game corner – Page 32 – Dr. K's Waiting Room

Game Corner: Johto is Still the Best Region in Pokémon

22/10/201708/09/2025Dr. K8 Comments

Make no mistake about it, when Pokémon Blue Version and Pokémon Red Version (Game Freak/Nintendo, 1996) were released in 1996, they didn’t just change the videogame industry; they redefined it completely. While other videogame franchises were extremely popular, Pokémon was an unparalleled phenomenon. Literally, when I was a kid, there was nothing like Pokémon; everyone was into it, everyone played it, everyone wanted more of it. I remember wanting to buy Pokémon Blue so badly that I actually bought it brand new for £5 more than the Red Version just so I could play the edition I wanted. Once we had completed the videogames and traded as much as we could, we extended our experience with the various glitches in the videogames by using the infamous Fly glitch to catch Missingno or .M, obtain a whole bunch of Master Balls, Rare Candies, and vitamins, and also to catch the elusive Mew. I remember playing my version of Pokémon Blue for well over 150 hours fighting the Elite Four over and over again and raise my team to Level 100 and to fully evolve every Pokémon. As we were playing the videogames, everyone was also deeply into the anime, religiously watching and following every episode, and even swapping and comparing their trading cards (though I never actually saw anybody battling with them).

*Buy them all, buy them twice, buy all the merchandise!*

With Pokémon such a huge hit among my generation, and my circle of friends, excitement reached fever pitch with the release of Pokémon the First Movie: Mewtwo Strikes Back (Yuyama, 1998) and when, during the anime, marketing, the film’s fun little short, Pikachu’s Vacation, and the movie itself, we all got our first glimpses of brand new Pokémon. At the time, these Pokémon were referred to as Pikablu and Buru/Snuffle; though they, and Togepi, would later turn out to be rather inconsequential Pokémon in the eventual sequels, they caused a wave of controversy and speculation in the playground. People would catch Missingno’s and rename them “Pikablu” just to trade them into other people’s videogame’s and glitch them out and wild theories ran rampant about how these Pokémon could be caught in Blue, Red, and Yellow Version: Special Pikachu Edition (Game Freak/Nintendo, 1998).

*Anticipation was high for* Gold and Silver.

Anticipation was so hot for the eventual release of Pokémon Gold Version and Pokémon Silver Version (ibid, 1999) that we rushed to download GameBoy emulators and Japanese ROMs of the videogames just to play them. We even saved them onto floppy disks (remember them!?) and brought them into school to play; it didn’t matter that we couldn’t read the Japanese text and had no idea what was going on, we just wanted the new Pokémon videogames that badly! You have to remember that, back then, the Internet was still really new; where I grew up and went to school, I had the most basic of dial-up connections and was never allowed online for more than a few minutes at a time, meaning that our entire stream of information about Gold and Silver was based on speculation, videogame magazines, and the anime. So when we saw more of these new Pokémon appear in Pokémon the Movie 2000: The Power of One (Yuyama, 1998) and in the anime, anticipation was at an all-time high! In the end, I got a copy of Pokémon Silver from my best friend, who gave me a French copy of the videogame that was, as a European cartridge, in English and fully compatible with UK consoles and, let me tell you, the hype was entirely worthwhile.

*Graphical improvements and a striking new rival added to the games’ appeal.*

The improvements in the new videogames were immediate; being on the GameBoy Color, the bold, cartoonish graphics were no longer hindered by the GameBoy’s always-primitive colour palette. In addition, the music and sound effects, already one of the most recognisable and enjoyable aspects of Pokémon, had improved dramatically. Having picked Squirtle in Pokémon Blue, I decided to shake things up and choose the fire-type Pokémon, Cyndaquil, for my new adventure in the Johto region (as a general rule, I stay away from grass-types as I feel they have far too many weaknesses and are ineffective as offensive Pokémon). Unlike Blue and Red, your rival is not a fellow Pokémon trainer but, instead, a young boy accused of stealing one of Professor Elm’s starter Pokémon. After your first encounter with him, you’re given the option of naming him for the police, and run into him at various points throughout the videogame. Unlike the rival from Blue and Red, though, this aspect is not as prominent as it originally was; instead, the narrative emphasis is split across numerous objectives: in addition to bringing your rival to justice, you must also catch all the Pokémon and complete the Pokédex, stop the return of Team Rocket, defeat all of the Gym Leaders and the Elite Four to become the Pokémon Champion, capture the roaming legendary beasts Entei, Raikou, and Suicune, investigate the Ruins of Alph, and capture the legendary Ho-oh and Lugia.

*Gold and Silver introduced a lot of new elements.*

Gameplay-wise, Gold and Silver remained relatively unchanged; alongside super-rare shiny Pokémon, two new Pokémon types were introduced, Steel and Dark, and the Special stat was split into Special Defence and Special Attack (these last three effectively gave players a better chance of combating the previously over-powered Mewtwo). One of the greatest additions to the series ever was a little bar underneath the HP meter that filled up after each battle, allowing you to visually see how many Experience Points your Pokémon had and how close they were to levelling-up; in addition, players were given a Pokégear, which acted as a map, telephone (allowing you to have rematches with trainers you’d previously beaten), and a radio (used for gameplay tips, to awaken sleeping Pokémon, and to pick up transmissions from the Ruins of Alph).

*The Pokémon world was expanded through breeding and two regions for the price of one!*

Other new features included a day and night system (which would not return until 2006), letting your mother save money for you (which would result in her buying you cool toys for your room), the ability to have your Pokémon hold items (including Berries) that could improve their speed, offensive or defensive capabilities, heal or cure status ailments, or to help them evolve, brand new PokéBalls that were more effective at catching specific Pokémon types, and perhaps the most significant gameplay feature: egg hatching. Up to two Pokémon could be left at a Day Care Center which, if the Pokémon are compatible (or if one is a Ditto), will result in the player receiving an Egg. After walking around with the Egg for varying amounts of time, the Egg would hatch, producing either a brand new Pokémon or a Pokémon that knows a move it normally wouln’t. Egg breeding, for some dedicated players, became as instrumental as EV training to crafting the best Pokémon possible; personally, I just used it to fill up the Pokédex with the brand-new Baby Pokémon like Pichu. What really made Johto stand out from Kanto, though, was the sheer size and variety the region allowed; not only could you walk, cycle, surf, and fly around the region, you could also travel up and down waterfalls and through whirlpools to reach new areas and legendary Pokémon. Best of all, and unlike any other region ever, defeating the Johto Elite Four awarded players with the S. S. Ticket which allows them to board the S. S. Aqua and travel back to Kanto! This basically means that you get to revisit every area from Pokémon Blue and Red (excluding the Cerulean Cave) and rebattle not only all of the Kanto Gym Leaders (some of whom are new, including the previous videogame’s rival, and with new Pokémon) but also the Kanto Elite Four!

*In addition to some returning faces, your gender was no longer limited to a boy.*

Make no mistake about it, this is still the greatest post-game feature in any Pokémon videogame. I don’t give a damn about the Battle Frontier or any of that noise and, while hunting down legendary Pokémon is fun and rewarding, nothing beats going back to the previous videogame’s region and, effectively, doubling the length of the videogame. The Pokémon in Kanto are a higher level than before, offering a greater challenge to your now-stronger team, and you can even acquire a Pass to take a train back and forth between the two regions. As no Pokémon videogame since has been as big as Gold and Silver, this, coupled with Pokémon being at the peak of its popularity among my generation at the time, means that Johto is, and will forever be, the greatest region ever seen in all of the franchise. Not only can you battle with a friend using the Link Cable and then battle that friend again whenever you wish by visiting Viridian City, not only can you travel back to Kanto and rebattle all the old Gym Leaders and Elite Four, but, once you have completed this, you gain access to Mt. Silver where, after traversing a difficult mountain cave filled with high-level Pokémon and utilising a whole bunch of HMs, you reach the top of the mountain and are challenged by Red, the player character from Blue and Red in what remains one of the toughest Pokémon battles ever! Finally, there was Pokémon Crystal Version (Game Freak/Nintendo, 2000), a third version of the videogame that, like Pokémon Yellow, expanded and improved upon the Gold and Silver experience. For the first time ever, players could now choose to play as a girl, Pokémon sprites had limited frames of animation to bring them to life, the first of the Battle Towers was included, and the videogame featured a brand-new side-plot involving Suicune and the Unown. Given that it contained the best of both versions, and more, Crystal was probably the preferred title to pick up at the time though, for me, its release coincided with a noticeable drop in popularity for the franchise that would not be rekindled for some time.

