Rabi-Ribi PS4 Review

Rabi-Ribi is a 2D Platform Adventure game for PS4, PS Vita and PC, which was developed by CreSpirit and published by Sekai Project. It's one of the Crowdfunding Indie titles from IndieGoGo that already has raised over $10,000 in year 2015, right just before the game was set released for PC in 2016 which received much positive reception from the critics and fans. It was then later released for Sony consoles in the year 2017 and hopefully coming soon for the Switch version in later future date.

What really made this game so special was that 2D platform Adventure game is combined with 2D Metroidvania gameplay with Bullet Hell elements and the cutie anime bunny girl as the main protagonist in the whole game, so it's sorta like Touhou meets Metroid that really made Rabi-Ribi quite interesting. I was quite surprised with this game that offers many of the positive things about Rabi-Ribi such as wicked gameplay with tons of exploration areas and over 40 intense boss battles, very cute visuals with anime-style animation, cool soundtrack, and it has whole extra content in the game that made the game worth playing. It is considered to be the hardest video game titles on the eighth generation era due to overpowered boss characters and so many attack patterns that made the game quite impossible to beat unless you need to be very professional at this game without having to throw rage quitting so many times, but still it's very fun and entertaining at the same time once you get hang of it with the whole game.

So without go further do, lets start the review.



Presentation

The game starts off with bunny girl creature named Erina who was a normal rabbit that lived in a peaceful life until one day, she found herself in an unknown place and noticed her appearance turned into a human. During her aimless wandering around the island, she meet the cheerful pink haired fairy named Ribbon came to help with her by searching all her missing friends and preventing the cursed magic from harming their peaceful islands.

The game has really weird story about the bunny girl thought she was lived as the real-life rabbit in her lifestyle, but instead as it turns out to be a human form which causing Erina to find out the reason why she's been transformed into the human, so the story in general is kinda mixed overall due to lack of Erina's backstory and below-average storyline which they should have been done better job by putting more effort on plot of the game rather than just making story sounds silly, but to be fair the half of the story in the game is somewhat pretty okay, but it's not that sounds great at the same time which makes a quite harder for western players to understand, maybe just because it's something to do with story writing or language translations on the story dialogue. 
The rest of the characters in the game are all females, so you have all female characters that dressed up as random animal and fairy cosplayer such as Erina the bunny girl, Ribbon the fairy girl, Cocoa the cat girl, Nieve the bear girl, Lilith the bat girl and etc. Most of the characters in the game are quite adorable that adds up nicely for the game's presentation to make them look interesting.

Every each concepts of the level design are looked quite stunning overall. Some levels such as Starting Forrest, Rabi Rabi Ravine, and Spectral Cave are quite colourful and detailed which gives a nice Yoshi's Island vibe to it, while it does share with interesting cool levels in the game like Floating Graveyard, Azure Snow Land, System Interior, and others which is very well done with different kinds of themes in the game.

Overall, it has adorable characters, nice slideshow style and stunning level concepts, but suffered with below-average story.



Gameplay

This game contains 8 main chapters and 2 extra chapters were included in the game. You take control of Erina and her sidekick Ribbon to explore whole area in each levels where you can able to earn items, finding secrets, discovering new areas and talking to random people which is good for exploration. Using the map screen on the pause menu which helps the player to know where you're at and you will be given with the missions, which was added on the diary and the map points, in order for players to complete the certain of the main objectives during the gameplay. You can also fast travel in each levels by using the teleport area which allows you to choose which levels to visit. The player can also use the save points to save the game, so it will let you continue where you left off, but everytime you save the game can also give you a full health which is quite useful. 

You will start off with a basic weapon called Piko Hammer which are used for attacking enemies in close combat range, but it can also drains your SP attacks which prevents you from attacking, so you have to wait until the SP automatically recharge itself. While Ribbon has ability to use magic firing weapon which are used for long range attacks, so you will have MP bar which tells you how much left you have it on your MP everytime you using the Ribbon's charged shot. Ribbon also has different types of firing attacks such as Sunny Beam, Chaos Rod, Explode Staff, Carrot Shooter and others which are used for shooting at different types of enemies in the game. Performing the boost attack allows Ribbon to shoot massive damage at the enemies including boss characters which are also making easier to defeat.

