3DO Interactive Multiplayer

I asked why they spell it 'Tokio'? No answer came the solemn reply. Tokyo - Kyoto. Get it? To-Kyo. Kyo-to. Tokyo means city to the West. West City. The old capital. It's similar to the way the Chinese name their cities. Nanjing etc.

Autobahns - for a gear head, again like me, represent roads without speed limits. Tokyo as a visitor, represents a city without limits. Tokyo is a place of contrasts. The city that has temples next to skyscrapers. I got married in one. A city with fishing lakes next to mega-hotels. The Emperor's palace, in a city with no space, has gardens. Italian pasta served with rice. Whole stores dedicated to Gundam models. It is amazing. No where like it on Earth. I love Tokyo. I really do.

Autobahn Tokio - what could be better?

I don't know why in this game they spell Tokio like that, as opposed Tokyo - but no matter.

Autobahn Tokio is described as a poor mans Need for speed. Good Lord - Heavens above. That represent ignorance on an epic scale. That is wrong.

Autobahn Tokio is actually Ridge Racer meets Gran Turismo meets Battle Gear or Initial D. After Ridge, before Polyphonic, before anyone thought an AE86 was cool there was Autobahn Tokio on the 3DO. It's red car verses yellow car, hinting towards real racing dynamics and the recongnisable cars of Gran Turismo or Initial D.

Bacteria is to Monkeys, as Monkeys are to Humans. In which Victory Lap is to Autobahn Tokio, Autobahn Tokio is to Project Gothem 3.

Autobahn Tokio smells of Ridge racer, has the tracks of GT and hints at initial D.

Where to start? The cars? Unlike Ridge Racer the cars are noticeably modelled on real easily identifiable cars. The blue one is a Honda Civic. The white one is an old Mercedes 'C' class. The yellow one is obviously a Nissan Fair-lady and finally the ubiquitous red Mazda RX7.

Moving onto the tracks, particular the night city one, these are undeniably Gran Turismo.

The night city mode is Special Stage Route 5, the mountain route is Grand Valley Speedway and the forest route is Deep Forest Racing Way. Don't argue.

Of cause GT didn't make it to the PS1 for another 4 years after Autobahn Tokio was released. I don't care what anyone says - they, the 3DO ones, are the originals. The 3DO versions do, again I emphasise, look like stripped down versions of the PS1 GT game. The dark city track, unnamed in the actual 3DO game, is very and I cannot emphasise this enough, reminiscent of the Sony Playstations Gran Turismo circuit Special D. So are the others. The circuits are fairly short but eerily familiar.

The game itself isn't great. The cars don't handle well, the graphics, compared to the Need for speed are at best iffy and the music is dreadful. Having said that - Left foot braking.

Braking with one foot, while keeping the revs up high with the other foot. It is great way of exiting a corner fast - it is a racing, rally and street racing driving technique - and Autobahn Tokio supports this driving technique. It supported it in 1995, when this information was privy only to few car geeks. Which means one thing - that Autobahn Tokio game developers were car fan-boys or racing fan-boys or passionate about cars and driving. NFS didn't support left foot braking - or Ridge racer or Daytona... GT did, so does Battle gear and Initial D.

I don't know the link between Tokio Autobahn, the ignored Japanese only arcade driving game for the 3DO. A driving game that uses only English language and hints at a gaming evolutionary link between Gran Turismo, Ridge Racer`and Initial D - but the link is there. I promise.

Rare - Simply rare.

3DO Kid.

Gaming is emotive. The more I write, the more I play, the more I begin to realise. Computer and video games play the player, and the games that do it well are the ones we enjoy the most.

What I'm trying to say is that games force sensory emotion. Let me qualify that or I'll begin to sound like Edge Magazine. I'll give you an example. Return Fire.

Essentially Return fire is a game based on find the Flag. Two teams fighting against each other, trying to find their opponents flag and take it back to their own base. A simple enough concept. Each battlefield is spread over a number of islands. Each player has a base and each base is equipped with the same military vehicles.

