Dreamcast Review: Outtrigger (2001)

Is the world craving a new review of an old Dreamcast shooter? Thrasher sure thinks so! Join him on this journey of discovery and find out the answer to the burning question: should you play Outtrigger? The answer? Ummmm, maybe. Depends.

Outtrigger is about half Crazy Taxi (or maybe half Time Crisis) and half TimeSplitters. It's a multiplayer-focused, arena-style FPS with virtually no plot and an ever-present timer at the top of the screen. Matches last about two to three minutes and the backdrop is often little more than "Collect these coins!" or "Shoot these guys!" Wikipedia's plot summary is probably too good: "The story revolves around a counterterrorism organization called Interforce, set up in response to terrorist attacks on military research facilities." I didn't get even the faintest whiff of this story, such as it is, while playing the game.

Outtrigger's two main single-player modes, Arcade and Battle, task you with completing various training exercises and eventually missions, in which you ostensibly deal with vaguely-defined threats. Really, though, there is nothing to connect the single-player exercises and missions with anything. The Arcade and Battle modes have much more in common with Crazy Taxi's "Crazy Box" or TimeSplitters' "Challenge Mode" than anything else. Though the single-player is occasionally frustrating in spots, it can be easily completed in the course of a day. And like the Crazy Box, Outtrigger's single-player experience is seemingly designed to train players for the heart of the game, which in this case is the multiplayer.

Multiplayer matches in Outtrigger play by the same rules as the "Thief" mode in TimeSplitters 2: each kill is worth one point, while another point, rendered as a coin, can be collected by any player from the kill spot. Other than a team variation on the same thing, all multiplayer matches in the game play by the same rules. This can make for a rather repetitive experience, even with Outrigger's considerable variety of weapons and maps. Given the relatively small size of the arenas in the game, deathmatches can only realistically last for about three minutes before the map in question loses what little novelty it had in the first place. And while the multiplayer mode can be played with AI bots, many of the maps feature pits, which the AI cannot successfully navigate.

In terms of controls, Outtrigger really shows its age. Dual analog control has been a standard of console first-person shooters for a long time, and returning to the single-stick controls of the Dreamcast is difficult. Although some of the options approximate dual analog controls, none of them really come that close, and I never truly felt comfortable with the pre-set schemes. The game does allow you to switch on the fly from first-person to third-person view, which is neat at the very least, but it's hardly useful.

Like many other arcade-style games for the Dreamcast, Outtrigger is enjoyable in short bursts only. Dreamcast aficionados may want to find a copy simply for the sake of curiosity, because it is a truly strange game, but everyone else can probably find something else to play.

PS2 Review: The Bouncer (2001)

It's difficult to make sense of The Bouncer. It looks like an ordinary 3D beat-'em-up, which is commendable enough given that the genre has been rendered practically obsolete since the SNES and Genesis generation. I like having games like this around, mostly because I like pulverizing proper nouns on the streets, even when the games themselves are at their most mediocre. However, in many ways The Bouncer isn't much of a beat-'em-up at all. In fact, according to the marketing this is more of a "playable action movie" than a straightforward brawler. It may be a cliche, but The Bouncer is truly neither fish nor fowl: far too vapid to be an action movie (think about that for a moment), and far too complex and involved with storytelling to be a satisfyingly mindless beat-'em-up. Simply put, The Bouncer tries to do too much and succeeds at very little.

The Bouncer has one of the most insipid "stories" I have ever played. Most beat-'em-ups, like Streets of Rage or Fighting Force, have the good taste and common decency to save you the trouble of worrying about characters and their relationships. Instead, they essentially tell you, "Some hoodlums have taken over the streets of our fair city, and they're evil, so please, go out there and beat the dog crap out of them and don't come back until you do." It does the job for me. That's all the motivation I need. But The Bouncer tries to impress you with the cinematic. From a technical standpoint, it actually succeeds. Given its age, it still looks and sounds pretty good. In terms of narrative, however, it stinks. Without looking it up, I can only recall a girl being kidnapped by oddly-dressed thugs, and our equally oddly-dressed bar bouncer heroes going out to save her from being turned into a cyborg kind of thing by some bozo running the evil Mikado corporation. There's also something in there about satellites and solar energy, I think. You spend the rest of the game getting acquainted with others who have also made numerous fashion faux pas. An idiotic premise, for sure, but that's not what gets to me.

The Fashion of The Bouncer. Good gracious.

