Most Sega owners will have this one, as it was free. It is a groundbreaking game only in the fact that it is the first one to be fully playable on line and also because it is vaguely original. It's a bit of a dull one in one player, but this is a multiplayer game in essence and most of it's thrills come from taking on other players (wherever they may be). Fully playable over the internet (though sometimes suffering from slowdown) Rocket is suprisingly good fun. It's really a sort of puzzle game, vaguely reminiscent of Chips Challenge or a whole host of other 8-Bit overhead adventures. Graphics, er don't exactly push the Dreamcast, er at all. Sound is alright but forgetable. In summary, groundbreaking if hardly the best ad for the Dreamcast.

Zogging Hell Rating: 8/10

Dead or Alive 2

3D beat em up in the style of Tekken, Virtua Fighter etc. The graphics are undeniably handsome but the characters aren't that much varied and interesting bunch. It's a bit weird though in a kind of poorly translated from Japanese way. The storylines barely make any sense, due to the awful subtitles displayed at the bottom of the screen. Why an English voice couldn't be dubbed over the Japanese is peculiar, I mean, the characters are unlikely to suffer from Bruce Lee type lip sync problems are they? The controls are of the normal 3D fighting game standard, meaning their good when you first pick up the game (i.e. and you just hammer the buttons) or when you have spent three months solid playing the game. Their not quite as intuitive at those of Streetfighter (mind you don't read the review of the current batch of Streetfighter games) and I'm still waiting for a fighting game with a more intuitive control system than two buttons, one for punch and one for kick, now move your pad in an unfeasable amount of directions. The controls are sometimes feel slightly sluggish and unresponsive (for a while you think you might be playing Fight for Life on the Jag) and this is downright annoying. As a multiplayer game though it's a lot of fun(as all 3D fighters seem to be) and anyone can get stuck in there relatively easily. Hhhmmm generally good...

Zogging Hell Rating: 8/10

Dragon's Blood

This one reeks of PC conversion. It's a dungeons and dragons type game with the sort of crisp but unrealistic graphics that are constantly in use in PC games. It seems pretty jolly enough if you can bear the D & D plotline (which I am finding a bit grating). It's also one of those games where you are going to get nowhere without a memory pack. And as I haven't got one I've only managed to get to the second level. I imagine though that it gets a bit tedious (I was beginning to find it a bit boring after one level). All in all it's a bit like Zelda: Orcarna of Time but less enjoyable (and as for those PC style graphics, please). I'll keep you posted when I get a memory pack and tell you my final views later.

Zogging Hell Rating: 6/10

Evil Dead: Hail To The King

Pending.

Zogging Hell Rating: Pending

F355 Challenge

One of the best looking racers on the Dreamcast, F355 is stunning to behold. The graphics are some of the best ever used in a driving game. Sadly the game suffers from some flaws. You only have a cockpit view, the only time you can see the beautifully rendered car from the outside is at the beginning and end of the race. Why. Surely as there are so many other beautifully rendered cars racing round the track, it would have been to much trouble to be able to at least view your car from the outside. Secondly, though this restriction is of course brought about by the title, there is only one car to race as. This of course is the F355 (doh!). There is a totally pointless option to change the colour of the car, but as you so rarely see it from the outside it's hardly worth the bother. Then there's the strength of the opposition. I'm all for hard driving games, but I prefer them to ease you in with a frankly crap opposition on easy level. Not this one, even on easy, their a bit good, and your automatic gearbox can't keep up with them on the straights. Switch to semi automatic and you loose all the benefits like traction control and ABS (and they still leave you behind down the straights). Mind you at least it isn't a total walkover like some Ploystation titles. The final fault of this game is the music. What is it with Sega, car games and eighties sounding rock music. Ever since Daytona USA on the Saturn they've been assaulting our ears with drivelling guitar solos, Whitesnake (ha ha!) sounding vocals and quite probably (though fortuantly you don't see it in the game) bad hair. Wake up Sega this is a new millenium and it's no place for grey haired, tight wearing, leather jacket implanted old men with toilet paper bulges in their crotches and rapidly growing bald patches on their heads doing outrageous amounts of pelvic thrusts and swinging their 'axes' about while singing about 'getting in the ring', paradise cities, whatever they want, bats out of hell or any other depressingly repetitive ballad you can think of.
Er yes well other than that it's quite good. The car handles nicely, the physics when you 'accidentily' run into another car are realistic and as I said before the graphics are splendid. One thing though, what the hell are the two chaps who talk through the race on about?