A base is populated with hospital tents, missile firing turrets, petrol dumps, roads, trees and beaches. All of which can be destroyed. Each base also has a set of vehicles: A helicopter, a Jeep, a heavy rocket launcher and a tank. You use these weapons to infiltrate the enemies base and as mentioned before, seize the flag.

The graphics are nice, 3D where 2D would might have done in my opinion - but none the less, they scale and rotate nicely, and the camera adopts a wide angled lens view as your vehicle accelerates, which is done to encompass more of the surrounding area - a nice touch.

The controls take a little getting used to but the balance between the helicopter and it's six axis of movement, the cumbersome rocket launcher and the energetic jeep are balanced well.

What was that I was saying about sensory? Oh yes - The music. The music is classical. It takes the game to a different level of emotional play. Not since - for me anyway - we docked a space ship in Elite. For example the helicopter flies to the tune of "Ride of the Valkyries" by Wagner. A particularly emotive piece of helicopter related music. Imagine if you will being in-charge of a helicopter gunship, while a full orchestra plays "Ride of the Valkyries" - You feel, embarrassing as it is to admit, 'powerful'. For those that struggle to remember it is the piece of music used in Apocalypse now, during the Helicopter Cavalry sequence. If you don't know it - it's unlikely to havet he same effect on you.

While playing to this tune, it is hard to fight the urge not to make the little helicopter swoop and strafe needlessly. Then launch missiles and cut down the little men escaping while you laugh maniacly. Then to, as gracefully as possible with the 3DO d-pad, circle the gun turrets as they impotently try and shoot you down, then before you run out of fuel, to destroy the mines of the submarine... I could go on.

Baron RK Von Wolfsheild, (what a name!) the designer of Return Fire, couldn't have made the experience better without paying some ex-US military Cavalry Lieutenant to come into your house and throw napalm around - it smells like victory you know.

Yet there is more: The urgency of escaping with the enemies flag with 1812 Overture chirping away, or any of the other brilliantly positioned pieces of classical music associated with the vehicles.

It is satisfying and it's the music that does it. The music is emotionally charged - combine that with what most people associate the music too makes for one hell of a gaming experience.

Return Fire would have been a good game with or without the music. With the music, that touch of inspired game deisgn, the game in my opinion becomes a classic and plays the player in way many games don't manage.

3DO Kid.

One final sub-note: The voice that does the laughing skull when you you lose is R J Mical. Designer of the 3DO chip set and the Amiga Chips set.

I have used the word cliche before. Several times. I sit now, writing this, wishing in my heart-of-hearts that there was another word. Another word to describe Draxons Revenge. A word that would encompass how tacky, bad and biblically cliched this game really is.

Honestly - Words truly fail to convey how thoroughly uninspired this game is. From its pre-rendered start, to the 'guys in the development team here at Dynamix really love you consumers' end.

If I went up a mountain and came down with white hair, sun burn and two stone tablets written by God himself, I could not impress upon you just how cliched this game is.

It is - without fear of contradiction - the cliche-zilla of games. A towering Mega-cliche-opolis of cliches. The white whale of cliches and I its Captain Ahab. It is the Wizard of Cliche at the end of the yellow cliche road. It is the cliched game that died for the sins of other games and we will forever await the return of this cliched Messiah and the Four Horsemen of the Cliche.
It is the Hulk, Spiderman, Batman, Superman, Fantastic Four, A-Team, Airwolf and Blue Thunder all rolled into one - one ultra-mega-elephantitus-super-deluxe-kingsize-XXL cliche. I think that just about does it. I've made my point. {Hopefully)

Let us start with the name of the main character of evil. 'Gir Draxon'. It's a cliche. Right there. You can't deny it. 'Gir' as in 'Grrr' and 'Draxon' as in 'Dragon' with an 'X'.

'X'?