*Updated for a whole new generation*, *and brought to life in* Pokémon Adventures.

In 2009, Game Freak and Nintendo released upgraded and enhanced versions of Gold and Silver for the Nintendo DS; Pokémon HeartGold Version and SoulSilver Version brought Johto up to date with the graphical improvements made to the series since the release of Pokémon Diamond Version, Pearl Version, and Platinum Version (ibid, 2006; 2008) while also reintroducing gameplay mechanics not seen since Pokémon Yellow. While Pokémon titles between Pokémon Crystal and HeartGold and SoulSilver were fun, they paled in comparison to the experience offered by Gold and Silver; because of that, having these videogames updated and enhanced on the Nintendo DS was like downing a glass of sweet-tasting nostalgia and finally allowed me to re-capture that same level of excitement that can only be experienced through the eyes of a child. With 251 Pokémon to capture, Gold and Silver’s Pokédex was nowhere near as impossible to complete as today’s 800-plus. Though the mystery surrounding Celebi never came close to that of Mew, and there was never quite the same amount of rampant rumours or glitches in Gold and Silver as in the previous videogames, Johto’s scope, coupled with the numerous new features that only enhanced the gameplay of Blue and Red, made Gold and Silver far superior to their predecessors in every way. While characters like Red and Blue have been semi-recurring throughout the franchise, Gold/Ethan, Silver, and Kris/Lyra have been cruelly overlooked and under-featured in everything but the long-running Pokémon Adventures manga.

Many of the innovative gameplay mechanics introduced in Gold, Silver, and Crystal carried over into later Pokémon titles; shiny Pokémon and egg breeding (and hatching) became recurring themes, hold items gained more prominence, interactivity between the player and non-player characters was increased through various Key Items, Battle Towers were expanded and made increasingly challenging, Pokéballs increased in their variety, and roaming Pokémon became commonplace. However, with each new iteration and expansion, Pokémon always seemed to be striving to recapture the magic of the Johto era. Admittedly, and obviously, a lot of this is due to nostalgia but, for me, Pokémon would never be as popular or as exciting as when Gold and Silver were released and, to this day, I would always choose to revisit Johto above any other Pokémon region, new or old.

Game Corner: THQ/AKI Wrestling Retrospective

01/10/201731/03/2023Dr. K13 Comments

With WWE 2K18 (Yuke’s/Visual Concepts/2K Sports, 2017) due to be released in a couple of weeks, I thought I’d take the time to revisit some classic wrestling titles on everyone’s favourite polygonal home console, the Nintendo 64. Inevitably, with every new WWE videogame released, debates reignite, resurface, and rage on about why (oh, why, just…why?) can we not get a new videogame in the style of WWF No Mercy (Asmik Ace Entertainment/AKI Corporation/THQ, 2000)? Granted, these debates usually occur on extremely adolescent and unruly forums, such as those on GameFAQs, but there is, nevertheless, a good reason for this. Well, actually, there’s two: nostalgia and the fact that AKI and THQ produced some simplistic and yet incredibly deep and addictive wrestling videogames back in the day. The partnership between Asmik Ace Entertainment and the AKI Corporation began way back in 1996, with Virtual Pro-Wrestling on Sony’s PlayStation, which was later published in North America by THQ as WCW vs. The World in 1997. Following this, AKI and THQ’s wrestling titles would be exclusive to the Nintendo 64 for the foreseeable future and the first instance of this collaboration came with the Japan-exclusive Nintendo 64 title Virtual Pro 64.

THQAKIVirtualPro — Virtual Pro-Wrestling *was the precursor to greatness.*

I’m not going to delve too deep into the Virtual Pro series as I never played these videogames; instead, with my young mind only grasping the simplest concepts of the pro wrestling world, my first exposure to the series came with the release of WCW vs. nWo: World Tour (Asmik Ace Entertainment/AKI Corporation/THQ, 1997). When I was a kid, this was the wrestling videogame everyone had and everyone played, to the point where I vividly remember finally getting a copy and playing it all through the night during a sleepover with some friends of mine and driving them to near boredom as I worked to unlock and complete everything as they had done weeks and months before. WCW vs. nWo: World Tour’s roster is split into various factions including the titular WCW and nWo but also some fictional wrestling promotions featuring renamed Japanese wrestlers to dance around tricky copyright issues. Each wrestler has four different attires, allowing you to play as Sting in his surfer persona and Hollywood Hogan in the good old fashioned red and yellow. An interesting twist of irony here is that, these days, people will lose their shit about 2K including five separate versions of Sting, yet players of World Tour should be more than used to this given that you can play as Sting and the imposter Sting recruited by the nWo back in the day.

THQAKIStings — *TWO Stings!? Blasphemy!!*

World Tour introduced many of the gameplay mechanics that would become staples of this videogame series over the coming years; up to four players can play at once in a variety of matches, though only a single player can take on the league challenge to win championship belts and unlock hidden wrestlers. The core gameplay is built around a simple and yet intricately challenging grapple, strike, and reversal system: players perform a light grapple by tapping the A button and a strong grapple by holding the same button. Pressing a direction on the D-pad in conjunction with either the A or B button will see their wrestler perform one of ten different grappling moves, while light or strong presses of the B button alone (or A and B together) will strike the opponent with a kick or a punch. Players can block incoming strikes with the R trigger and counter grapples with the L trigger. Players can also perform submission holds on a downed opponent, dash at their opponents to land running attacks or dodge around them, drag their prone opponent’s body around the ring, climb the corner turnbuckles, exit the ring and grab weapons from the crowd, or taunt by wiggling the analogue stick. Taunting, and successfully countering and landing moves, raises your wrestler’s Spirit meter; once it is full and flashes “SPECIAL!”, players can perform a strong grapple and wiggle the analogue stick to perform their wrestler’s finishing move and attempt a pin fall.

THQAKIPowerbomb — *Nearly every wrestler has a Powerbomb as a Special move.*

And good luck with that; World Tour has a steep difficulty curve, even on the easier settings, that can make some matches last nearly ten minutes at a time as you trade counters and moves with your opponent, constantly egged on by the rising and falling cheers and jeers of the crowd and the thumping bass of the in-game music. However, playing through each challenge and winning championships allows you to fight against, and unlock, a number of hidden characters to add to the already-substantial rosters (even Muhammad Ali shows up…as “Joe Bruiser”, whose entire moveset consists of punches!) Sporting a distinct cel-shaded appearance, WCW vs. nWo: World Tour is easily the simplest and least technically-impressive of the AKI/THQ wrestling videogames; there is no create-a-wrestler function (though you can alter the colours of the wrestlers’ attires) and very little options outside of the single and multi-player aspects. However, AKI/THQ took a significant step in the right direction with the subsequent release of WCW/nWo Revenge in 1998.

THQAKIValet — *Some wrestlers came out with valets or managers.*

Revenge took every aspect of its predecessor and improved upon it vastly; wrestlers now have individual entrances (sometimes including a valet or holding a weapon, though their individual theme music is unfortunately absent), there are more animations and variety for reversals, a cartoon referee appears onscreen to visualise pin falls and submission holds, an instant replay triggers whenever a wrestler hits their Special move or a signature attack, and arenas are modelled after those seen regularly on television and pay-per-view events. Players can now also steal their opponent’s taunt by rotating the analogue stick in a clockwise direction and a combo system, of sorts, allows certain wrestlers to string together strong striking attacks at the cost of some of their grapple moves. Wrestlers also enter the ring wearing their championship belt and sport more true-to-life finishers and signature manoeuvres thanks to the addition of multiple new animations and moves.

