Player One Podcast

This week! It’s been five years since we began this podcasting journey, and we continue it in the usual fashion: discussing the game tapes that we played this week. That includes Resistance 3, Forza 4, Guardian Heroes, Scribblenauts Remix, Ico, Greg’s Sega CD marathon, Saturn accessories, hiding content behind online passes. Plus, parenting/baby stuff!

Own an iPhone/iPod touch? We’ve got an app for that–the Player One Podcast player app is available now. Play shows new and old, read show notes, access the show Twitter, website, email, voicemail line and more! Plus, you’ll be able to access bonus audio and video content (soon, once we figure out what that is). Click here to download.

Got an Android device? You can now download our app on the Android Marketplace. Find out all about it here.

Follow us on twitter at twitter.com/p1podcast.

Thanks for listening! Don’t forget to visit our new web site at www.playeronepodcast.com. Don’t forget to join our forums if you haven’t already!

Direct download: 10_17_11-Episode260.mp3

Running time: 1:05:56

Chris Johnston Episodes, Video Games Baby, breastfeeding, Forza 4, guardian heroes, Ico, online pass, parenting, Resistance 3, Saturn, Scribblenauts Remix, Sega CD

This week! We dedicate half of the episode to talking about Dead Space 2 (alert: spoilers ahead). But don’t worry – the spoiler talk isn’t until the second half of the episode. We start off with other stuff – Marvel Vs. Capcom 3, Street Fighter IV 3DS, Halo: Reach, Stacking, Activision retiring Tony Hawk and Guitar Hero, retro 3D updates, Sega CD games, the next generation and much much more.

Own an iPhone/iPod touch? We’ve got an app for that–the Player One Podcast player app is available now. Play shows new and old, read show notes, access the show Twitter, website, email, voicemail line and more! Plus, you’ll be able to access bonus audio and video content (soon, once we figure out what that is). Click here to download.

Got an Android device? You can now download our app on the Android Marketplace. Find out all about it here.

Follow us on twitter at twitter.com/p1podcast.

Thanks for listening! Don’t forget to visit our new web site at www.playeronepodcast.com. You can leave us a voicemail by calling 713-893-8069 or you can send a comment via MP3 to our email address, playeronepodcast@gmail.com. Don’t forget to join our forums if you haven’t already!

Running time: 1:55:03

Direct download: 02_14_11-Episode225.mp3

Chris Johnston Episodes, Video Games Dead Space 2, guitar hero, Halo Reach, marvel vs. capcom 3, Sega CD, stacking, Tony Hawk

Publisher: Good Deal Games (Acclaim)

Developer: Domark

Released: 2004 (1994)

I’m not sure if I’ve mentioned Good Deal Games on this blog or not. They’re a great place to find copies of previously unreleased games for some of your favourite classic game systems. They have a decent selection of Sega CD titles available, one of which is Battle Frenzy.

Battle Frenzy was actually released in 1994 in the UK, but didn’t see a North American release until a decade later.

This is another example of a Genesis cartridge game being re-released on the CD format, complete with redbook audio and… not a whole lot else. Considering this is a first-person shooter, it’s not surprising to see other reviews out there on the interwebs saying it was only possible through the scaling and rotation abilities of the Sega CD hardware.

Not true. The cartridge version of the game runs pretty much exactly the same as the CD release.

The goal in Battle Frenzy is to navigate 12 levels of shooty action. Each level contains a core (or something) that you must destroy. Once that’s done, you have to run back to the level entrance before a timer counts down and everything goes boom.

It’s not only very repetitive – it’s very difficult to play. There’s a reason we didn’t see a whole lot of first-person shooters on the console scene before the advent of the dual-analog stick controller. This thing is just a pain to control, with the d-pad controlling both look and forward/backward movement, and a button that you can hold in order to strafe.

When I do these updates, I always try to find something interesting about each title. It was difficult to come up with much in this case. Of course, developer Domark is one of the handful of software houses that eventually merged to create Eidos Interactive (currently owned by Square-Enix).

I thought that was all I’d have to go with. But then a name in the credits jumped out at me. Ian Livingstone is credited with writing the story in Battle Frenzy. If you’re a child of the 80s, you might remember him as a writer of fantasy fiction, as well as one of the people behind the Fighting Fantasy series of books – a sort of single player, RPG-lite series for the younger crowd.

Turns out he’s been a part of the games industry for a long time (and even before that, co-founded Games Workshop in 1975). In fact, he’s still around. When Square-Enix took over Eidos he was apparently promoted to “Life President.”

Sounds fancy.

Greg Sewart Sega CD Battle Frenzy, Good Deal Games, Sega CD

I love the Sega CD. And I love the 16-bit era in general. I’m not sure if that sentiment is purely based on nostalgia, or if it truly was one of the greatest gaming eras ever, but I’m gonna go with the latter for now.

Playing Ys Book I & II as our latest Game Club game has rekindled my passion for 16-bit CD games. And since I’ve spent way too much money and time collecting a bunch of Sega CD games, I’ve decided it’s time to actually, legitimately play them. And since CJ says I have to contribute to the show blog once in a while, I’ve decided to share my resulting thoughts with all of you.

Unfortunately, the first selection makes a greater case for nostalgia than it does for the 16-bit era being the great one.

Although they would go on to be the catalyst in Sega’s eventual exit from the console market, Sony provided pretty decent third-party support for the Sega CD throughout its lifetime with a mixture of movie-licensed platformers and full-motion-video titles.

The movie-licensed stuff usually ended up being nothing more than copies of their Genesis counterparts featuring redbook audio drawn right from the film’s score. To be fair, that didn’t always happen (Cliffhanger and Bram Stoker’s Dracula are good examples of that), but in the case of the abysmal 3 Ninjas Kick Back, I’m pretty sure it’s exactly what’s going on.

Why am I not completely sure? Well, two reasons – the game is so bad I can’t be bothered to see if the Genesis/SNES versions were identical to this one; and I honestly can’t get past the first group of levels. There’s a particular scene where a boulder is chasing me down a long slope (for no particular reason) that has vexed me for long enough that I just don’t care whether I see the rest of the game at this point.

EDIT: Actually, there was some content added to the game in the form of 3D hanglider missions, pictured here. That’s pretty much the same approach taken with Cliffhanger – they added 3D snowboarding missions to that one.

Well, I should point out that, on top of the “real” music, 3 Ninjas does feature a bit of video footage. Before certain levels, the old man I can only assume is your Sensei will pop up and explain what he wants you to do in that area. He’ll also appear during the continue screen in order to explain that you have to hit start to continue. This grainy, FMV crap is why I loved this system.

Otherwise, 3 Ninjas is a pretty standard action platformer with a horrible difficulty curve. It’s more or less identical to the style of play found in Sony Imagesoft’s other licensed platformers — especially Hook (another one that made the jump to the Sega CD — in fact it was sold in a two-pack with this very game).

Thank god I didn’t actually spend any money on this game back when the system was shiny and new. Years later, playing as a collector, I can simply shake my head at how bad it is and move on. Had I spent upwards of $100 on this junk back then, I can only imagine the depression that would have followed.

After all, our self-worth is measured by the relative success or failure of the games systems we own, right?

It seems this series has gotten off to a rather depressing start. Oh well. Up next: The Adventures of Batman & Robin!

Greg Sewart Miscellany, Sega CD, Video Games 3 Ninjas, bad game, Nostalgia, Sega CD