The 'Stella 7' part I assume was borrowed from a 1960's science fiction TV show. Stella obviously associates the game with space and '7'? - Well '7' is just lucky. I should also point out it also represents the number of levels. But they are not levels are they? You know that and I know that. No. You guessed right... They are "Worlds". I sigh for a generation.

The box art is cliched. Badly. The representation of Mr Draxon himself is cliched up the waz-zoo. A modernised version of Genghis Khan with one, just the one mind, terminator style robotic red eye.

The storyline. In what must be the greatest ever display of a complete and utter lack of imagination, the storyline is set in the future and goes something like this:

Earths military is otherwise pre-engaged and Gir Draxon is going to destroy the earth and its futuristic 12 billion human population, if something isn't done.

But wait. What's that? There is hope? One man can pilot the prototype defense craft - 'Raven?' The gods be praised. If only this young rookie can battle across the seven worlds and defeat the evil Gir Draxon - well - everything would be fine wouldn't it? It's the earths only hope.

...stop me, anytime, if this sounds familiar.

O.K. but this cliched game doesn't stop there. Oh no. What's that? 3DO? The year's 1993? Pre-rendered space introduction for you then.

Music you ask? Guess. Go on. Guess. How about looping rock? Not the candy type. Oh-no. The heavy metal type. Rock on dude! ...and on ...and on ...and on.

The manual is brilliant. OK. I lied. It isn't. But it has picture of the development team. Underneath which they all hope "...you'll agree that Draxons Revenge for the 3DO delivers incredible graphics, smooth control, astonishing art, and action so fast and realistic you'll have to wear sunblock to prevent laser burn!"

What's truly amazing is that the game was coded by two people, the Lukaszuk brothers and the manual was written by two people. The manual is 20 pages long which doesn't leave much hope for the game.

What can I say. The ultimate cliched game for the 3DO Multiplayer. All-in-all a cheap clone of Atari Battlezone. Only not as good.

The manual is well written however. If only the writers had worked for Panasonic...

Medium rare.

3DO Kid.

[Disclaimer: Good grief. The following comments regarding Carrier: Fortress at sea are not meant, in any way, to belittle or degrade either the British people, the Argentinean people, the people of the Falklands or anyone else - living or dead. The comments on this website are a light hearted view of entertainment on the 3DO multiplayer from a time before the turn of the last century. Anything that could be considered offensive is not said with that intent. Rather a half-arsed attempt at comedy. While 3DO kid recognises people of all races, religions, cultures, sexual persuasion and political beliefs and would happily embrace them all as his brother - he reserves the right, as culturally British, to take the piss - especially of do-gooder hippy tree-hugging sheep shaggers like ALC. If you find yourself being offended - sod-off.]

What is most astounding about the 3DO multiplayer, even today, is that it still manages to surprise. "Of cause it does 3DO Kid!" I hear you cry, "You're a dyed-in-the-wool 3DO fan-boy and you'll say anything to justify this blogs existence!" Maybe so. Yet who would have thought that such a derided, ignored, scorned genre of the mid-nineteen-nineties, the veritable cow-pat-zilla of video game console genres, could stump up something worth while? It's a fact: Carrier - Fortress at sea is entertaining and I learnt something. I was, without a desire to cause peoples hearts to stop - 'Edutained' by Carrier.

A phrase, and I don't wish to give credit where it's not due - but a phrase forged I believe in the mighty mind of Trip Hawkins himself*. Father of the 3DO multiplayer. Edutainment.

OK. I'm not talking bunny-girl mud wrestling entertained or Tony Blair lobotomised live on Channel 5 entertained. More like it's the last thing to watch on the interactive in-flight entertainment, entertained. Still - entertained I was.

Carrier: Fortress at sea has depth, it has breadth and it has scope. It's not solely focused on American Aircraft Carriers either. One of the highlights was a quick summary of Falklands conflict - a glorious moment in history where Britain exercised it's sovereign right to kick seven military grade shades out of the filthy pilfering Argentinian neigh-do-wells and their nefarious designs to steal land that didn't belong to them.

