The holy grail of Dreamcast gaming

Super Magnetic Neo (DC)
Why is Super Magnetic Neo my favorite game of all time? Well, for nostalgic reasons mostly: it was my favorite Dreamcast game and for a long time the Dreamcast was my favorite console. It is a 3D platformer and those are my favorite genre, it stands tall in a generation crowded with good to freaking great games.(Billy Hatcher and the Giant Egg, Mario Sunshine, Voodoo Vince, I-Ninja, Vexx, Tork, Sonic Adventure 1 and Heroes, Sly Cooper and the Theivius Racoonus, Ratchet and Clank 2 and 3, Jak and Daxter, as well as Daxter [PSP]) But mostly I still love it so much because it keeps pulling me back, something the exceptional Rayman 2 unfortunately has not done. First things first Neo is HARD as fucking nails, especially the last 40% of the game. Something that obviously caused the nancy boy who reviewed it for IGN to give it an unfair 6.9. Just head over to Youtube to get a glimpse of the bright, vibrant visuals and the wonderful score. What that won't tell you however is that this was an early second gen game that a) still looks amazing b) runs at a constant 60 fps, providing sublime control and c) is filled with wonderful play mechanics never seen before of since. Genki the devs behind all this magic have you flinging happy go lucky Neo all over hell and back, up and down, to and fro. If you have a gaming rig that can emulate Dreamcast games this deserves to be your next stop. If, however, you have to pony up $30-40 to the ebay gods to play this woefully under appreciated masterwork then I do have to forewarn you that this game gets Mega Man/Dark Souls hard in the end. The last boss is giving me a pain in the ass right now. For slightly more casual gamers: B+. For lovers of 3D platformers/hard games: A-.
Super Magnetic (Chris)

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Image
Viva la Vita I finally picked up the PlayStation Vita before I went on vacation last year and wow am I blown away by this little bad boy. The thing just kicks all kinds of ass. It fixes almost all of the PSP's short comings while offering the best on the go core gaming experience on the market. (although I'm sure the Switch will have something to say about that in the future) The Original model is just fantastic: Proper analog sticks, plus smaller, better buttons, a great D-pad, OLED wonderfulness, front and rear touchscreens. Amazing graphics and a good selection of games. Uncharted, Borderlands 2, Killzone, Unit 13, Jet Set Radio, The Unfinished Swan, Sly Cooper Theives in time, LittleBigPlanet, Rayman, Tearaway. Then there's the smaller, mostly 2D goodness: Fez, Risk of Rain, Super Meat Boy, Steam World Dig, Guacamelee, Velocity 2x, Soldner X 2, Sound Shapes, Bastion, Mutant Blobs Attack, Resogun and SHOVEL KNIGHT. God, Risk of Rain and Shovel Kinght are total revel
Read more

Switch Ports you should avoid

Work in progress... These won't all be terrible ports but certainly not good enough ones. let's begin with the metro 2033 and last light ports. While these are very good games the dynamic lighting is completely absent from these ports (understandably so, the Switch doesn't have the processing grunt of the 360/ps3 era).The downgraded visuals just aren't good enough without that lighting: robbing the game of its ambiance and atmosphere, even on the small screen. Demon Turf: this is a small indie game so it's probably unfair to bad mouth this game for it's bad draw distance but it bugs me. The control isn't great either, the biggest problem with the game is the infuriating checkpoint system. I have a soft spot for 3D platformers and 3D enviroments with 2D sprite characters too, so the fact that i still didn't like this really says something. This is mostly a dislike of the game itself, then the port but I'm not putting more money into this game to find
Read more

Billy Hatcher and the Giant Egg

Image
What's Sonic Team's best game? Sonic 2, Nights, Sonic Adventure, Sonic heroes ? Sonic CD, OK it's definitely not Sonic CD. The definitive answer, for me,  is the GameCube's hidden gem: Billy Hatcher and the Giant Egg. The GameCube game I played the most by far back when it came out, Billy Hatcher is wonderfully inventive and joyously playful with the only negative being the gratingly annoying sound design. These annoying sound effects were, unfortunately, symptomatic of Sega games at the time. Dashing, jump slamming, and throwing the giant eggs just hasn't gotten old. This game just makes me smile, zooming and swinging through the giant hoops, hatching rare items, slaloming around hazards, fighting baddies: this is Sonic Team humming at top gear. The graphics still look great especially the vibrant color palette. This is inventive, compelling and time tested gaming that may have disappeared from today's consoles but is not forgotten, not yet anyway. A-
Read more