What gets to me is the laborious way in which that story is presented. My first trip through the game took approximately an hour and a half, about an hour of which was seemingly spent on watching the cinematics. They either go on forever or they are pointlessly short, like the numerous three second clips of the characters running through doorways. Every utterance, every development in the narrative is just, like, So What? Who Cares? and also, You Left the House Dressed Like That, Do You Not Have Friends or Mirrors? The Bouncer has multiple pathways through the story depending on which character you choose and when, but none of them are exciting, even though one of them is a thoroughly bizarre "stealth" mission.

This interminable story ruins what is otherwise a decent beat-'em-up engine: deep enough to keep most fights interesting, but easy to learn (though a counter button would have been nice). Basically, you watch and then you briefly fight, level up your characters, watch then briefly fight, level up your characters, and so on. Luckily, you have the option of using characters unlocked in the Story mode to play either Survival or Versus. Survival isn't much better than Story, mostly because it quickly becomes alternatively tedious and cheap. Versus is your typical multiplayer mode, and it supports up to four players, human or CPU. It redeems the game somewhat, but not enough to recommend it for anyone other than the most starved beat-'em-up fans.

PS1 Review: NBA Showtime: NBA on NBC (1999)

What an ungainly title. NBA Showtime: NBA on NBC is another in the long line of NBA Jam derivatives, which includes Midway "sequels" like Hangtime (1997) and Hoopz (2001, and quite fun to spell, incidentally). Despite the name change, all three of these games play pretty much the same, although each introduces its own wrinkles to the core design. The NBA Jam formula just works, and for a variety of reasons, but of the tweaks or updates (outside of the annual roster update) offered by the various versions, Showtime happens to be the best of the lot. Everything is about the same as before, only smoother, more polished: you get 2 on 2 ball, most of the rules get relaxed if not removed, physics get exaggerated, and so on. Showtime introduces a foul system, however, which initially seems like an odd fit for the kind of no-holds-barred style of this or previous Jams. Basically, a foul is assessed each time you shove an opponent. Play remains uninterrupted until you earn your fifth foul, at which point your opponent is then allowed to shoot a free throw (worth three points) and retain control of the ball. This introduces a fairly subtle bit of strategy into the otherwise manic gameplay of the series. Foul your opponent for the fifth time late in the game, for instance, and you may find yourself on the wrong side of a six point swing. It's a small change, but at the same time it does quite a lot to change the dynamic of offense and defense, particularly down the stretch. As with all Jam iterations, Showtime can likewise get a bit repetitive if you play it for any significant duration, but in short bursts, and particularly with friends, it's terrific.

Of course, I would be remiss if I didn't mention the more cosmetic changes of Showtime. There is something wonderfully nostalgic about the old NBA on NBC theme, especially (actually, more likely solely) for those of us who grew up with the peacock's Sunday afternoon matinees. In comparison with its arcade version, or even its Dreamcast and N64 cousins, Showtime for the PS1 clearly loses a bit in the looks department. This is particularly noticeable in the player models which, while understandably polygonal for the time, fail to accurately render most of the players' faces. They all look a bit mangled. However, player animations are almost uniformly excellent. I should also mention the generally terrible roster. This was not a particularly lively time for fans of the association. You're looking at a league post-Jordan, consumed by labor disputes, and pre-LeBron. "Slim pickings" is probably the kindest way to describe the squads available. Thankfully, you can create your own player, and although you can develop that player into a superstar by defeating every team in the league, this is no career mode. It's essentially no different from the game's other main mode, in which you run through every team in the league with only the players made available to you on a particular squad. No career mode, no season mode, nothing else. As a single-player experience, then, Showtime is lacking in longevity. As an isolated, multiplayer experience, Showtime is the best of the bunch.

PS2 Review Double Feature: Smuggler's Run (2000) and Smuggler's Run 2: Hostile Territory (2001)

Hey, why not. I'll do these together. I can't think of a particularly good reason to do them separately.

