411 Retro Review: Virtual Hydlide (SAT)
Posted by Steve McHugh on 08.16.2006
It's almost Rise of the Robots bad.
When I first found this game in the bundle of games I got with the Saturn I'd never heard of it. I couldn't remember it ever being out back in 1995 and so I figured I'd go online and see what I could find. After a while of I'd looking I'd managed to discover not very much. Even Wikipedia had nothing on this game.
I can't really do a retro piece without finding something about it so I kept looking and eventually found out a few things. Firstly this was a sequel to a dreadful NES game, which I'd already known, and secondly that this game was also completely dreadful.
Any reviews I'd read were just mauling this game. The graphics even for back then were awful a blend of FMV and sprites instead of polygons which ending up making everything look blocky and badly pixilated. If that wasn't enough the gameplay was just as bad with awful controls and a bizarre attempt at fighting where it was basically a case of trying to judge how close you were to your enemy before hitting it. Once it hits you you're close enough to fight. It seemed that this game had nothing going for it.
Okay, I figured, maybe it was one of those games where it's grown on people over time and is some sort of cult gem. Okay maybe not but surely it couldn't be as bad as I was reading it was. I mean it's not like its Rise of the Robots. Oh was I ever wrong.
Graphics
Well now this doesn't exactly scream quality. In fact it's awful. The first big problem is that everything is really grainy and pixilated. Then the character moves and things get worse, much, much worse. For starters whenever you move it looks like you've got some serious problems with piles. You don't so much run and walk as waddle side to side like a fat duck. And don't think anything else in the game looks better. Enemies look flat and dull, which is actually a pretty good way of summing up the whole graphical experience. Despite the game supposedly being, in part, 3D it all looks very flat and hardly stands out. When the main color used seems to be brown you have a problem.
Oh and then there's the FMV. I hate FMV as it's mostly used in really crap games and usually acted out by people who the words ‘over act' are some sort of mantra. For those who don't know FMV was quite popular in the mid 90s as it was seen as being cutting edge. Blending films with games, brilliant. In all fairness they did have some great games use FMV because they got a good script and half decent actors… this wasn't one of them. The opening movie, for example, shows a castle and then a Princess inside a castle running away from a monster in a window. Now imagine that but acted by people whose acting ability is roughly the same as toilet roll and you get the general idea. Basically the Princess' job is to look scared and run towards the camera or player. And she screws it up. I mean how hard is it to look scared and then move away. Trained chimps could do it. Trained chimps smoking pot could do it. So as you may have grasped the ‘acting' is not so good.
On top of character and enemy problems there's also a problem with the back grounds, namely that as you move around so do they so no matter where you move to you will always see the same part of the item you're looking at. It makes for some very surreal moments when you try to position yourself for a better look at something and get… the same bloody thing. And when you do get to the mansions every room inside looks the same. I don't mean similar I mean identical. Occasionally you'll get a different lay out or new piece of furniture. It's really as exciting as it sounds.
2/10
Indeed this armor does make you look like a giant fairy.
Gameplay
Oh where do I start? To sum up my experience I will walk you through the first four and a half minutes of the game.
After watching the epic opening sequence I start the game in what I assume is supposed to be a forest. Well there are trees and shrubs so I'm going with forest although it could well be anywhere really. I bring up the map by pressing the map button and see a small blue diamond at one end. I assume I have to go there so I head off in search of whatever is there. On the way I figure I'd better got to grips with the controls. So I press A, and he gets out what could be the worlds smallest knife and he does a small slash. B does a bigger slash. That's it for fighting. Okay now I try to figure out how to put the knife away and it's X, which is also used for activating things. I can see conflict coming with the set up but I ignore it for now and head off. A minute or so in a come across a green slimy thing and so I run up to attack it. After numerous attempts at getting close enough and not knowing how far I am away he hits me first and I assume I'm close enough. So I attack the little git and he dies. I take a second to feel happy and vaguely worried that if this is a long game and all fights take ages to figure out how close I am I could die an awful lot. So I head off in search of the blue diamond. Thirty seconds or so passed and I came across another green thingy and attack it. I am then attacked by a tree that hits me twice and I die. I stare are the screen wondering what the hell is going one. It was a tree and it came out of no where and ate me. How is that gently guiding someone into a game? So I swear at the game. A lot. I curse its programmers for making the bloody thing and I curse Sega for ever actually daring to publish this steaming great sack of horse crap. Four minutes in and eaten by a fucking tree. I mean I like hard games, Ninja Gaiden for me was just right but at least have consistency in enemies. If you start fighting small green blobs you don't go and throw in a really hard enemy you have no hope of beating.
So I switch it back on and play again. This time I get to a grave yard. And to the blue diamond. And nothing. There's a grave stone so I go up to it and press every button on the controller and nothing. So I leave the graveyard thinking well maybe I made a mistake. Nope as the map is still showing what it was before so back into the graveyard I go. And this time I press the EXACT SAME BUTTONS and it works. I curse a little. My wife laughs at me and points out how hugely crap this is. I nod.
This is pretty much the whole game. Go somewhere pick something up go somewhere else. Fight really boring creatures that do nothing of interest. I can't stress how soul destroyingly boring this is. And apart from the whole bizarre tree incident it's also amazingly easy. And when it's not boring it's infuriating. Were the games testers smoking crack or something?
So are there any positives? Well not many I'll admit but the main one would be its straightforward approach. You won't get lost or ever really have to thing about what to do next because it's not the sort of game where you have to think. Also the inventory system is quite novel. It's based on weight so if you find a nice new sword you can only pick it up if you have enough weight. It's not close to being as user friendly as Elder Scrolls 4 but it's still a nice way of doing it.
2/10
Sound
When the best thing you can say about the game is that the sound is okay you have a problem. It's basically a classical score and it sounds pretty good even today. It's not offensive and most of the time you'll forget it's even there. The sound effects however are very weird and don't seem to actually match what is going on at the time.
4/10
Lasting Appeal
It's a short game. You could finish it in only a few hours, maybe 8 at an average. And you'll never want to play it again. If you do manage to get all the way through the game though, congratulations because most people will stop after twenty minutes, if that.
3/10
Fun Factor
Well my wife and I had huge fun watching the main character run and thinking of as many rude comments to make as we could. That was good times had by all. The only reason why anyone would play this game is to take the piss out of it. The story is crap, there's no progression of story actually in the game itself only occasional cut scenes. The gameplay is some of the worst I've ever played.
1/10
The most exciting screenshot i have. Wow.
Is it worth buying?
This is a truly awful game on all accounts. If anyone actually brought this for you when it came out I am very sorry. But they hate you. I got this game for free and I still feel cheated so if you actually want to buy it then expect to pay about $5.Which is $4.99 too much.
Should you buy the console for the game? Well what do you think?
A dreadful game. The only nice thing I'll say about it this, it's not quite as bad as Rise of the Robots. But then what is?
2/10 (and that's just because I pissed myself laughing at the damn thing).
Well that's it for this week. If you disagree or just want to discuss what i've written then drop me an e-mail. Join me next week for another look at a retro game, i haven't decided what one yet so it'll be a surprise for us all.