It covers all aspects of Aircraft carriers from history, to functions, deployments, manning, it's very good.

The menu's are pretty and well designed. The video footage is clear and large enough to see without binoculars or magnifying-rose-tint-o-spec's and even the little game of land the F15 on the carrier is mildly amusing - if not entirely technically accurate.

If you get a chance I would strongly recommend you grab a copy of this. Not at all like the other Edutainment I have seen on the Multiplayer.

Rare like the Argentinian flag at Port Stanly.

3DO kid.

*Apparently not true. Which is a pity. See below.

Here is the most reliable list of 3DO games I can find. Copied from the guys at 3DO Today.

http://3dotoday.classicgaming.gamespy.com/page1/3do3.txt

The total number of US games released (not including multi-pack re-releases) seems to be only 174. Japanese only games is 75* - although I'm not convinced because Flopon the Space mutant I know for fact is Trip'd, which suggests there maybe others.

The good news is I believe I have almost 95% of the US games and a good taste of the Japanese ones.

*Update: added "Grand Chef of the Kingdom"!

3D Atlas
Advanced Dungeons and Dragons - Death Keep
Advanced Dungeons and Dragons - Slayer
Alone In The Dark
Alone In The Dark 2
Ballz: The Director's Cut
Battle Chess
Battlesport
BC Racers
Blade Force
Blonde Justice
Brain Dead 13
Burning Soldier
Bust-A-Move
Cannon Fodder
Captain Quazar
Carrier: Fortress at Sea
Casper
Club 3DO: Station Invasion
Corpse Killer
Coven
Cowboy Casino
Crash N' Burn
Creature Shock
Crime Patrol
Cyberia
Cyberdillo
D
Demolition Man
Dennis Miller - That's News to me.
Digital Dreamware
Dinopark Tycoon
Doom
Dragon's Lair
Dragon Lore
Drug Wars
Endlessly
Escape From Monster Manor
ESPN Beach Volleyball
ESPN Golf
ESPN Golf: Mental Messages
ESPN Interactive Hitting
ESPN Let's Go Skiing
ESPN Let's Play Soccer
ESPN Let's Play Tennis
ESPN Step Aerobics
Family Feud
Fatty Bear's Birthday Surprise
Fatty Bear's Fun Pack
FIFA Soccer
Flashback: The Quest For Identity
Flying Nightmares
Foes Of Ali
Fun 'N Games
Gex
Gridders
Guardian War
Gunslinger Collection
Hell: A Cyberpunk Thriller
Horde
Ice Breaker
Immercenary
Immortal Desires
Incredible Machine
Iron Angel Of The Apocalypse
Iron Angel of the Apocalypse: The Return
Jammit
John Madden Football
Johnny Bazookatone
Jurassic Park Interactive
Killing Time
Kingdom: The Far Reaches
Lemmings
Lost Eden
Lost Files Of Sherlock Holmes
Love Bites
Lucienne's Quest
Mad Dog McCree
Mad Dog II: The Lost Gold
Mathemagics: An Interactive Learning Cube
Mazer
Mega Race
Microcosm
Mind Teazzer
Myst
Need For Speed
Neuro Dancer
Night Trap
Novastorm
Off-World Interceptor
Olympic Soccer
Olympic Summer Games
Out Of This World
PaTaank
Panasonic Demonstration CD
Panasonic Sampler CD
Panzer General
Perfect General
PGA Tour 96
Phoenix 3
Plumbers Don't Wear Ties
PO'ed
Primal Rage
Psychic Detective
Putt Putt Goes To The Moon
Putt Putt Joins The Parade
Putt Putt's Fun Pack
Quarantine
Quarterback Attack
Real Pinball
Return Fire
Return Fire: Maps o'Death
Rise Of The Robots
Road Rash
Robinson's Requiem
Sample This!
Samurai Shodown
Scramble Cobra
Seal of the Pharaoh
Sesame Street Numbers
Sewer Shark
Sex
Shadow: War Of Succession
Shanghai: Triple Threat
Shelley Duvall's: It's A Bird's Life
Shock Wave
Shock Wave: Operation Jumpgate Shockwave
Shock Wave 2: Beyond The Gate
Sid Meier's C.P.U. Bach
Slam 'N Jam '95
Slope Style: An nteractive Learning Cube Instruction.
Snow Job
Soccer Kid
Space Ace
Space Hulk: Vengeance of the Blood Angels
Space Pirates
StarBlade
Star Control II
Star Fighter
Star Wars: Rebel Assault
Stellar 7: Draxon's Revenge
Strahl
Super Models Go Wild
Super Street Fighter II Turbo
Super Wing Commander
Supreme Warrior Fighting
Syndicate
The Daedalus Encounter
The Last Bounty Hunter
The Life Stage: Virtual House
The San Diego Zoo
Oceans Below
Space Shuttle
Theme Park
Toon Time - In The Classroom
Total Eclipse
Trip'D
True Golf Classics: Pebble Beach Golf Links
True Golf Classics: Waialae Country Club
True Golf Classics: Wicked 18
Twentieth Century Video Almanac
Twisted: The Game Show
Virtual Vivid Sampler
Virtuoso
VR Stalker
Way Of The Warrior
Who Shot Johnny Rock?
Wing Commander III: Heart Of The Tiger
Wolfenstein 3D
Woody Woodpecker 1
Woody Woodpecker 2
Woody Woodpecker 3
World Cup Golf: Hyatt Dorado Beach
Zhadnost: The People's Party

