate it above the A range. It's certainly way better than Bug, at least.
Funky Head Boxers is actually really fun. For starters, I absolutely love this game's visual style. Each Boxer is represented as a low poly man with a cube for a head with a digitized face on it, which changes as things happen (like attacking, getting hit, etc). It looks absolutely hilarious and is a great example of how to create a really nice looking game with a low polygon count. It plays pretty well too. It's a fairly simplistic boxing game, there's two punch buttons and a block button, and you can hold up or down to target the head vs the body. As with many boxing games, regular punches are not really reactable, you sort of have to guess where to defend, but there is a bit of nuance to this. Jabs to the head are weak but safe, while body blows are strong but unsafe, if you block a body blow, you can jab the opponent to the face for free. So usually, you want to jab, and thus you want to block high, but that opens you up to the body blow, but if you call out their body blow with a block, you get to hit them, which adds an interesting sort of Rock Paper Scissors mechanic to the game. Beyond basic punches, there are also super punches, which are inputted with standard fighting game style commands. These are very telegraphed and incredibly unsafe on block (you can often even punish with your own super punch), but each one typically involves some kind of dodge or feint at the beginning, allowing them to counter certain types of punches. It creates an interesting kind of back and forth and helps matches avoid feeling stale. The game has a fairly standard campaign mode, where you take on boxers to climb the ranks, and inbetween matches you get to do training to improve your stats or learn new super punches. This is nothing we haven't seen before, but it's appreciably simple and briskly paced and works well with the game's solid gameplay and visuals. One issue with the game is that KOing opponents is super hard, even if you have only a sliver of health left you usually get up on the 9 count, so TKOs are usually your only option to end matches early, but at least the maximum round count is only 4 so even matches that go the distance don't take that long. Overall, this is just a pretty fun game and one of my favourite takes on the sport.
DeleteUnlike Croc, Need For Speed 1 seems to feel a fair bit better on Saturn compared to PS1. For starters, the Saturn version of the game performs better. The menus on the PS1 version are very poorly done, when you change tracks for example the game will freeze for a second or two before just instantly swapping to the next track, whereas on Saturn it animates smoothly. The game also seems to run at a higher framerate during gameplay. Most importantly, though, the Saturn version also seems to handle somewhat better. On PS1, when you're going fast, your car simply doesn't turn. This is still somewhat the case on Saturn, but less so, making it more possible to adjust your position at high speeds. You still have to break a lot on the corners, but racing does feel a fair bit better here, and the game also feels somewhat easier, possibly as a result of the improved handling. It's still a far sight from what NFS will become, but you can at least kind of see a little bit of promise here.
NFL '97 is a dud. I often talk about how with most types of sports games, you can tell if the game is good instantly by looking at a single mechanic. For baseball, it's fielding, and for Football, it's passing. This game has maybe the worst passing of any football game I've ever played. It has the "pass targets are assigned to buttons" system that some other football games have, but it's really just a suggestion here, as I will often push the button assigned to a player to instead have the QB either refuse to pass at all or pass the ball off into space. Running plays are a little better, but not much, at least you can perform the handoff fairly consistently, but your spin deke move is really just for show and does nothing to dodge tackles, making these plays unlikely to gain much yardage. Defending is okay I guess, you just press one button to tackle but it works well enough, but offense is so poor that it makes drags the whole game down. The presentation is incredibly barebones as well, the players all look the same and there's no commentary or visual flair whatsoever. Apparently Sega actually didn't make this game, it was made by Gametek, who later released an upgraded / sequel to this game on PS1 called Jimmy Johnson VR Football 98, which is similar but drastically better, as the passing control in that version of the game works properly (and includes numerous other improvements, like an icon showing the direction of a pass target if they are offscreen), so if you do want to play this game, get that version instead.
DeleteNight Striker S is a pretty cool game. It's conceptually quite similar to Space Harrier, you control a car that can also take the the skies and fly, and you drive into the screen while shooting at enemies coming towards you. Compared to Space Harrier, it's a vastly more intense and chaotic game, which IMO helps the concept substantially. Stages tend to be fairly short, but there are boatloads of enemies and obstacles to deal with. Initially, I had some trouble keeping up with the chaotic nature of the game, one thing that kinda bugs me is that when you destroy enemies, they explode into particles that come towards the screen, and the visual clutter can be mistaken for enemy projectiles, which are a similar colour. Speaking of which, enemy projectiles also have a strange design where when initially fired, they are blue (as are your shots), but they turn orange as they approach. My eyes gradually adjusted to it, though, and after a couple runs I wasn't taking many hits anymore, save for in the stages where you have to avoid obstacles like walls, which come at you super fast and their vertical positioning is sometimes hard to gauge due to the game's scrolling system. That said, you can take quite a lot of hits and the game gives you more health every stage, so even if you get disoriented now and then it's not too unforgiving. One neat mechanic in the game is that it has the same branching stage system found in Darius, where each stage branches to one of two different stages, which gives the game a fair bit of replay value. There's also a Saturn exclusive "extra mode" which consists of a single, very hard set of stages, which you can play if you find the standard game too easy (circle dodging is quite strong in most of the regular stages, but not so much in the extra game). A particular highlight of this game to me were the boss fights. Each area has a different boss, and they're quite varied. Some bosses consist of a single, powerful entity, but many of them are instead fought in groups, which feels novel for this type of game. For example, the boss of the Sea stage is a squad of mechs. Each of them only takes a couple hits to go down, but there's so many that you'll want to focus on eliminating some as quickly as possible to reduce the number of shots coming at you. The stage themes can appear multiple times throughout the game, but if they appear later the bosses are upgraded, for example with the mech squad boss, after destroying the regular squadron, you then face an elite mech which has substantially more health and firepower. The game also has a cool sense of visual style and a rockin soundtrack, which helps keep the experience rolling. There's a bit of a learning curve for sure with this one, but once you get into the groove it feels pretty cool, especially once you get to transform into your super form on the final stage.
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