I remember when Cruis’n USA and Killer Instinct were shown off and allegedly were using Nintendo 64 technology. It was 64-bits! Fuck your 32-bits, they were leap frogging that shit! Both games seemed far ahead of their time and the prospect of arcade perfect ports of these two games on Nintendo’s future console made many […]Cruis’n USA
I remember when Cruis’n USA and Killer Instinct were shown off and allegedly were using Nintendo 64 technology. It was 64-bits! Fuck your 32-bits, they were leap frogging that shit! Both games seemed far ahead of their time and the prospect of arcade perfect ports of these two games on Nintendo’s future console made many […]
I would not own my own computer until 1999 so I could only look on with envy at the PC gaming renaissance of the mid-90s. While I would occasionally get the chance to dabble with Doom and Hexen I only got to experience the majority of the really popular titles that made PC gaming unique […]
Back in the 32-bit era the thought of Ridge Racer or any Namco property appearing on a rival platform was pretty much blasphemous. Their partnership with Sony was one of the most lucrative in history but in the waning years of the generation there was nothing to lose in experimenting with a new user base. […]
Turok: Dinosaur Hunter was on old comic’s property from the 1950s that I’m sure not many remembered until it was brought back by Valiant Comics in the 90s. However even with that resurgence in popularity for the character I was surprised Acclaim chose this to make a video game adaptation. Personally I would have picked […]
When the Star Wars: Episode One video game adaptations were announced I’ll admit, I was disappointed that the N64 would be “saddled” with just a pod racing game, especially in light of the PlayStation receiving the action game I thought I was looking for. The Nintendo 64 sure as hell did not need another racing […]
During the Nintendo 64’s first year on the market new releases were incredibly sparse and as such each and every game was scrutinized. It didn’t take a genius to figure out that War Gods was terrible while an unknown (at least in video games) quantity like Turok stood out more due to a lack of […]
I will admit that of all the franchises to make the leap to the 32-bit generation I never expected Top Gear would be one of them. I enjoyed the 16-bit installments but never thought much of them however Kemco did an excellent job of expanding the brand on the N64 with Top Gear Rally, Top […]
Once Super Mario 64 revolutionized the industry we all knew, it was only a matter of time until the clones came running. And boy did they! Collectathon 3d adventures replaced the generic 2d mascots of yesteryear and most were just as insipid as Bubsies, Zools, Awesome Possums, and every other furry animal you can imagine. […]
With Mario 64’s impact on the market we all knew it was only a matter of time before a legion of imitators would follow. While most were generic trash there a few that were particularly inspired. Chameleon Twist marked Sunsoft’s reentry as a publisher and although it did not live up to their past exploits […]
Back in the day before the average computer became affordable to the poor masses I could only sit and dream about how cool games like Doom, Command and Conquer, and Descent were like. Eventually I would get to play some of these titles and they were everything I expected and more (Diablo, so damn good). […]
Well this was certainly unexpected. Psygnosis were the jewel in Sony’s development cap and the key to gaining them respectability as a console manufacturer. Let’s be honest, Sony Imagesoft sure as hell were not the ones you looked to for quality gaming. Sometime around 1996 for a brief period Psygnosis regained some of their autonomy […]
As innovative and addicting as Tetris is for years every developer who touched the license was content to simply put out their own version of the same game over and over again. Whether it was due to restrictions placed on them or fear of screwing up a sure thing, the most popular puzzle game in […]
Remember when first person shooters were new and exciting? Obviously we’ve come a long way from the heady days of Doom and while I won’t say they’ve ruined the industry (because it’s not true) no one can deny that there are far too many generic FPS on the market. But it wasn’t always this way. […]
Coming of the success of Tomb Raider Core Design and Eidos could do no wrong. Flush with Lara Croft money they began an aggressive marketing campaign for nearly all of their games supposedly based on “character” when in reality it was mostly tits and ass. Badly shaped polygonal asses at that that; look up any […]
As much as we love Bomberman for its riotous multiplayer mode let’s be honest, the single player campaign has been tolerable at best. Through five installments on the SNES and the awesome Bomberman ’93 on the Turbo Grafx-16 this has held true but the N64’s release provided an opportunity to put a new spin on […]