Japanese games.

Achieve Peace: An Almanac For Improving Your Fortune
Aesop's Fables: The Ants and the Grasshoppers Vol. 1
Ai Shogi
AV Girl Mahjong
Bakusito
Battle Pinball
Belzerion
Battery Navi
Bonogurashi
Confrontation: Wax Water game.
Crayon Shin Chan: The Big Magic.
Doctor Hauzer
Dragon Tycoon Edge
Emit Vol. 1
Emit Vol. 2
F1 GP
Flopon the Space Mutant
Fumin's Toy Box
Ghost Hunter Series: The Mask of Black Death
Global Defense
Graduation: Final
Graduation II: Special-Neo Generation
Grand Chef of the Kingdom
Grimm's Fairy Tales Vol. 2: Hansel and Gretel
Grimm's Fairy Tales Vol. 3: Little Red Riding Hood
Hello Kitty Toy Box
J.League Virtual Stadium
Kamachi's Museum
Kerokerokeroppi and the Origami Experts
Macaroni Interactive
Mahjong Enlightenment Sky: Heaven Sent
Marine Tour: Diving Spot Guide
Masters: Harukanaru Augusta 3Sports)| T&E Soft
Mitsumasa Anno's Four Seasons in Pepperon
Miyuki Nakajima
Montana Jones
Monoshiri Freedom School
Moon Cradle
Multimedia Cruising
Murphy's T.V.
Neo Organic Bioform
Nice Body
Nobunaga's Ambition
Oyaji Hunter Mahjong
Paddock Note '95
Penthouse Interactive:Virtual Photo Shoot Vol. 1
Peter Frankle: Tower of Challenge
Pretty Soldier Sailormoon Fighting)| Bandai
Prime Suspect
Princess Maker 2
Puppet Tales
Pyramid Intruder
Romance of the Three Kingdoms IV
Royal Pro Wrestling
Rush'n'Fire Megadas
Shanghai: The Great Wall
Sensu no Tensai
Super Mahjong P. IV
Susono Country Club: Golf Course Multimedia Tour
Takeru
Tarot Card Fortune Teller
Theatre Wars
The Deep Blue Fleet
The Doraemons
The Letter That Overcame ime
The Tower
Together With Nontan: TheStar's Gift
Twinkle Knights
Ultraman Powered
Virtual Cameraman Part 3
Virtual Puppet Reika
Winners Take All
Winning Post
Yu Yu Hakusho

Firstly and because I'm in bad mood. 'Urrrggg!'. A bad mood with a Kzatar-death-humper so large I may die. What is a Kzatar-death-humper you ask? Imagine a hang-over so large. So life threatening. So absolutely enormous that the term 'hang-over' fails to convey the misery, the suffering and the self-loathing that I am currently afflicted with.