THQAKIEdit — *Customisation has always been an option.*

However, there were some drawbacks; losing the cel-shaded appearance, characters now appear far more polygonal than before. The difficulty curve remained relatively consistent, meaning that even a dominating performance from a player and the successful delivery of a Special move would not guarantee victory in the majority of matches. Instead, players had to earn their victory, wearing their opponent down with counters, strikes, and grapples in order to win a championship belt and, again, unlock hidden wrestlers. Create-a-wrestler was still absent but the editing options for existing wrestlers was greatly expanded, allowing players to play about with existing attires in interesting and fun ways. WCW/nWo Revenge was the last of AKI and THQ’s titles with the WCW license; from here on out, they would take their revolutionary videogame engine and ideas and apply them to the WWF brands. WWF WrestleMania 2000 (Asmik Ace Entertainment/AKI Corporation/THQ, 1999) was the first of these endeavours and, as before, AKI and THQ took everything that worked in their previous videogames and expanded and improved upon them further still.

THQAKIWrestlemaniaIntro — *Just another chair shot for poor old Mick…*

The improvements can be seen immediately; just as Revenge opened with a introduction sequence showcasing its roster and gameplay elements, WrestleMania 2000 begins by showcasing the best of the best of the WWF’s acclaimed Attitude Era. Following this, players are taken to a comprehensive menu screen where they can elect to play a single or multi-man match with the title’s exhaustive roster; while the roster is still arranged in groups, they are no longer organised into factions and the roster is comprised entirely of those seen on a weekly basis back in 1999. Whereas AKI’s WCW titles featured a rather simplistic series of one-on-one matches in the pursuit of individual championships, WrestleMania 2000 includes a lengthy career mode called the Road to WrestleMania. Players select a wrestler and a tag team partner and play a series of matches through one year, facing lower-card wrestlers, taking part in tag team matches, and winning championships in the pursuit of the WrestleMania main event.

THQAKIWrestlemaniaCutscenes — *After facing Foley’s personas numerous times, you’ll welcome this fight!*

Winning multiple championships may mean that the player has multiple matches on one card and the better your progress, the more hidden wrestlers you will unlock; only a 100% success rate will reap the best rewards, which is a pretty tall order considering the mode’s difficulty spikes and drops depending on your success rate and the opponent you are facing. There will even be a few cutscenes in this mode where hidden wrestlers (usually one of the three faces of Foley) will challenge you to defend you championship.

THQAKICreate — WrestleMania 2000 introduced a proper create-a-wrestler mode.

Perhaps the most significant addition was the comprehensive create-a-wrestler mode, which also allowed players to freely customise their name, music, video, and appearance. Using the create-a-wrestler mode, however, players could piece together close approximations of wrestlers not included in the videogame, such as Kurt Angle or Tazz, in addition to those who hadn’t appeared in a WWF ring at the time, such as Diamond Dallas Page and Goldberg, or entirely original characters. Players could choose from an exhaustive list of moves, many of which are carried over from the previous titles, to pretty much create anyone they could envision.

THQAKIWrestlemaniaHBK — *Only a 100% win streak will reap the best rewards.*

In addition, players could create a custom championship belt to defend or entire pay-per-view events; wrestlers all have their own individual entrance themes and tag teams even came to the ring with their team name displayed. The only real downsides were the increased polygonal look of the videogame and the sharp difficulty spike in Road to WrestleMania mode, which could result in players struggling to put away the Godfather but dominating Chris Jericho within two minutes. Finally, the pièce de résistance, the crown jewel in the AKI/THQ partnership, WWF No Mercy. It’s strange to me that the follow-up to WrestleMania 2000 would take its name from a strictly B-level pay-per-view event but there was nothing B-level about this videogame. WWF No Mercy was the culmination of nearly six years of development, refining, and improvement, featuring the biggest and deepest roster yet, the most striking graphics available, the most intricate story mode of all of AKI’s wrestling titles, and the deepest create-a-wrestler you could ask for. There’s a good reason this videogame has been heralded as one of, if not the, best wrestling videogames ever made; more than nostalgia, it’s depth and replayability.

THQAKINoMercyChampionship — No Mercy believed in gender equality, if nothing else.

After the suitably over-the-top opening sequence, players could enter the Championship mode to compete in a series of matches and win a championship belt. Unlike WrestleMania 2000, players competed for each belt individually (or alongside a friend if they chose to go for the Tag Team Championships) and this mode featured multiple branching paths and cutscenes based on a variety of WWF storylines; for example, players could play through the entire WWF Championship storyline and fight against Triple H in exactly the same manner as Mankind did, even transforming into Cactus Jack for their street fight at Royal Rumble, or they may lose a match and branch off into a storyline mirroring Chris Jericho’s issues with Triple H from 2000. Once the player won a belt, they could play the mode again in order to defend it. With its multiple paths, no longer forcing players to win 100% of their matches, and far more manageable difficulty curve, No Mercy’s Championship mode was light years ahead of anything seen in AKI’s previous videogames and it’s a lot of fun to play differently each time to 100% each path.

THQAKINoMercyShop — *Purchase new content in the SmackDown Mall.*

New additions to the gameplay in this title included not only a graphical overhaul that makes wrestlers far lass polygonal but also the inclusion of running grapples, both from the front and behind, the return of blood (though early editions of the videogame would randomly wipe themselves due to some glitch involving the blood), guest referee and ladder matches, a breakable announce table at ringside, multiple backstage areas to fight in, a new version of the cage match to better display the in-ring action, the Survival mode (where players faced an endless Royal Rumble against every single wrestler in the title and in which you could unlock hidden wrestlers), and the SmackDown Mall. In the Mall, you could use the money you earn in Championship and Survival mode to unlock loads of extra content, from new moves and gear to use in create-a-wrestler to hidden characters and weapons.

THQAKINoMercyCAWs — *You could create almost anyone in* No Mercy.

Speaking of create-a-wrestler, this mode returned better than ever; the moves and attire options made available were more than extensive, allowing you to not only create WCW, ECW, and Japanese wresters not included but also modern day wrestlers to keep the videogame as up-to-date as you desire. The inclusion of wrestler faces (both as avatars and to use on your created wrestler) and certain attires also allowed you to create omitted wrestlers like Gangrel and the Mean Street Posse. Each attire slot could now be assigned entirely unique attributes, meaning you could use one slot to create four separate wrestlers and all that they are forced to share is a moveset. The developers even utilised this to put TAKA Michinoku and Funaki in the same slot, something 2K are seemingly reluctant to do in this day and age (despite proving they are capable of doing so in the past). There were, however, some drawbacks; wrestlers no longer had their entire entrances and tag teams no longer entered as a duo, multi-man matches suffered from slowdown that was not present in previous titles, there were no good mask options to create luchadors like Rey Mysterio, the Big Show was entirely absent from the videogame and (hilariously) replaced in Championship mode with Steven Richards (as opposed to, say, Chris Benoit or even the Big Bossman), and, as mentioned, early copies of the videogame featured a game-breaking glitch that would cause the data to be randomly lost.

THQAKINoMercySurvival — *Still the best multi-player wrestling videogame, for my money.*

This was a major downside to the videogame at the time, as many players had corrupted copies, and even reissued copies of the videogame would often be prone to this glitch. Unfortunately, WWF No Mercy was the last videogame produced by AKI and THQ; despite apparently planning a third title, WWF Backlash, THQ and AKI parted ways, meaning the WWF videogames would follow the model set by the equally-enjoyable WWF SmackDown! (Yuke’s/THQ, 2000) up until the modern era. Since then, the standard set by AKI has not even attempted to be emulated much less imitated by THQ in their subsequent titles. Moving away from the simple, but in-depth grappling system developed on the Nintendo 64, WWE videogames now seek to closely emulate the televised product through simulated gameplay rather than arcade-style action. Although, graphically, AKI’s titles have not aged terribly well, nothing can take away that rush of nostalgia when starting up a new session on WWF No Mercy; instantly, I am transported back to a simpler time when me and as many as three other friends would spend all day and night playing match after match and pushing the cartridge to its very limits. No WWE videogame since has received that kind of constant love and attention from me, as online gaming and the realities of everyday life intervene with the simple pleasure of gathering around a television and throwing Spears at each other endlessly with the very best polygons money can buy.