Konami had lofty plans for Castlevania 64, setting out to create one of the most ambitious 3d adventures of the time. However between their developmental inexperience and the reality of the monster they were trying to create Castlevania 64’s initial release was a scaled back version of what they originally planned. Less than a year […]
When the inevitable move to 3d gaming came certain genres benefited the most. Racing games and fighting games in particular made the transition extremely well but above all others came first person shooters. Prior to 1996 all fps were created using different sprite scaling methods to create 3d environments and it’s a testament to ID’s […]
I suppose everyone had to find their niche somehow. By the end of the N64’s first year on the market there were entirely too many racing games in my opinion. Any developer trying to make a splash in that crowded space would have to do something different; the standard Ridge Racer style power slide extravaganza […]
Although Extreme G was not an exceptional game it at least had the foundation for a competent futuristic racing game. It simply lacked polish in terms of its play mechanics. Extreme G-2 manages to fix the majority of the flaws of the first game but introduces new ones all its own that unfortunately bring down […]
The Star Wars franchise has always enjoyed a fruitful relationship with Nintendo consoles, dating as far back as the NES. The Star Wars trilogy of platformers on the SNES were all high quality games so it came as no surprise when LucasArts announced a new game in the series for the unreleased N64. Heads turned […]
One thing you can say about the N64, it has more than its fair share of racing games. Of the 290 or so North American releases for the system almost 50 are some form of racing game. With that many nearly every incarnationof the genre were covered from car combat to the more esoteric […]
Nintendo has always excelled at taking genre’s they are not comfortable with and putting their own unique spin on them. The Mario Kart series was born from this as an example. So when word came of a fighting game starring their most iconic characters the gaming world lost their shit. You could say it was […]
I remember the racing games of the 32-bit era pretty well. Most were a stuttering mess that could barely keep a decent framerate and even when they did it was in the low 20s at best. Sure we had our Gran Turismos and Ridge Racers but those were the exception, not the rule. The N64 […]
Absolute crushing disappointment. That’s the only way I can sum up Yoshi’s Story. You have to understand: this was the sequel to Yoshi’s Island, one of the greatest platformers ever made! And now the next iteration was going to the N64, imagine what they could achieve with 64-Bits! Well their vision and our imaginations took […]
To a legion of gamers the analogue stick has always been the preferred method of control in video games. To them it always existed. But that isn’t the case. Those of us who have been at this hobby for 2 decades or more remember the early years of the Playstation and Saturn. 3d games were […]
The early months of the Nintendo 64’s life were dark day’s man. As someone who lived through it, I can tell you the anemic release schedule up until the end of its first year was enough to send most gamers back to their Playstations. So why did so many of us put up with for […]
By now Goldeneye has gone on to become legendary. There were honestly no expectations placed on upon its release; if anything you could say it was expected to be horrible. Movie licensed games on average usually turned out terrible, and Goldeneye had a protracted development schedule, further placing it in the doghouse. But its release […]
The early days of the N64 can be summed up in 1 word: waiting. As third parties ran screaming from cartridges and Nintendo’s hefty license fees not only were releases few and far between but constantly delayed as well. As someone who lived through that period it was infuriating, let me tell you. The games […]
Hype is an inescapable part of the video game industry. Whether it is a developer extolling the virtues of their latest creation to game journalists struggling to put into words how awesome a new product they’ve just seen is, we are all guilty of falling for it. New console launches are when these events are […]
During the 32-bit era there was a disturbing trend of taking beloved franchises and slapping them in 3d, as if that were enough to instantly make them better. Once you take into account 90% of the developers in the industry had no experience working with 3d you can see how the results were usually […]
During the 32-bit era no exclusive developer was more important to their partner than Rare was to Nintendo. You could argue Squaresoft filled that role for Sony but the truth is even without them there were a ton of other third parties that would have picked up the slack. Whenever Nintendo would delay a game […]