Zogging Hell Rating: 8/10

Metropolis Street Racer

One of the great things about Sega's recent consoles is the quality of the driving games available on them. The Saturn had Daytona, Sega Touring Cars and of course the brilliant Sega Rally. The Dreamcast already has had the excellent Crazy Taxi, the beautiful but flawed F355 and now it's set to wow us with, what is quite literally one of the best driving games ever. MSR is, in a word, brilliant. The graphics aren't quite as good as F355, but are still fabulous, the radio soundtrack (very reminiscent of Lotus on the 16bit) is actually very good. There are different weather effects ranging from a beautiful sunny day to driving rain. The courses are brilliant being superbly recreated from actual streets in London, Tokyo and San Fransisco. The game features an excellent system for opening up tracks (kudos), and a challenging range of courses with variable goals ranging from full on racing to time trials. Multi player, excellent control, some online options, a huge range of cars to open up, the list goes on and on. In fact there is so much I like about MSR, I'll think I'll just list it's few flaws. Realtime online racing would have been good. As would snow weather conditions for racing in (though a bit unlikely in San Fransisco). Er, graphics like F355. A few more tunes on the radio. The option to race a plastic pig round the Houses of Parliament, and that really is it. Pretty much flawless then. This really is the Goldeneye of driving games and in my humble little opinion is joint best racing game ever, along with F-Zero X.

Zogging Hell Rating: 10/10

Resident Evil: Code Veronica

This I must admit is my first encounter with the Resident Evil series. Not having a Playstation, combined with it not really being a must have on the N64 and Saturn, meant that this lot rather missed me. First glance immediately shows it up for what it is, Alone in the Dark with a bad Zombie problem. Don't get me wrong Veronica is a very good game, but I wouldn't rate it (like teletext's infamous Digitiser) along with games like the N64's Perfect Dark and the Dreamcast's own MSR and Soul Calibre. It's just a little too reliant on boring cut sequences that add little to the atmosphere. The graphics do save it somewhat, though I do dread to think what the Playstation's versions of this game are like. So does the Zombie threat, it's just like being trapped in Zombie Flesh Eaters. The lead character, Clare Redfield, is an obnoxious gep, in fact now that I mention it, so are the rest of the 'cast'. They should all be lined up in a room and shot, and then burned. It's also one of those games where there's never enough ammo or health. You spend a lot of time wounded, and hobbling about the place clutching your guts (which presumably are on the verge of bursting out). You finally find some health, but promptly end up walking round the corner into a zombie and having him tear open your neck. The other annoying thing about the game is the loading times. Just like the Playstation and N64 versions everytime you go through a door, there's a rather tedious door opening screen. Everytime you go up some steps, there's a tedious walking up the steps screen. Boring, and totally un-necessary, this is the Dreamcast, Capcom, not the PS1, it's CD-ROM is 24 x as fast, it's graphics chip is infinitely more powerful. MSR draws more graphics onto screen in a couple of seconds than Veronica does in the entire first section, but it doesn't need to stop for a fag break to do it. Perhaps fans of the series become have nostalgic about them or something. Anyway rant over. Other than that Veronica's quite good, though the puzzles are of the obvious variety, rather than seriously puzzling. The moments when you are shooting the hell out of the zombies are rather enjoyable in fact. In an oh gosh, this really is morally distasteful way. Those poor zombies, butchered in their natural habitat, sob, call in the church of England and the women's institute. Preach family values to our kids. Respect the government, they always act with your best interests in heart. Do not drink, smoke or have fun. Vote right wing. (this was an advertisment for the Conservative party)(or not...)