Game Corner: Sonic Mania

19/08/201723/06/2024Dr. K12 Comments

Announced at the commemoration of Sonic’s 25^th anniversary, Sonic Mania (Headcannon/PagodaWest Games, 2017) is a side-scrolling, two-dimensional platformer in the spirit and style of Sonic’s original 1990s outings. Headed up by Christian “Taxman” Whitehead, in collaboration with notable members of the Sonic fangaming community, Sonic Mania sets out to be the true sequel to Sonic the Hedgehog 3 & Knuckles (Sonic Team, 1994) that Sonic fans have been clamouring for for over a decade. Sonic Mania opens almost exactly the same way as Sonic the Hedgehog 3 (ibid), with Sonic and Tails flying in the Tornado towards Angel Island. Sonic’s bad luck with the floating haven continues as he immediately runs into a group of Eggrobos who unearth a mysterious gemstone (the Phantom Ruby), which blasts them all through space (and, possibly, time) back to the Green Hill Zone, where the Eggrobos have been transformed into more powerful variants, the Hard-Boiled Heavies.

SonicManiaRubyHeavies — *The Phantom Ruby empowers the Hard-Boiled Heavies.*

From there, Sonic, Tails, and Knuckles (whose encounter with the Eggrobos takes place as they flee with the Phantom Ruby) must travel through twelve zones in pursuit of Doctor Eggman, battling his Hard-Boiled Heavies, in their quest to obtain the seven Chaos Emeralds and put a stop to them wreaking havoc with the Phantom Ruby. Players can choose to play as Sonic, Tails, or Knuckles in a solo adventure or team-up as Sonic and Tails in two-player simultaneous mode. Each character plays differently but exactly as they did in Sonic 3 & Knuckles; Sonic is the fastest and can perform a Drop-Dash, where he instantly drops into a Spin Dash attack, Tails can fly and swim for a limited time (in a welcome twist, solo players using Sonic and Tails can command Tails to fly and then have him carry Sonic around), while Knuckles has the shortest jump, can glide, and can bash through certain breakable walls that the other two characters can’t. As in Sonic 3 & Knuckles, playing as Knuckles will take players on slightly different paths and even involve battling slightly different bosses. As always, players must collect Golden Rings to survive enemy attacks and hazards, break open monitors to acquire shields (the Water, Fire, and Electricity variants also afford Sonic the ability to bounce, blast, and double-jump, respectively), enter Bonus Stages stylised like Sonic 3 & Knuckles’s Blue Sphere stages by passing checkpoints with over twenty-five Rings, and leap into hidden Giant Rings to enter Sonic the Hedgehog CD (Sonic Team, 1993) style Special Stages.

SonicManiaSpecialBonusStages — *Make no mistake, the Special Stages are no push-over!*

In these Special Stages, players must collect Blue Spheres to increase their speed but also collect Golden Rings to add to the strict time limit in order to chase down a UFO holding a Chaos Emerald. Mastering these stages is the game’s hardest challenge as turns are tight, time is extremely limited, hazards are plentiful, and the UFOs do not give up their prize easily. If you try to get cute and run in the opposite direction, you’ll find yourself out of luck as the programmers thought of that and it’s basically impossible. The first thing you’ll notice when playing Sonic Mania is that it is simply gorgeous to look at; the attention to detail is staggering. Backgrounds and environments are vibrant and colourful, full of life and little details that long-time fans will delight in spotting. The game features eight zones lovingly recreated from classic Sonic titles but expanded and given additional gameplay twists and mechanics, many derived from other Sonic gameplay mechanics (for example, Stardust Speedway features the pulleys from Marble Garden Zone, Flying Battery Zone is amalgamated with Wing Fortress Zone, and Mirage Saloon Zone features the Tornado as in Sky Chase Zone). In the case of the Mirage Saloon Zone, the programmers derived the aesthetics from cancelled desert levels from Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (Sonic Team/SEGA Technical Institute, 1992) and Sonic CD.

SonicManiaDustDesertMirage — *Dust Hill and Desert Dazzle are finally realised.*

The fan service doesn’t stop there, though. Chemical Plant Zone features a boss battle ripped straight from Dr. Robotnik’s Mean Bean Machine (Compile/SEGA, 1993). Also, Sonic not only races against Metal Sonic in the Stardust Speedway Zone once more, but also has to battle an endless army of Silver Sonic’s from the Master System/Game Gear version of Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (SEGA/Aspect, 1992).

SonicManiaMeanBean — *I certainly didn’t expect this inclusion!*

Finally, in perhaps the greatest piece of fan service I have ever witnessed, players will encounter and battle against Fang the Sniper/Nack the Weasel, Bean the Dynamite, and Bark the Polar Bear, three characters long missing from the franchise since 1996. Fans have been literally begging to see these three characters return to the franchise though, up until now, the best we got were some brief homages in Sonic Generations (Sonic Team, 2011). To be fair, their depiction in Sonic Mania looks to be more of an illusion created by the Heavy Magician Hard-Boiled Heavy but the joy I felt upon seeing these three finally return, in glorious sprite form, cannot be understated; the fat little ten-year-old in me was literally geeking out right there.

SonicManiaFangBeanBark — *Fang/Nack, Bean, and Bark make their welcome return at last!*

Sonic Mania features numerous endings, with the best ending obviously coming once players have collected all seven Chaos Emeralds. Blue Sphere bonus stages award players with either a silver or a gold medal which unlock additional bonus features (Sonic 3 & Knuckles’s Insta-Shield, Sonic CD’s Super Peel-Out, “& Knuckles Mode” to allow players to play as Sonic and Knuckles, Tails and Knuckles, or even Knuckles and Knuckles(!), a Debug Mode, and a Sound Test). Unfortunately, you are not allowed to save your progress when using these bonus features, which is one of the game’s biggest flaws.

SonicManiaSilverMetalSonic — *A love letter to the past.*

Another is the plot. Honestly, there isn’t much more plot here than there was in Sonic 3 & Knuckles, with the gist of it being expertly told through in-game animations. However, given that this game takes place a short time after Sonic 3 & Knuckles, it makes no sense for Angel Island to be floating on the ocean again. It was also a bit of a contrivance to see the Phantom Ruby being unearthed on Angel Island, a place already known for being home to the Master Emerald; I would’ve preferred to see it be discovered in one of the new in-game locations.

SonicMania&Knuckles — *Play as Knuckles and Knuckles…and be rescued by Knuckles!*

Furthermore, not every zone ends with an in-game transition to the next, making for a jarringly inconsistent experience at times as the Hard-Boiled Heavies disappear from the plot mid-way through the game. Finally, I can’t be the only one a bit annoyed to see Green Hill Zone and Chemical Plant Zone so soon after their recreations in Sonic Generations; I would’ve liked to have seen more emphasis on Emerald Hill Zone and maybe Mystic Cave Zone (possible with some Underground Zone and mechanical influences) and, while I loved seeing Lava Reef Zone return, the programmers maybe missed a trick by not incorporating some elements from Marble Zone and Sonic 2’s Hidden Palace Zone here. These really are very minor issues, though, as the game plays flawlessly; the controls are just as tight and reliable as they were in classic Sonic titles. There are no cheap deaths or bottomless pits here (well, very few…I only ever fell down maybe two, actually) and the game is exhilaratingly fast and extremely fun to play, while also being very challenging. The ways in which classic zones are remixed add a new layer to the game as even seasoned veterans like myself cannot be sure of what they’re going to encounter. Every boss battle involves a bit of strategy; there is far more to each encounter that just bouncing on Eggman’s head. Honestly, Sonic Mania is a must-buy not just for long-time Sonic fans but for anyone who enjoys beautiful graphics, crisp controls, and a fun, challenging gameplay. From the Sonic CD-inspired animated introduction to the eye-wateringly exquisite graphics and attention to detail in every single element of the sprites and backgrounds, to the remixed levels and soundtrack, Sonic Mania delivers on every single level. Finally, after over a decade of waiting and enduring lacklustre attempts at recapturing Sonic’s classic gameplay, SEGA have done the smartest thing they ever could and handed the keys to a group of developers with a real love and passion for the franchise and Sonic Mania exudes that from every aspect of its presentation.

My Rating:

Fantastic

Game Corner: Happy Birthday, Sonic the Hedgehog!