The player are required to earn enough items to make it even more stronger and plays better. For example: the ability items can be found in any of the levels such as carrot bomb that uses for blowing up objects, rabi slippers that allows you to jump higher while air jump can allow you to perform double jump and sliding powder that allows you to slide on the ground which are quite useful for platforming purposes, while Ribbon's items such as Auto Earrings, Plus Necklace and Charge Ring can also improve Ribbon's firing attacks such as rapid fire and charge shot. You can also earn skills items such as Wall Jump, Bunny Strike, Air Dash, Bunny Whirl, Hammer Roll, Hammer Wave, Speed Boost, Soul Heart and Spike Barrier, while the orbs items also reduces the dark places, freely move in underwater and melting ice blocks which adds more variety for both combat gameplay and platforming as well. The player can also earn EN points by attacking all the enemies which you can spend all the upgrades, potions and consumable items from the Miriam's shop. Spending all the upgrades and potions can rewards player's stats and skills allowing to increase the overall levels of health, mana, regen, pack, attacks, skills and orbs, which means your character becoming even stronger and easier to battle against the foes. Collecting badges in the levels which you can able to equip it from the badge menus and performing your buffs/debuffs assets can also improve your player's levels.

So far, I really liked the exploration aspects of the game where I enjoyed exploring around the non-linear levels, which kept me playing in whole hours of fun by finding secrets and earning items. The combat gameplay works pretty accurate overall with responsive hit detection and reliable player's combat weapons.
Depending on game's difficulty, the game gets even harder for later chapter. Each of the boss battles can be very frustrating to play due to overpowered boss health, using enemy's buffs/debuffs assets that weakens your character's powers and too many attack patterns that scatters around which made the game quite impossible to beat, so playing a bullet hell type of game is not very easy for the most of the casual players unless you need to be experienced with bullet hell type of game by practising it more, the better you will become which adds the whole challenge of the game. So far, the boss battles are quite epic to play which I was surprised to see how developers managed to make the game even harder, but entertaining at the same time when I kept dodging their attack patterns without trying to get damaged badly.

The game also features new game plus which you can able to play the whole game again while still retaining the same contents from the previous save, which adds up the nice replay values and you can also enjoy playing two of the game modes such as speedrun mode where you had to beat the whole game faster with best time record as possible and then you will have a boss rush mode where you have to beat every boss characters without having to be defeated.   


Overall, it has great exploration, impressive combat gameplay, intense boss battles and nice replay values.



Graphics

I really liked the mix between the modern 8-bit and 16-bit style of in-game graphics. The character's design is well drawn in 2D sprites giving a cute look of the characters. Each of the whole levels are well built with full of great environments and the use of animation which offers colourful visuals details and parallax effects on backgrounds that made the level design looked amazing for retro type of game. For example: Golden Pyramid has light candles, doors, and gold pillars, while Azure Snow Land has full of trees and snows, but it has the water animation that really moves giving a nice variety of level design. I also liked the use of special effects during the boss battles, the enemy's attack patterns are looking spectacular with sparkly and glowing effects that made the game looked amazing overall.

Overall, it has well drawn characters, great environments, colourful visuals and amazing special effects.



Music and Sounds

The best part of the game was the whole original soundtrack that sounds really wicked overall. The music in the Rabi Rabi Town and Starting Forrest has cheerful tunes that puts everyone into smile, while the other music is sound kinda similar to other video game such as Golden Pyramid stage that has simular vibe as Shantae series and the Cicini's Computer stage which kinda sounds reminds me of 3D bonus stages from Sonic the Hedgehog 2. While the original soundtrack are absolutely sounds fantastic, it has really good use of sound effects for the environment noise and atmospheric sounds that really fits perfectly for the game's presentations and in-game environment.

Overall, it has wicked soundtrack and impressive sound effects.



Special Features

This game has unlockable contents such as gallery mode, speedrun mode, and boss rush mode. The game also have new game plus which allows player to start the game at the beginning while still retaining the same items which adds up the nice replay value. For PC version, they will able to puchase DLC from the steam store such as digital soundtrack, digital artbook, and of course Cicini's Halloween and Is the order a DLC features extra chapters, while Sony's console version will also have Cicini's Halloween and Is the order a DLC included on both physical and digital version of the game.