"Kzatar-death-humper". Noun. A name given to the results of having consumed more alcohol than all of France during the traditional annual French festival in which they celebrate being French by drinking gallons of French wine until they are sick.

In my opinion hang-over is a stupid term anyway. Hang-over from what? 'Throw-over' now that expresses things more clearly...

Where was I? Oh yes... Powers Kingdom. Off to kill Lord Azrael. I better tell you what type of game it is first. A 'Tactical RPG'. Think Final Fantasy tactics on the Gameboy or Fire Emblem on the NES or Segas' Shining Force. Power Kingdoms was, using my amazing powers of deduction, the first Tactical RPG on a 32bit platform.

In essence a tactical RPG is no different to any other RPG game other than the emphasis is much more strongly placed on combat.

Which is a good thing because the Powers Kingdoms story is at best weak. Essentially you are trampling around the Powers Kingdom liberating varying areas from evil and freeing other characters that can join your team. The final objective is to ultimately kill the nasty Lord Azrael.

The game starts off with the lead character 'Pumpkin Knight' and a priest called 'Clay'. Both have been recently resurrected by the Goddess to do her dirty work. You start off by being gently eased into what eventually becomes fairly engrossing sequence of battles. The more you trample around, the more you kill, the more stuff you buy in the shops, the more things you learn about the game.

The combat used in the battles seems well thought out and the intelligence used by your foes is varied and balanced. Each monster, of which there approximately 40 different types, do seem to adopt a different strategy.

This is a good thing because the lack of plot or engaging characters could have made this game a chore. You see in my opinion the combat system and its artificial intelligence, the wide selection of weapons, tactics, spells, characters and settings valiantly rescue an otherwise very below mediocre game. The combat is without any doubt excellent and intuitive - Intuitive is especially important because the manual stinks. Its wording stinks. Its use of English stinks

Each 'golem', this is the games terminology for the characters in your team, can be equipped with a 'body' - the games terminology for a set of attributes. You see what I mean? It gets worse.

I'll explain: Clay, the priest, is by definition more attuned to using spells and magic - so associating him with Wizard and Shaman 'bodies' makes sense. Once associated 'Clay' has access to additional skills, spells and special items you'll find along the way. This again works well. It certainly adds to the strategy. As each attack or healing power has a range and a strength.

Planning how you intend to attribute say a magical body to a none magical golem, which sometimes maybe necessary, is major part of the overall depth.

Another example to explain: Some monsters go straight for attacking the priest. Physical attacks have no bearing on this particular monster - so the knight must be equipped with magic so he can heal the priest, so the priest can concentrate on killing the monster using his spells - if you follow me.

Combat is good. Translation is bad. Use of English is bad.

The manual is a good example. There are approximately 1,000,000,000 English speakers world-wide. I would emplor anyone looking to convert a game from Japanese to English to have one of these native English speakers to give the game the quick once over before you release it.

Yes, I know - people in glass houses should not throw stones and here I sit in my glass palace with a big pile of spiky rocks but let me give you an example. One I have copied perfectly from the manual:

"You were chosen as a combatant golem of the Goddess to restore this particular world from Azrael, Evil Lord. You are in quest of peace. Fight against all the enemies to the total destruction, and finally beat Azrael for the complete peace of the world. It is also important to revive your comrades."

It certainly makes me feel better about my written English. Matsushita Electric Industrial wrote that. With a $30 billion turnover, you might have thought they could have affored to have toddled off into downtown Tokyo or Osaka and found someone to give it a quick read before it went to the printers. Apparently not.