24/06/201725/06/2025Dr. K16 Comments

Sonic the Hedgehog turned 26 this week so I figured it was only appropriate for a very special edition of Game Corner to celebrate the legacy of everyone’s favourite supersonic blue hedgehog. I know that Sonic isn’t exactly as relevant or anywhere near as popular as he used to be but, there was a time back in the nineties, when Sonic the Hedgehog was the videogame icon and the character, and his franchise, have significantly impacted my life over the years. Growing up, I went through many phases where I had franchises and characters I gravitated towards; first it was Thomas the Tank Engine, then Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, and so on, alongside superheroes from DC Comics (mainly Batman, Superman, and Green Lantern) and Marvel Comics (primarily Spider-Man, the Incredible Hulk, and the Fantastic Four). However, my first real memories of truly latching on to a franchise and taking it as my own were with my first experiences with Sonic the Hedgehog.

The first Sonic videogame I ever played, and owned, was Sonic the Hedgehog (SEGA/Ancient, 1991) for the SEGA Master System. I remember playing the game for the first time and being struck by the colourful imagery, the addictive tunes, and the simplicity of the gameplay. I used to play that game all the time; one time, my friend came over and struggled to get past the first boss, so I offered to beat it for him and ended up getting further than I ever had before at that point, all the way to the final boss of the game. Sonic on the Master System had many features that were markedly different from its more graphically-impressive counterpart on the Mega Drive; Chaos Emeralds were cleverly hidden throughout the games Zones, for example, and the game also featured three Zones not seen in the Mega Drive version and, with the exception of the first boss, it also had completely different boss battles as well. I didn’t have quite the same experience, or have quite the same love, for Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (SEGA/Aspect, 1992) on the Master System. Sonic 2 was much harder than its predecessor, with Chaos Emeralds hidden in stupidly-difficult places and a gameplay mechanic whereby you had to collect all five before facing the robotic Silver Sonic or else you’d never get to see the good ending. Unlike the first game, though, Sonic 2 had a rather complex cheat code involved the second player’s controller, which I’m not ashamed to say I would utilise to overcome this issue.

It was around about this time that I acquired a sample of Fleetway’s Sonic the Comic series, which had one-page teasers of the full issue’s stories. The first issue I got was issue two, which I still have, and I got issues here and there throughout the first year of its run before subscribing to it on a fortnightly basis. A few years ago I was able to fill in the gaps in my collection and have managed to collect every single issue bar the last two, which is good for me as the comic was unfortunately cancelled after a long series of reprints. However, the series is being continued at Sonic the Comic – Online. I don’t remember the exact year (it must have been 1992 or 1993) but, after some cajoling, I was able to convince my parents to upgrade me to the SEGA Mega Drive purely based on pictures and reviews of Sonic the Hedgehog 2 (Sonic Team/SEGA Technical Institute, 1992). I got the game, and the console, as a Christmas present and it tided me over for quite some time; I remember getting into trouble because I’d finally defeated Doctor Robotnik’s Death Egg Robot and wanted to watch the final cutscene and credits of the game rather than go eat dinner.

After picking up Sonic the Hedgehog (Sonic Team, 1991) I was set; from that moment on, I bought every Sonic game I could for the consoles I had. I never got a Mega-CD, so I didn’t play Sonic the Hedgehog CD (Sonic Team, 1993) until many years later on PC and, now, PlayStation 3 so, for many years, my absolutely favourite Sonic game was Sonic the Hedgehog 3 & Knuckles (Sonic Team, 1994). We all know the story; Sonic 3 was too big, too complex to be one game so, to save time and make more money, SEGA split it into two, releasing Sonic & Knuckles six months later. The Sonic & Knuckles cartridge would “lock-on” to Sonic 3 (and Sonic 2, or any other Mega Drive cartridge) to unlock the full, complete version of the game. For me, Sonic 3 & Knuckles was a game-changer; it introduced me to my favourite character of the franchise, Knuckles the Echidna, and topped everything its predecessors had done. You could play as Sonic, Miles “Tails” Prower, Knuckles, or Sonic and Tails simultaneously. Each had different paths to take, fought bosses differently, and had a unique ending. The game was bigger, brighter, faster, and more action-packed than its predecessors and had way more options, enemies, power-ups, and replay value. I was absolutely hooked! Then dark times came for SEGA; the failure of the Mega-CD, 32X, and Saturn spelled the beginning of the end of the company. As videogame developers began entering the 32-bit era, I switched to the Nintendo 64 rather than the Dreamcast or Sony’s PlayStation. This was still at a time when parents couldn’t afford to get you every console going; just like back when I used to have to go around to my friend’s house to play the Super Nintendo (SNES) and he would have to come to mine to play the Mega Drive, so to did I opt for the N64 over the Dreamcast or PlayStation. The PlayStation was nothing to me then. It had no iconic characters, no games I was familiar with, and no-one I knew had a Dreamcast so I went with the popular option.

This meant that I didn’t play Sonic Adventure (Sonic Team, 1999) or Sonic Adventure 2 (Sonic Team USA, 2001) until they were re-released on the Nintendo GameCube. Sonic Adventure 2: Battle (ibid) became my new favourite Sonic title, with its crisp 3D graphics, over-lapping narrative, and exciting, fast gameplay variety. Sonic Adventure 2 allowed me to play as Eggman for the first time (by this time I had begrudgingly accepted SEGA’s global acknowledgement or Robotnik’s original Japanese name) and introduced the angst-ridden Shadow the Hedgehog who also became a favourite of mine (he’s like Sonic….but dark!) Sonic Adventure DX: Director’s Cut (Sonic Team, 2003) actually proved even better (it feels like a bigger, more exciting game despite being a bit less pretty to look at and a bit buggier than its sequel) and came with unlockable ports of the Game Gear Sonic titles, allowing me to fill some gaps in my collection. From there, I’d have to say that I actually preferred Shadow the Hedgehog (SEGA Studio USA, 2003) over Sonic Heroes (Sonic Team USA, 2003) simply because it’s a better, more polished videogame. Shadow gets a lot of hatred because Shadow uses guns and vehicles when, to be fair, he doesn’t really need to and the title was, arguably, dark for the sake of being dark. However, I really enjoyed the shooting mechanics; the weapons were varied and ran out of ammo pretty fast (and were also entirely optional) so you can just used the patented Homing Attack instead. The storyline, while a bit convoluted (aliens? Really?) was fun to play through and to see all the many (and many) different endings to the game. The soundtrack and final boss were fantastic, as well, and the game just controls a lot better than Sonic Heroes, which always feels like you’re running on ice!

Of course I also played the various Sonic titles on the Nintendo Gameboy Advance. A personal favourite of mine was Sonic Battle (Sonic Team/THQ, 2004), which featured a really long and decent story with multiple characters and options and a simple, yet addictive, fighting, level-up, and gear system. However, things took a sharp turn for the worst with Sonic the Hedgehog (Sonic Team, 2006). By this point, I had switched over to the PlayStation 3 after everyone raved about how great the PlayStation 2 was (ironically, everyone was now raving about how great the Xbox 360 was…). I bought Sonic ’06 knowing it had gotten bad reviews, having heard all the negative press, but steadfast in my commitment to the franchise. Despite some stumbles along the way (Sonic 3D: Flickie’s Island (Traveller’s Tales/Sonic Team, 1996), for example), Sonic had never steered me wrong and I’d always found something to enjoy in every Sonic title I played.

Unfortunately, Sonic ’06 was a pretty dire title; while I don’t hate it as much as some segments of the fandom, the loading times were stupidly long, the sudden, jarring shift to a real-world aesthetic was a strange choice and the camera and controls could hinder you at some really awkward and frustrating moments but there were some good things about the game. It looked amazing, for starters, had a great soundtrack, lots of variety in characters and gameplay, and told a unique and surprisingly deep story for a Sonic title. Probably the worst thing for me were the Mach Speed sections, where Sonic would speed off at a stupidly fast pace and become impossible to control; these were the sections that gave me the most grief and sucked away my lives. The rest was…okay, I guess. I really hate seeing people online bash this game with images and videos of Sonic casually just walking around a loop; when you actually play the game, you’re moving too fast to do stuff like that so you have to be intentionally looking for it. A similar thing irks me when people criticise Sonic the Hedgehog 4: Episode I (Dimps/Sonic Team, 2010); when I played the game, I did so at a fast pace and threw myself into the action. I didn’t just stop and walk to test and bitch about the physics; normal gamers don’t do that (or, at least, they shouldn’t because videogames are made to be played, not bug-tested!)