Smuggler's Run (2000)

The first Smuggler's Run was something else, especially when it was released as part of the PS2 launch. I say "was" because, as you can probably surmise, not everything about it has aged well. It doesn't look great, it doesn't always play great, and it doesn't move you with an involving narrative (it doesn't even really have one). You're a smuggler, and you smuggle things, and there's really nothing more to it than that. You have big (for the time) open worlds set on the US/Canada and US/Mexico borders in which to smuggle the goods. Now, there's a bit of plot from the menu that introduces each mission, read by an irritating narrator with an especially juvenile sense of sexuality, but essentially it means the same thing as the plot of the original TimeSplitters (2000), which is to say it means nothing, or just about. Actually, Smuggler's Run and TimeSplitters have more in common than such easy-going narratives: essentially, Smuggler's is nothing more than a series of deathmatches with cars (actually more like BagTag, for all you TS fans out there). You pick up packages and deliver them, or you and a team do the same, or you have an inexplicable checkpoint race with rival gangs. It's more like an arcade game than anything else. You pick up packages by driving over them, and you can steal or transfer them by slamming into other cars. It works quite well as mindless, almost anti-narrative horseplay, but like any arcade game, it can get more than a bit repetitive if you play it for too long. And more often than not, Smuggler's is incredibly frustrating and difficult, especially the latter half of the game (another similarity to TimeSplitters). Despite the difficulty, however, I enjoyed the way in which Smuggler's allows you to create your own route to mission completion. Smuggler's Run is a meat and potatoes kind of game. It does the job without a whole lot of panache.

Smuggler's Run 2: Hostile Territory (2001)

This is more like it. Smuggler's Run 2 is an improvement on the original in every way possible. This one not only has an actual story, but live-action cut-scenes with real actors and everything. They're silly as hell and probably not in a good way, but I appreciate the effort. You play as a guy who works for another guy who works freelance for some bad people with some bad goods to move. This takes you to Russia and then to Vietnam, then back to Russia for Winter Russia. Several things make this game much better than its predecessor: it looks fantastic, the worlds are bigger and the terrain is more varied, and the difficulty has been toned down to what I consider to be a reasonable level. There's still an annoying glitch carried over from Smuggler's 1, in which your pursuers' vehicles seem to be magnetized to your rear bumper. This can be a real drag because they more often than not spin you out of control, which is really frustrating when you're on the clock and racing to the next checkpoint (which is always the case). 2's missions are much better and more varied than the original as well. As before, 2 can get repetitive if you persist in playing it for too long, but for short bursts of fun, it really is one of the best arcade-style racing games on PS2.

Movie Review: Exit Wounds (2001)

Consider this a slight detour or offshoot from our ongoing Classic Li series. Exit Wounds is like Cradle 2 the Grave, except with Steven Seagal instead of Jet. Same director, same DMX drama skillz.

Once again, cops, martial arts, and hip hop butt heads. This time a white detective played by Seagal is demoted to beat cop following an attack on the vice prez. He doesn't play by the rules, you see, and solves crimes with his unusually direct approach to law enforcement. Our favorite renegade police officer is relegated to service in a particularly nasty precinct in Detroit, and from there his new chief orders him to take classes in anger management. This makes no sense because Seagal's character never really demonstrates any significant symptoms of rage. He keeps beating people up or shooting them because they keep trying to rob or murder him. He's an unlucky bastard, not an angry one. In fact, outside of an incident in which he breaks a school desk because he's such a large man, he's a pretty cool customer overall. One night, while bumming around town in his pickup truck, he stumbles upon a heroin deal. This leads him to discover a drug smuggling conspiracy involving several of his fellow police officers. DMX seems to be involved with the smuggling, but you know, all is not what it seems, nobody can be trusted, loyalties will be tested, and so on.

Exit Wounds is nowhere near as good as Cradle 2 the Grave. Not that C2G is high art or anything, but Jet Li is so superior to Seagal, and DMX has a much larger role in that one than he does here. I've only seen Seagal in a few films, but his brand of martial arts is fairly deliberate, and in that sense it doesn't work nearly as well for me cinematically as does Jet's faster and more intricate maneuvers. Honestly, he's a big, humorless oaf and he's boring. He doesn't do it for me, but DMX sure does. Unfortunately, DMX doesn't have much to do in this one. For most of the film, he only buys expensive cars, drives around listening to his own music, visits his boys in prison, wears tank tops, and buys drugs. Seagal carries most of the film, and it suffers. DMX has more to do in the second half of the film, particularly the last half hour. Like Cradle, this film has an entertaining finale. It's entertaining enough to save Exit Wounds from being a total loss. While Seagal engages in a nonsensical sword fight, DMX ties his belt to a shotgun and uses it to fire from behind cover. It's lovingly absurd, but there's too little of this kind of thing to make it truly worthwhile.

Happy 13th Birthday, Code Redd Net!

It's been that long?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?! My, how time flies.