Remember when you were a budding post-adolescent and started having this almost instinctive urge to start “raging against the machine”? That feeling of needing to fight The Man, whoever That Man may be, though in retrospect probably juvenile and almost assuredly stupid, has become the basis for untold stories, films, and video games, though none have been created with such bravado and outright Japanese insanity as one of my most treasured experiences from my youth, Jet Set Radio Future.
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The prehistoric theme has been vastly under-utilized in the world of video games. I mean, what comes to mind? Jurassic Park for the Genesis? Christ it was difficult. That cancelled BC game for the xbox? Just another case of Peter Molyneux being the step-father of the video game world, promising the world and then letting us down. The Dino Crisis series? The first one was terrible, the second one was mediocre, and the third one was in goddamn space. You have officially broken through the bottom of the barrel when you’re taking your game with a prehistoric-enemy theme and putting it in space.
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In a day and age where it feels like the world of Japanese video-gamery is becoming more and more marginalized, with the only genre’s from across the sea still at their best being bullet-hell shooters, discomforting hentai adventures, and Tekken, I feel the necessity from time to time to think back on the days when Japanese video games weren’t just the gold standard, but the gold standard in crazy.
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First things first lets address the elephant in the room: A big reason why I feel compelled to write this article this week is because Beyond Good and Evil is as of Wednesday available on Xbox Live Arcade, for the pauper’s sum of only ten dollars. If you’ve never played it before, man go and download it right the hell now. It’s okay I’ll still be here when you get back.
Anyways. Beyond Good and Evil was an overlooked 2003 classic by Ubisoft and Michel Ancel (creator of the Rayman series) that managed to synthesize some of the best aspects of previous gaming masterpieces. Do you enjoy The Legend of Zelda games? Of course you damn well do. How about the crazy, “the government is watching me through my dental fillings”-styled conspiracy-theory story akin to that of Metal Gear Solid or Deus Ex? Again, that’s a yes. Oh, and do you like collectibles? But not just pointless baubles or macguffins but rather items that take work to find and give you real, tangible rewards for their discovery? As a gamer that sounds like my drug of choice. Beyond Good and Evil manages to wrap these elements together and place into a world that can only be described as heartfelt.
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Since I enjoyed the last article so much I’ve decided on doubling down with the concept of “Games You Should’ve Played”, and so for this second installment I’m going to tell you about the hidden beauty that was Deathrow for the original xbox.
Developed by Swedish outfit SouthEnd Interactive (the same guys who I just found also made the recent super-cute puzzler ilomilo, a fact which caused me to stop in my tracks for a few seconds), produced by Ubisoft, and released in October of 2002 to spectacular indifference, Deathrow was a unique creature in that it actually went about creating a an entirely new sport for the player to learn and master.
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I’ve decided that I need to start making some public service announcements in regards to this confused diatribe of articles I call a blog. Hence a new series of articles, based around games that I loved, but for some reason few others acknowledged. I’m coming to the defense of the defenseless! The little games that don’t have a voice to speak for them! Etcetera, etcetera!
To inaugurate this fine new establishment I’m discussing Breakdown, a much-maligned gem by Namco and one of my favourites for the original xbox. Released in 2004 to overly mixed reviews, it was something of an enigma to the general public.
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