Anyway, unfortunately for me, Sonic ’06 made such a negative impact that SEGA decided to strip everything back. While this resulted in some incredible titles, like Sonic Unleashed (Sonic Team, 2008), Sonic Colours (ibid, 2010), and Sonic Generations (ibid, 2011) it came at a price. Sonic videogames were now about Sonic and Sonic alone; you couldn’t play as Tails, Knuckles, Amy Rose, or any of his other cast of characters. We went from Sonic alone, to adding Tails, then adding Knuckles in the first three/four titles, to six playable characters, right back to just one. Even in polished, sleek, incredibly fun titles like Sonic Unleashed and Sonic Generations, you’re limited to playing as Sonic or another version of Sonic (the Werehog, who could’ve just as easily been Knuckles, or Classic Sonic, respectively). Another by-product of this was that abilities and gameplay mechanics afforded to Sonic’s friends now became a part of his move-set. Although this had been happening since Sonic Adventure 2, Sonic Colours (and, later, Sonic: Lost World (ibid, 2015)) made it abundantly clear that you don’t need to play as Tails to fly or swim or as Knuckles to glide, climb, or bash through walls because Sonic now has either default moves or power-ups that let him do all of those things.

The plus side to this is that it seemed like SEGA were finally getting their act together; after being forced to pull out of console manufacturing and focus on software, and the massive screw up that was Sonic ’06 , SEGA, and Sonic Team seemed to have rediscovered the formula that made Sonic such a popular and exciting franchise. Then they shot themselves in the foot with Sonic Boom, which was initially presented itself as a complete rebranding of the Sonic franchise, with all-new character designs and a streamlined, refreshed continuity. Then, SEGA backpedalled and said it wasn’t a reboot but a spin-off series. So instead of having one worldwide brand, they now had Modern Sonic (the taller, older-looking one who used Boost gameplay), Classic Sonic (the chubbier, 2.5D version of the character), and Boom Sonic (with sports tape!) all co-existing at the same time. This was also alongside the Archie Comic series which, until recently, had been publishing consistently for over twenty-five years. Although it began as a strange amalgamation of the Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog and Sonic the Hedgehog (SatAM) cartoons made by DiC in the nineties, Archie’s Sonic comics had since incorporated aspects of the videogames and become a huge, unwieldy lore all unto their own. Recent lawsuits and shenanigans had seen the comics undergo a dramatic reboot which simplified the continuity and brought the comics closer to the videogames, only for SEGA to suddenly undergo an identity crisis with Sonic Boom.

After Sonic Boom: Rise of Lyric (Big Red Button, 2014) was a critical and commercial flop, rivalling only SONIC for its bugs and issues, the Boom franchise seems too be dead in the water except for the criminally underrated and highly amusing all-CGI cartoon series that accompanied the videogames. throughout the nineties, I used to watch Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog on Channel 4 on Sunday mornings religiously. It was bright and colourful and fun, even if it was hardly anything like the videogames. Then, one day, I tuned in and it was suddenly all different; the cartoon was darker, populated by all-new characters, and nothing like what I’d been watching before. Initially I was upset and confused, but I quickly grew to love SatAM even more than Adventures. It was darker and more serious, had a truly horrific Doctor Robotnik, and was also smarter and sleeker. Then it ended on a massive cliffhanger and shifted tone once again to Sonic Underground in 1999. By this time, I was a bit older and wasn’t watching cartoon as much and, although I liked the action and animation, Sonic Underground was just way too different for me. So, growing up, I was used to all these different interpretations of Sonic; these days, though, it seems a lot of kids can’t seem to grasp the concept of multiple versions of popular characters. Yet, Sonic Adventure did a great job consolidating Sonic’s conflicting interpretations into one unified brand image only to somehow drop the ball with it.

To me, Sonic Boom should have been a complete rebranding of the character. People moaned about the redesigns but they actually aren’t that bad; I didn’t mind Knuckles’s redesign at all (though I’d rather he was smarter) and all the characters are exactly the same despite looking different. Plus, the Sonic Boom cartoon is amazing; it’s smart and actually laugh-out-loud funny with its self-referential humour. Plus, the episodes are really short s it’s easy to watch over and over. As for the future, it appears as though SEGA and Sonic Team are getting back on track. While Sonic Boom continues to air, future videogames in the franchise appear to be dead; this has actually negatively affected the upcoming Sonic Forces (Sonic Team, 2017), at least for me. Forces is apparently set in a time when Eggman has finally conquered the world, causing Modern and Classic Sonic to team up once again to stop him. There’s also the option to create your own character which, while exciting, seems to have pushed Boom Sonic out of the title (the custom avatar uses an energy beam similar to the one seen in Sonic Boom, lending credibility to custom character feature having replaced Boom Sonic). However, we’re also finally getting a brand new 2D Sonic title that will hopefully be the true Sonic 4 I’ve been wanting since Sonic 3 & Knuckles. As I said, I enjoyed Sonic 4 (Episode II was the much better experience of the two parts, though) but, for me, a true Sonic sequel should offer more than one playable character. The upcoming Sonic Mania (Headcannon, PagodaWest Games, 2017) finally returns Tails and Knuckles as playable characters and appears to be a lovingly-crafted piece of nostalgia for fans of Sonic 3 & Knuckles with its massive, tiered Zones, huge bosses, and gameplay variety. At the same time, there’s apparently going to be a live-action/CGI hybrid Sonic movie coming out in 2019; I’m a big fan of Sonic the hedgehog: The Movie (Ikegami, 1996) and feel its past time for a new Sonic film (although I’d rather it was all CGI).

Sonic the Hedgehog has been a part of my life since I was about six years old; that’s nearly twenty-five years now. I went to SEGA World in London when I was a kid and got to play Sonic the Fighters (SEGA AM2, 1996) and SEGASonic the Hedgehog (SEGA AM3, 1993), which ended up being really special as those titles became extremely rare. I went to Summer of Sonic in London in 2010, where I got to play Sonic 4, see Crush 40 perform live, and mingle with many other Sonic fans. Not only did I put together my own series of sprite comics, not only do I even have Sonic tattoos I also wrote over 20,000 words about the development, rise, and fall of both SEGA and Sonic and all about how the cartoons have changed and shaped the videogame canon as part of my PhD. For me, there is no greater videogame icon than Sonic the Hedgehog. He was faster, more expressive, more action-packed than his counterparts; his videogames had more variety and depth, a larger cast of characters, and far more appeal and replay value. He inspired not only a slew of 2D platformers starring attitude-ladened anthropomorphic protagonists, not only one of the fiercest and most competitive marketing wars in the videogame industry, but also me to be more creative and to write and draw about the things I love. So bust out the Mega Drive, blow the dust out of your cartridges, and stick Sonic 3 into Sonic & Knuckles and celebrate the legacy and impact of what I consider to be the greatest videogame icon of all time.

Game Corner: Conker’s Bad Fur Day (Xbox One)

03/06/201708/07/2025Dr. K3 Comments

Similar to Banjo-Tooie (Rare, 2000), Conker’s Bad Fur Day (Rare, 2001) is an action-platformer originally released near the end of the Nintendo 64’s lifespan that I had planned on picking up back when it first came out but, due to a combination of having no money and other priorities at the time, I was never able to. I remember borrowing a copy and briefly playing it but nothing concrete; since then, I had trawled Amazon and eBay to try and find a copy, only to find it reaching extortionate prices as one of the rarest and most expensive Nintendo 64 titles even in an unboxed state. In 2005, Microsoft released a prettied-up remake for the Xbox 360 which I planned to get once I bought the Xbox One. Luckily for me, however, the title was including in the Rare Replay (Microsoft Studios/Rare, 2015) collection and, after sixteen years of waiting and anticipation, I was finally able to play this elusive title with high hopes of an experience comparable to that of its predecessors, Banjo-Kazooie (Rare, 1998) and Banjo-Tooie.

Boy, was I disappointed.