Advantages

Adorable characters

Great exploration

Impressive gameplay

Amazing graphics

Wicked music

Nice replay value

More special features


Disadvantages

Punishing difficulty

Below-average story




Final Verdict


Presentation 6.5/10 - adorable characters, nice slideshow style and stunning level concepts, but suffered with below-average story.

Gameplay 8/10 - great exploration, impressive combat gameplay, intense boss battles and nice replay values.

Graphics 8/10 - well drawn characters, great environments, colourful visuals and amazing special effects.

Music and Sounds 8.5/10 - wicked soundtrack and impressive sound effects.

Special Features 8/10 - unlockable contents, new game plus and DLC.



Overall 8/10 - Rabi-Ribi is a surprisingly fun 2D Platform Adventure game with great Metroidvania style exploration and insane bullet hell action that made the game quite fun to play. Despite the silliness of the story which is not the main highlight of the game, what really matters the most as long as the quality of gameplay and graphics are turns out to be quite epic which features impressive combat, intense boss battles, great level design and has replay values. This is definitely a hidden gems for most of the video game collectors should be able to pick this game up if you're up with the highest challenge, so good luck with playing this game.         



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Polybius PS4 Review

Polybius is a shoot em ups game for PS4, which was developed and published by Llamasoft, as the game was created by Jeff Minter, who is known for his earlier work such as Tempest 2000 and the spiritual successor TxK. The game's title was taken from the original 1981 arcade game was also called Polybius which was a gaming urban legends in popular culture that inspires the fan-made game and of course the Llamasoft's 2017 game for PS4. Unlike the original game, the creator decided not to reproduce gameplay from the original arcade version, but instead this game was designed for a fast-paced 3D shooter gameplay which shares the elements from multiple other classic games such as Space Harrier and S.T.U.N. Runner was sounds different from the original game, but slightly better overall game in my opinion because this game is actually quite fun due to addicting gameplay, impressive visuals and cool game modes to play, so I wasn't feel regretting pick this game for my PS4 because I'm a fan of the Llamasoft's game titles such as Tempest 2000 and TxK.

So without go further do, lets start the review.



Presentation

As the game starts off with health and safety warnings on the screen to ensure the gamers to fully understand the concerns of the motion sickness before playing the game. The title on the screen has well designed fonts size, but it somewhat has creepy dark blue backgrounds with illusion effects which is looked kinda disturbing for shoot em ups title, but it's still looking cool. As the game starts, each of the level has different kinds of designs depending what level you're on. The beginning of the level has nice checker board mixed with blue and purple on the flat surface, while most of the later levels has cylinder shaped, U shaped, tunnel shaped and many different kinds of shapes are looking spectacular for level design choices. What really made the game looked insane is that where you collect the pills during the gameplay which causing the stages to change colours into random LSD effects which adds up the overall atmosphere of the game, wow talking about being on crack while playing this game. They have the weird random stuff on the levels are bunch of screaming cows, horns, space invaders like aliens, cubes, ships, shattering glass, flagpoles and etc. which adds ups the overall presentation very well done for this type of arcade shooter game.

Overall, it has well presenting levels, atmospheric and weird characters in the game.



Gameplay

This game features classic modes where you had to complete over more than 30 levels, so your goal is to race through the stages until you reached the end of the level. You take control of player's ship by using the left analogue stick to move from left and right side of the level and it has only one basic fire with no special weapons and upgrades, which made the game quite simple to play as you use the basic fire to shoot down the enemies in the level, but your ship will able to go faster by passing through the each horns or collecting the pills which increases the overall speeds of the ship's firing and acceleration. You also need to be careful by dodging the collisions objects and enemy's projectiles nearby before you're accidentally bumped onto the objects or got shot by enemy which causes to lose your shields, but your shields will increase after you beat each levels which is no problem. While your ship becomes faster, it gets really harder for players to evade the hazardous area due to overused collisions objects and enemy's projectiles unless you master at the game by practising it more, the easier it becomes which gives a player worth challenging to play. Talking about the challenge, some of the levels that increasing the fun factor of the game such as run past the flagholes in correct way, shooting all the fried eggs without any miss, complete each levels without damaging shields and make your ship fly in 50 seconds which rewards the player's in-game scores. The player's score can be added to online hi-scores to show the best players out of thousands for worldwide.