Having said all that Micro Cabin did employ some English speakers. English speakers to do the voice overs. Oh dear. Oh dear. Oh dear. It's difficult to convey just quite how bad they are. Just how stilted. Dis-jointed and generally appalling the voice overs are.

...But I'll give it a go.

"Sa-ve, u-s, fro-m, Looord AzREAL." Time taken to say this is about 20 seconds. It made my ears bleed and I wept.

What else is bad? Not the graphics and the audio. They are amazing. The early desert levels look impressive with the scaling and rotating cacti and rocks but it is the later forest areas that are most impressive. The character animations are a little jerky and similar in some ways to those used in Final Fantasy 7 on the PlayStation but for the era, the console and everything that had gone before it - they were damned good. A special mention for the graphics used when employing spells - best described as ahead of their time. Not until Final Fantasy 7 were we to see such impressive magical imagery again.

The music, like I said, is good. A combination of rock and classical piano. Reminded me, bazaarly, of the tunes found in Ace Combat.

If you can ignore the English written and spoken bits and the lack of engaging characters and plot - Powers Kingdom is actually very very good.

I have two copies. Be warned this game is, unlike most other games, region locked. The U.S. version, known as Guardian Wars, didn't work on my PAL system but would work on my emulated NTSC system and vice verse.

Not rare - definitely worth having.

3DO Kid.

I had such a small amount of hope for this game. Thanks in no small part to the lousy box art.

Developed by Xatrix Entertainment who also made 'King Pin - Life of crime' they went on to become 'Grey Matter' who were swallowed whole by Activision in 2002. You may remember them more clearly from the more modern Wolfenstein game.

Cyberia - I can best describe it as a moody mini Sci-fi epic. Set in the year 2027, a meagre 21 years away as of today, it has you as Zak, a hacker, being sent to Siberia to investigate a secret base. The plot is well presented and the story line is credible. Although 'credible' under sells it.

Without giving too much away it is an adult Sci-fi story. Implausible but on a grand enough scale to draw you in. Anyone familiar with 'Iain Banks' Science fiction will be familiar with this. Artificial Intelligence, Nanotechnology, Blades (Bi-optic Low Amplitude Displayed Energy System) which includes Magnetic Resonance Imaging and less we forget sentient rock formations. All of which steers the story well clear of too many cliches. I should re-emphasise it is better than it sounds. This is a sophisticated vision of the future not the usual 'ooh look, they'll have spaceships in 2027' that so many sloppy story-lines cling too, even today.

I enjoy this kind of stuff. Which leaves the immortal phrase 'Don't judge a book by it's cover' or in this case a 'game by its box art' ringing quite loudly in my ears. Especially since I put off buying Cyberia for so long based on the cover.

Made in the mid-90's the game is made from all pre-rendered CGI graphics. I think, given time, my heart will recover from the none-shock of that. They aren't bad but we've seen better. With the game play split between arcade style shooting and solving puzzles with some roaming thrown in for continuity. The only way, and perhaps the best way to describe Cyberias style is something akin to a pre-rendered pre-Metal Gear Solid sci-fi? Like I said, a bit of wandering, a bit of shooting, a bit of puzzle solving. Make note: That's 1994 folks! That's right 3DO had it all.

Cyberia turns out to be a bit of a sleeper. It's quite good. Ported to DOS (Remember that?) Sega Saturn and Sony PlayStation. Most people, and I agree with them, say it was too short but quite good. Other than the unskippable but not too irritating cut-scenes it's definitely a reasonably enjoyable game and one most people will enjoy it without adding extra rose to the tinted specs.

Usually you have to import Cyberia from the US. Occasionally appears in the UK!

3DO Kid.

That's right. It's 3DO time.

I got into a lot of trouble because of this damned game. Naked 17 year old girls indeed. Here is a tip. Never (ever) get soft porn shipped to your mother-in-law in her name. Common sense should have really raced-in to save the day here but I suffered one of those moments when everything seemed so right and then it turned so very very wrong. For some reason, and I can't quite pin-point the moment, it all turned bad... very bad. Difficult conversation that.