In Conker’s Bad Fur Day, you assume control of an anthropomorphic, beer-drinking red squirrel named Conker who, after a particularly bad night of drinking and debauchery, attempts to stumble home to his girlfriend, Berri. However, the Panther King’s side table is missing a leg and his lackey, Professor Von Kriplesac, suggests using a red squirrel as a substitute; thus, Conker is not only beset by the Panther King’s minions but also a series of increasingly daft missions and side quests, and the search for wads of cash that are dotted about the land. Although the overworld and scope of the game feels smaller than Banjo-Tooie, the concept is similar; Conker traverses a large overworld, which provides access to a number of sub-worlds, in which he must complete a number of side quests and missions to be awarded with cash. Once Conker has accumulated enough cash, he can access other worlds and the game expands further. Each world allows Conker to perform new actions and afford him different abilities, but he cannot carry these over into another world (for instance, in one world, Conker wields a shotgun to dispatch zombies, but he cannot use this weapon in the overworld or in other areas). There are also numerous times throughout the game when Conker can utilise a context-sensitive pad to open up new areas or reach the ever-elusive cash.

Conker’s Bad Fur Day utilises a life system, which is a bit of a step back from Banjo-Tooie, which gave the player unlimited lives. Conker has to grab squirrel tails in order to gain extra tries at beating the game but, once they run out, it’s game over and you have to start again from the last save point. Conker’s health is measured in segments of chocolate, which can be found dotted around every level of the game. However, this is where the game’s most glaring issue lies; Conker is probably the weakest videogame protagonist ever. Conker takes damage when he falls from anything higher than a couple of steps (meaning that a fall from a great height will result in instant death more often than not), chocolate segments are few and far between, and there’s no way to expand or enhance his life bar. There are numerous times when Conker either takes double damage or dies instantly from one shot, making the game feel very cheap and frustrating as it’s not so much a question of player skill and more the fact that Conker is so incredibly weak, especially compared to Banjo and Kazooie.

Conker’s basic controls are fluid and smooth; Conker runs, jumps, swims, and can hover in the air by spinning his tail like a helicopter all with the same grace and poise you expect from a Rare title. Conker’s main enemies whenever he is performing these basic platforming actions are the camera, which swings around wildly and is oddly intrusive, and the fact that Conker can easily slip from paths and walkways; without the ability to grab ledges, it’s far too easy to fall to your doom. However, it’s when you gain access to his additional abilities where the game’s flaws begin to really rear their head. When Conker receives the aforementioned shotgun, you have a choice between using it from a third-person perspective (which makes it difficult to aim) or from a first-person viewpoint (where the controls are reversed, slow, and clunky). Similar to the forced first-person shooting segments from Banjo-Tooie, any time Conker has to use guns really brings the game down and makes for some of the most frustrating parts of the game; Conker reloads too slowly, has terrible aim, and the shooting is annoyingly bad from a company that perfected first-person shooting in GoldenEye 007 (Rare, 1997) and utilised a far better third-person shooting mechanic in Jet Force Gemini (Rare, 1999). Honestly, I expected much better from Rare after they proved they can do first- and third-person shooting and action platforming a lot better in their previous titles. The fact that all these elements are so poorly implemented in this game really makes it difficult to play through and to enjoy.

However, Conker’s Bad Fur Day has many elements that are enjoyable; the game looks and sounds amazing, with some of the wackiest and strangest anthropomorphic characters you’ll ever encounter (Conker encounters a talking pot of paint, an opera-singing giant turd, mafia weasels, and battles a Xenomorph, amongst other things). Heading into this game, I was fully aware of its mature content; blood bursts from enemies as they are blown apart, characters swear every other word, and the game definitely isn’t taking itself seriously at all. To my surprise, Conker isn’t actually the foul-mouthed character I expected heading into the game. He’s a drunkard (the opening moments have you controlling him as he stumbles about and pees everywhere) and a greedy little git (he attacks wads of cash with a frying pain and stuffs them down his shorts with reckless abandon) but it’s actually the other characters he meets that swear and provide most of the mature content.

Conker’s Bad Fur Day is also, to its detriment, an oxymoron; the game has a lot of variety but also way too much repetition. So, one minute you might be gunning down wasps, rolling balls of poo into a giant turd mountain, or retrieving objects to fulfil your missions but you can guarantee that if you have to do these things once you’ll have to do them again, anywhere from three to five times. It gets extremely frustrating to have to repeat these actions so many times, especially while fighting the controls; for example, in the first level, Conker has to find some cheese for a mouse. You have to find three pieces of cheese and each one has to be collected separately and also find five bees to pollinate a sunflower (which you later have to use to bounce to a wad of cash but good luck getting the timing of the bouncing right and, when you do get the timing right, the controls fight you so you miss the ledge and fall from a height high enough to cause you significant damage!)

Seriously, this damn sunflower took me the better part of forty minutes to get past!

Similarly, there’s a part where you have to scare some cows into pooping to access a new area. To do this, you have to trick a bull into hitting a target, jump on the bull, and scare the cow. Once it’s pooped, you kill the cow and another waddles out, and you have to repeat this again twice more. There’s an even worse task in the Rock Solid disco. Conker has to get drunk, stagger around, and pee on a rock monster so it turns into a ball, then roll it into an opening. You then have to roll it along a narrow path, hope you don’t fall off, and onto a switch to rescue Berri. You then have to do this twice more and, if you don’t get enough pee on the rock monsters, they pop up and attack you. Things like this are so incredibly tedious and laborious tasks that get old and frustrating very quickly. Later on, Conker gets transformed into a vampire bat and must poop on some villages to stun them and then carry them to a meat grinder. The controls make all this extremely difficult and annoying to pull off, especially considering how often you have to repeat the task. Things only get worse in the It’s War! Chapter; in a parody of Saving Private Ryan (Spielberg, 1998), Conker joins the war against the Nazi-like Tediz. While this makes for some of the game’s most amusing and controversial moments, it is also host to easily the absolute worst part of not only this game, but maybe any game I’ve ever played.

After defeating the boss, Conker has a limited time to navigate through tight corridors full of laser trip wires; if you touch the wires, explosives go off and cost Conker at least two pieces of health. At various points, Tediz will also attack Conker with bayonets, forcing you to switch to the awkward first- or third-person shooting perspectives to attack them. Once you make it through these obstacles, though, you get locked in a room full of Tediz who start shooting at you; you get about two seconds to whip out a bazooka before you’re blown to pieces. The only way to succeed is to try and try and try again and again to master the trip wires and the Tediz in the corridor so you get through flawlessly and have all of your health for this final shoot-out to give you a gnat’s wing of a chance to positioning yourself properly to shoot all the Tediz. There’s no health in this areas, no chance for error, oh, and, also, if you shoot your bazooka too haphazardly then you’ll blow yourself up!

*Good luck getting through this crap without the fifty-lives code!*

However, for every bad part of the game, there are positives; the boss battles are amusing and interesting, the worlds are full of life an activity (although there’s far less to collect than in the Banjo games), and the storyline is very funny and tongue-in-cheek. Ironically, though, the final area and final boss is perhaps the easiest part of the game. In a shocking twist, Berri is killed before Conker’s eyes and a Xenomorph bursts out of the Panther King. Conker has to (clunkily) beat the Xenomorph down and then throw it into an airlock (three times, naturally…). As the Xenomorphs moves in for the kill, the game locks up; Conker breaks the forth wall to get the programmers to help him out and wins the day, but forgets to get Berri brought back to life. Conker ends up being crowned the new king and sits, disenchanted and annoyed, surrounded by the characters he has helped out throughout his little quest (all of whom he hates). Conker’s Bad Fur Day is a beautiful and challenging game…but it’s so damn frustrating and annoying! I don’t mind a challenge but this game takes it to another level! There is absolutely no hand-holding and no quarter given; this would be fine if the controls and camera didn’t work against you all the time and if Conker wasn’t so weak. I wouldn’t mind repeating some of the tasks you have to do if they were actually fun by the third time; once, maybe, but having to repeat some many laborious tasks really gets annoying very quickly. The boss battles are all multi-layered and challenging, though a lot easier than the platforming and puzzle-solving aspects of the game. The humour is crude, rude, and hilarious at certain points; it’s obvious that Rare were having a lot of fun just pushing the envelope and doing whatever they wanted in this title.