There are another two interesting game modes are featured in the game such as pure mode where you start off with first level, but unlike the classic mode which has level selection, you can't able to continue the level where you left off, so your goal is to complete all the levels as possible without losing all the shields and the other one are survival mode which is similar with pure mode, but without increasing the shields after beating the levels. These two modes are actually fun to play which gives a great arcade experience for players to enjoy. So far the game's controls are quite responsive when controlling the player's ship and I didn't have any issue with lags and delays which made the game so playable.

Overall, it has great controls, cool game modes and fast-paced stages.



Graphics

The graphics in the game are very old-skool looking which fits well in the whole game. It very like the Llamasoft's previous titles with cool 3D polygon shaped design for enemy's ships and collisions objects which is well built for classic style arcade titles. Most of the environments are very colourful for level designs choices due to magnificent checker boards on flat surfaces and unique 3D shapes giving a 80's style look of the game and the special effects are very well done with the use of LSD effects and illusion animations. The game was also has Playstation VR compatible which allows you to use VR headset to experience a virtual reality of this game with the use of VR effects that made the whole game looked awesome. If you don't have a Playstation VR, the second options are 3D glasses which is also cool, but I think you should stick with the VR version, if you have one already. 

Overall, it has cool 3D polygon design, colourful environments and impressive special effects.



Music and Sounds

Most of the original soundtrack was made by several of Llamasoft's musicians such as Peter Duggal, Gareth Noyce, Rodger Poker and others. It sounds similar with the previous game such as TxK that uses the early 2000's trance music style which is acceptable for this type of game, but I felt it's not quite entertaining as the soundtrack from the tempest 2000 because I prefer the 90's techno style a lot better in comparison with this original soundtrack, but still it's sounds pretty decent overall. I also liked the song from the music videos called "Less Than" was composed by industrial rock bands Nine Inch Nails which featuring woman playing Polybius.

The game has retro styled sound effects which borrows the elements from the classics Midway's and Taito's arcade titles such as defender and space invaders which are the best part of the game that uses the same sound effects from the olden days gaming. 

Overall, it has decent soundtrack and awesome sound effects.



Special Features

This game featuring two playable game modes, online leaderboards, and trophy supports, but no unlockables features.



Advantages

Well made presentation

Fast-paced gameplay

Cool game modes

Old-Skool Graphics

Decent soundtrack

Retro style sound effects


Disadvantages

Overused collisions objects

Punishing difficulty

Lack of local 2-player modes

No unlockables features




Final Verdict


Presentation 8/10 - Well presenting levels, atmospheric and weird characters.

Gameplay 8/10 - Great controls, cool game modes and fast-paced stages. 

Graphics 8/10 - Cool 3D polygon design, colourful environments and impressive special effects.

Music and Sounds 7.5/10 - Decent soundtrack and awesome sound effects.

Special Features 7/10 - Two playable game modes, online leaderboards, and trophy supports, but no unlockables features.


Overall 8/10 - Polybius is a excellent shoot em ups title for PS4. You'll be amazed with this game that blows your mind with fast paced gameplay, insane special effects and cool game modes because it's challenging, it's entertaining and it's very addicting to play. If you're into with Llamasoft's past titles or type of game like this, then you should download this game from PS Store. I definitely going to look forward seeing the Tempest 2000's sequels in the future is gonna be sounds kick ass.




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Yakuza: Kiwami PS4 review

Yakuza: Kiwami is a Action-Adventure game for PS4 and PS3 (Japanese release), was developed and published by SEGA, while the game was distributed by Deep Sliver for western release. It is a remake of the 2005's original game for PS2.