Anyway - 'Toybox!' Or at least that is what 'Omochabko' means. 'Secure' is a brand name. 'Fuumin' is a persons name and 'no' is a particle word that I think means 'owner'. So in this case 'Secure Fuumins Toybox'. Yep - seems to mean nothing.

Basically this game is virtual CD cover creator. That is in so far as I can make out. You would never guess that from the games CD case or the title.

The game comprises of three basic steps. Step 1: Select the main image for the CD case from a selection of pictures of girls. Some pretty looking, some weird looking, some pretty-weird looking. Step 2: Design, using your selected images, the CD case. Step 3: Put your CD case up for review.

I found it difficult, without knowing the criteria, what exactly my design was being reviewed on. So I never got above 80 out of 100. I think, if you get into the top 10, you can watch your video. I never did.

So how was Fuumins toybox for me? It promised so much and delivered so little. For shame Fuumin.

Basically it's not great. The lack of an 'undo' feature makes the game somewhat frustrating. The limited tools and having to use a 3DO D-Pad doesn't help either. All the designs, regardless of the effort put in, ended up looking embarressingly rubbish. But don't worry, you wouldn't want to show these to you Mother-in-law, even if your efforts were any good. However, due to lack of imagination on my part and lack of features on the part of game, each 'effort' was eye-whincingly poor.

This bad game was made even worse by the woman who essentially 'talks' to you and acts as the presenter - Damn! She is creepy. Yet even the poses of the girls in the pictures is a little weird. They really need to cheer up a bit.

On the Japan-quirk-o-meter this is on the scale of 'Earth-killer'. As to what was actually going on - who knows?

Over-priced, rare and unsatisfying.

3DO Kid.

Life is shocking. Always has been, probably always will be.

Not all Japanese people are short. Shocked? I was. I'm a vertically restricted 5'8" (1m 72cm) which in my opinion is on the tail end of acceptable. 6' 0" would have been nice. But no. So imagine my shock when on first trip to Japan (some six years ago) when I discovered that many Japanese men and women towered above me. Clearing the elusive 6' 0". Shocked? I was. It didn't end there however. Shocks of many shapes and forms (much like Japanese people) have been hurtling towards me all my life.

Michel Buffa shocked me when he said this game was good. He said it back in 1994 but none-the-less it is a shocking statement because it's not.

The other shocking thing is that Dick Dastardly speaks Japanese. Fluently. As does Penelope Pitstop. And the Ant Hill Mob.

Wacky Races is not, I repeat, 'Not', a racing game. Shocked? Yes - me too.

Wacky Races is split into two parts. One part is betting. The Second part is map and object finding.

You bet on a race by selecting two cars from a selection of 10, they then race - such as it is. Each race is composed of a sequence of pre-rendered clips.

These clips are not as good as the actual cartoon and while faithful to varying degrees it should be remembered that the cartoon was 2D and the game is rendered, 1990's style, in 3D. It suffers.

Once you win a bet it's time to take a trip. Since the game is 90% Japanese language and 10% Japanglish the nature of the trip is somewhat, what can I say? Obscure.

The option to collect 'items' and trade them is apparent. Dick and Muttley are certainly out to get you. Sadly though the finer details are explained by a red sponge that sits on your dashboard. The dashboard to a skeleton inspired car you never seem to drive. Oh - and these finer details are all in Japanese. So only 170,000,000 Japanese know - of which probably only about 3 care.

Ultimately the game lacks polish. The sequences are unstoppable. The language is excitable. The chap doing the voice seems to have escaped from a third-rate noodle bar TV advert.

Artistically the developers 'Future Pirates' (Should that be Future Cowboys or Present Cowboys?) have cut too many corners and while the idea of Wacky Races on the 32bit system seems promising - I was hoping for Mario Racing style game - it's all well short of mediocre.

It's a 'shocking-ly' poor effort all-in-all.

Rare-ish Japan only game.

3DO Kid.