However, it also feels like they’re openly mocking the player and purposely implanting terrible gameplay mechanics; that must be the case as I know they can do better action platformers, better first person shooters, and better third person shooters. The game also has a tacked on multi-player component which involves these shooting aspects, however I’ve not played it and have no urge to given how bad the controls are for these parts of the game. And that’s the summary of it all, really. I have no urge or desire to ever play this game again, and that’s really disappointing to me. I loved the Banjo games and everything they did; I love a good, bright, fun action platformer and I’m all for variety and trying now things…but this game just has far too many negative points for me to ever hold it in as high regard as I do Banjo-Kazooie or even Banjo-Tooie, which is a massive personal disappointment for me.

My Rating:

Could Be Better

Game Corner: Banjo-Tooie (Xbox One)

14/05/201708/07/2025Dr. K4 Comments

To reach Gruntilda, Banjo and Kazooie had to traverse a variety of worlds and collect a multitude of items, the most important of which were Jiggies – which were required to access new worlds and climb higher up Gruntilda’s castle. The game was a huge success for Rare, heralding a number of successes for the company on the Nintendo 64, and has been a personal favourite of mine for nearly a decade now for its charming aesthetics, catching music, amusing characters, and vibrant worlds.

Back in 1998, Rare developed an incredibly intricate and amusing platform videogame called Banjo-Kazooie. The game starred a slightly slow, but very helpful, honey bear named Banjo, who first featured in Diddy Kong Racing in 1997. Banjo, humorously garbed in bright yellow short-shorts, carried around his friend and counterpart – a Breegull named Kazooie – in a blue back-pack. Together, the two were tasked with rescuing Banjo’s kid sister, Tooty, from the evil witch Gruntilda, aided along the way by Bottles, a short-sighted mole who teaches the two their attacks and abilities, and Mumbo-Jumbo, a shaman who transforms the duo into other forms to aid their quest. In 2000, Rare finally produced a sequel, Banjo-Tooie, which was released near the end of the Nintendo 64’s lifespan and has consequently become one of the rarest and most expensive videogames around, even when bought unboxed. As a result, obtaining a copy has been a goal of mine for years, ever since I briefly played it in 2001, and in 2013 I was finally able to procure a copy and play the game through to completion. Of course, since then, the title (alongside the original and many of Rare’s top titles from the area, before, and beyond) was given a high-definition remaster that I later picked up as part of Rare Replay for Xbox One.

BanjoTooieGrunty — *Grunty is back and out for revenge!*

Banjo-Tooie picks up two years after Gruntilda’s defeat. Trapped underneath a giant boulder, she summons her sisters, Mingella and Blobbbelda, to free her so she can avenge her defeat. Now little more than a skeleton, she destroys Banjo’s house, killing Bottles, and prepares a special ray gun that will suck the life out of the planet and restore her physical form. Eager for another adventure and desiring revenge for he death of Bottles, Banjo and Kazooie head out to travel new worlds and put the witch to rest once and more all. The first thing to note about Banjo-Tooie is how much bigger it is than its predecessor. Not only can players run around Spiral Mountain (the tutorial area from the first game) and re-enter the mouth of Gruntilda’s Castle, the player can explore and travel through an all-new overworld that is intricately connected to the playable levels in the game. For instance, rather than opening up worlds to enter in a central hub as in the previous game, the players go from one hub to the next following the path of Gruntilda’s digging machine through a huge overworld. Whilst exploring each level, the player can open up shortcuts to other levels, the most obvious being Chuffy the Train, but other sluiceways, tunnels, and paths also exist which connect one world to the next and allow players to traverse what now feels like an entire world rather than an enclosed space.

*Jamjars has some new moves to teach Banjo and Kazooie.*

The main aim of the game is still to collect loads of items, but the actual task is much less tedious. Previously, the player was awarded for collecting each world’s 100 musical notes, but the number you collected reset every time you left a world and re-entered it. Now, the number carries over, and they are a lot easier to find and collect. Jiggies, however, are found in a multitude of ways, as before, with each world now being home to a formidable boss battle which will test Banjo and Kazooie’s new skills. Speaking of which, Bottles’ brother, Jamjars, is on hand to teach the duo additional moves. While Banjo and Kazooie are capable of every move from the last game bar one (Banjo’s bear swipes are absent), Jamjars loads the player up with a variety of new eggs to shoot at enemies (which becomes a focal point in the game during its many first-person-shooter sequences), the ever-handy Grip Grab that allows Banjo to hang on to ledges, and the ability to have Banjo and Kazooie separate from each other to tackle switch-based puzzles. Mumbo now becomes a secondary character, as players use his magic to access unreachable areas and acquire Jiggies, while Humba Wumba’s spells are used to turn the duo into new forms, which are new required for a multitude of Jiggy-based tasks and even to conquer certain bosses.

BanjoTooieStopNSwop — Banjo-Tooie has many secrets and collectables.

One of the greatest things about Banjo-Kazooie was its many secrets, most of which were meant to be accessed in Banjo-Tooie through a unique “Stop and Swap” feature that, theoretically, would have seen players swap one cart for another to unlock new content. Though this feature was eventually dropped, the ever-mysterious Ice Key and Secret Eggs return in this game, now used to unlock new moves and the awesome Dragon Kazooie, though the full extent of this feature would not be made accessible until the Xbox 360 HD remixes. Banjo-Tooie also features a multiplayer mode, allowing for up to four players to take part in Goldeneye 007-like deathmatches and other modes that, honestly, I haven’t played but I imagine are similar to the same multiplayer modes seen in Conker’s Bad Fur Day. Like The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask, Banjo-Tooie features many recycled characters and character models, as characters encountered in the previous game return to aid or hinder the duo at various points.

BanjoTooieCutscenes — *It’s all about the story…except when it’s not…*

In the end, playing Banjo-Tooie was an awesome experience, but a couple of things let it down for me. Firstly, why remove Banjo’s bear swipes? This seems like a nit-pick, but I expected Banjo to have the attack when he goes solo and he never acquires it, meaning that he is limited to his Pack Whack move. Second, when you acquire a Jiggy, Banjo and Kazooie no longer go into a cute little celebration animation. The Jiggy is simply collected and you move on. While I don’t necessarily mind this, as the lack of the celebration means you don’t get any wasted momentum, it kind of makes acquiring Jiggies mean a lot less as the characters no longer seem to care. Next, the game takes a long time to get started – the opening cutscene is quite long and, at various points at the game’s beginning, the action cuts to a cutscene that shows Gruntilda’s plan in motion. Then you never hear anything of her plot until the final boss, which is pretty jarring – Gruntilda uses her restoration ray once and you never hear anything of it again, so the threat seems diminished and an afterthought by the conclusion. You also never confront her two sisters, which seemed a given, though the addition of a boss for each level kind of made up for that.

*There’s a bunch of new transformations to play around with.*

Certain other aspects are a bit tedious as well; before, when you tried to exit a level as a transformed Banjo and Kazooie, Mumbo’s magic would automatically wear off. Here though, you must return to Wumba to transform back into the duo to exit – similarly, Mumbo and either character alone cannot exit levels and must switch back to do so, which can get a bit tedious. There’s a ton of backtracking in this game, which can be frustrating but it’s great to see how characters and events in one level can affect and influence the other, so I didn’t mind this too much and it didn’t really feel like it was padding the game out, more that the world was big and interconnected, so backtracking is more like a given. Also, in comparison to the first game, the ending felt a little limp and the overall game time seemed less – I finished the entire game in just under 25 hours, whereas I remember working on Banjo-Kazooie for a long time, but that may have just been rooting around for more secrets and such.

My Rating:

Great Stuff

In the end, the game is a masterful example of how to make a great action/platform title – colourful worlds, great music, amusing characters, loads (and loads) to do, see, and collect, great controls (flying and swimming can be a bit testy, as before, however), and a pretty simple premise. Games like this aren’t really made much anymore – once you beat videogames these days, there’s not much incentive to pick up and play again, but in the Banjo titles there’s always more to do. As the Nintendo 64 copy is quite expensive, I recommended Xbox owners download both titles (or purchase Rare Replay) and play them to death and think themselves lucky to be able to experience the full games.

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My Rating:

Fantastic

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My Rating:

Could Be Better

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My Rating:

Great Stuff

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