Zogging Hell Rating: 8/10

Soul Calibre

The Dreamcast has a veritable obsession with games beginning with Soul, quite why I don't know, it's totally unprecedented. Perhaps some bod at Sega stipulated that this should be so.... Anyway, Soul Calibre is a another 3D fighter. Half the crowd groans. But Soul Calibre is actually very good, brilliant in fact. Much better than the dull straight out Virtua Fighter clone that is Dead or Alive. The graphics are spot on for a start and the music fits well with the gameplay. There's loads of superbly created fighters (19 in fact plus costume changes), who for a change are actually a varied bunch. There's a huge ugly looking character called Astaroth, a foxy but distinctly messed up British tart called Ivy, who's into her whips; and a very scary sado-masochist called Voldo, who looks like he's an extra out of Hell Raiser. The other characters range from knights to tarts and overly macho weirdo's. None are as boring as Tekken and Dead or Alive's dull, stereotypical, collection of hip guys and chicks. Another obvious difference between this and Dead or Alive is that everyone's got a weapon, and it's usually extremely large. Being pounded over the head by Nightmare's sword, which is almost as large as he is, is not something to be sniffed at. This and there's a load of standard modes like Tag, Survival, Arcade and Vs. But it's the story mode that adds a little extra to the game. You move round a map taking on various challenges in a bid to save up money to buy various pictures in the games 'gallery'. The picture's aren't all that special, but getting them opens up new bits of the game including new characters, costumes and levels. It's very Goldeneye and keeps bringing you back to get open up more stuff.
The game is also helped by the intuitive control system. Anyone who finds it easier to get to grips with Streetfighter's controls, rather than the baffling array of blows and counter blows that some 3D fighters seem to sink into, will enjoy Soul Calibre's system. My only complaint about the control system is that seemingly like any fighting game that employs a 'free-steps' system (i.e. you can move round your opponenent) it can be a bit difficult to clobber your opponent if their continually rotating round you. To be fair this is also the case in Dead or Alive and heavens! that Fight for Life game on the Jaguar. Actually speaking of Fight for Life it's interesting to note how much seems to have been pilfered from the aforementioned in Dead or Alive and Soul Calibre.
Anyway I'm straying again.. Yes get Soul Calibre, it's the best beat em up new beat-em-up since Streetfighter.

Zogging Hell Rating: 9/10

Soul Fighter

A 3D beat em up Soul Fighter at first leaves you gasping with it's great graphics. Everything's beatiful, right from the characters to the backgrounds and even the floor. When the characters execute their moves you sometimes feel like you're watching 'Crouching Tiger, Hidden Dragon' or something. When this eventually wears off (which will take a while) you'll notice some of the games crap points. For starters the scenery may be pretty but there's little or no interaction. You can't go into houses, for example, seemingly because you're character can't walk over the major obstacle that is the doorstep. There's no two player mode, which is a major downer as it would have been great for a mate to join in. Then there's the dodgy control and camera combination. To manouvre you're character you have to move according to the camera, however this doesn't always react how you expect it too. All to often you find yourself attacking a wall when there's a small army behind you. The camera always seems to point in the wrong direction, which mainly seems to allow all sorts of meanies to sneak up on you from behind. Alright there may be a radar, but it's not a lot of help if your too busy wrestling with the controls.
Soul Fighter isn't a bad game by any means though and is well worth getting. It also gets a prize for terrible over acting by the King on the opening sequence. It's kind of like the stunner you pull in the club and then when you get them home they are a bit crud in the sack....

Zogging Hell Rating: 7/10

Streetfighter 3: 2nd Impact

I bet you were waiting for me to get another Streetfighter game weren't you. I'll admit that I luv em, but even for me, this may be the last one I get. In my opinion Super Streetfighter and Streetfighter Alpha 2 and 3 are the best versions of Streetfighter ever. In Streetfighter 3 Capcom have perhaps tinkered to much and still failed to come up with anything new. The characters have mostly changed (though Ryu and Ken are of course still present) and some weird and wonderful ones have been brought in. There's a strange blue character who sings opera at you when you loose. A weird hermit and a chap that makes Zangief look like a dwarf (I kid you not). All in all though these characters are just like the characters they replaced. The blue weirdo has strechy arms and legs like Dhalsim, the giant character is just like Zangief (and just as crap) and there's a Chun Li character thrown in for good measure. There are also more per capita crap characters in this one than ever before seen.
There are a few new moves, but basically they're all lifted from Alpha. Generally the great fighting system though is being replaced by awful counter attacks. What I really liked about the original Streetfighter 2 and Alpha was that whatever you're opponent did there was always a move to beat it, not some ridiculous combination of buttons to press to get a counter. In 2nd impact this is highly eroded. The graphics are little better or (dare I say it) worse than Alpha on the Saturn. Music is alright as is the sound but it still could be done just as well on the SNES. Finally having two versions of the same game on one disk, why? Streetfighter 3 and Streetfighter 3: 2nd impact have no differences bar some extra characters and a couple of extra moves on 2nd impact. Brilliant.
All in all it's the first Streetfighter that hasn't really gripped me ever (even Streetfighter 1 on the ST is gripped me, sort of). Oh well maybe it's a sign to stop buying Capcom sequels.
In summary, yes it's Streetfighter, but it is a bit boring compared to others. It's got nothing really to recommend it over other cheaper versions.

Zogging Hell Rating 6/10

Streetfighter Alpha 3

Pending.

Zogging Hell Rating: Pending