Last year I really enjoyed playing Yakuza 0 for PS4 due to fantastic storyline, memorable cast of characters, epic brawling gameplay, and wicked cinematic design that made the game fun to play. I've finally got Yakuza: Kiwami to play it on my PS4 to see if this remake actually plays better than the original PS2 version, the answer is yes of course because this game definitely improves over the original game such as presentation sequences and resolving the plot points of the game which allowing the remake of the first game keeping more refreshing and updated from the PS2 version, while gameplay style and graphics design retains the similar assets from the Yakuza 0. The game is slightly a bit shorter than the previous game which is fine to me depending on the each chapters in the game. While this game has great presentation, impressive open-world exploration, excellent gameplay and incredible graphics, it does shares with fewer problems such as requirements to upgrade new moves for dragon style and not being able to play your favourite SEGA's classics from the SEGA club, but the game is still entertaining to keep the series more interesting.

So without go further do, lets start the review.



Presentation

The game has similar plot from the original game, the story follows Kazuma Kiryu, a former Yakuza of Dojima's Clan, had discovered his boss Sohei Dojima was murdered by his fellow Akira Nishikiyama who saves Yumi's life, which Kiryu forcing Nishiki and Yumi to escape from the crime scene, while he is being arrested by the police. After being released from the prison for ten years, he find out that ten billion yen has been stolen from the Tojo Clan's bank. After he learned from his adopted father Shintaro Kazama about Yumi's disappearance, his quest is to find stolen ten billion yen and the missing girl Yumi, while he protecting the orphaned girl named Haruka, who is being targeted by the clan.

So far the story had becoming very interesting to know why Yakuza's rivalry been after the ten billion yen that belongs to Tojo Clan's bank. Omi Alliance is one of the Tojo Clan's biggest rivalry that they wanted a ten billion yen to become a successful business clan in Japanese organisation which puts Tojo Clan into trouble after they losing their income salary. Kazuma Kiryu is still badass in the game where he spents time going through hell to deal with Yakuza's gangs. I was pretty surprising that Akira Nishikiyama is no longer becoming Kiryu's side instead he is now becoming villain and slowly betrayed him which I finding Nishiki quite more aggressive than he was from previous game. I really liked the cutesy little girl Haruka which I finding her quite interesting regarding her story about searching her lost mother whereabouts in the city. She had her pendent on her hand that her mother gave it to her long ago in her orphanage days which I've believe that Yakuza's gangs is been after her and claims that her pendent is the key of the missing ten billion yen. I also liked Goro Majima as the character because I finding him very funny and has crazy sense of humor that annoys the hell of the Kiryu by putting him into fight because he's loves being jackass with him all the times, but still he's very entertaining person at the same time.

The game's presentations still retains a fantastic cinematic design during the cutscene with great use of motion capture for character's dialogue and facial animation. The action sequences of the game is still just great as the previous installiment with intense action and has serious moment that puts the game in magnificent level. I'm very glad that the game's development team have added the plot point of the game to resolve the confusing plot from the original game which keeps the story more easier to follow for the remake version of the game.

Overall, it has interesting storyline, memorable characters, and well designed cinematic designs.



Gameplay

Similar to previous game where you can explore the city, your goal is to complete the mission throughout the story scenario which can be marked with the pink symbols on the map screen.

You may be encountered by groups of Yakuzas which you are being forced to fight them during the battle gameplay. In battle gameplay, you'll start with three basic moves such as weak attack, strong attack and grabbing, while you have the health bar and heat power bar at the top-left corner which representing character's health and heat. The weak attack are pretty much quicker to attack enemies, while the strong attack can also give bit of damage. The grabbing can allow you to grab the opponent which lets you smash them into the objects if the heat power are fully increased and there are some different kinds of weapons to pick-up such as katana-swords, pistols, bins, bicycles, crates and more of them are very useful during the combat gameplay. You have three sets of fighting styles such as brawler which is more balanced fighting styles, the rush is pretty much more fast-paced figthing style which is quite good for performing faster combo moves, and the beast is pretty slow but more powerful fighting style with brutal fighting moves can give more heavy damage to the enemies. You can unlock the new moves in each three fighting style sets through the abilities options which allowing you to perform more variety of fighting moves, so you need to earn enough experience points in order to unlock moves which is sounds better than spending money to unlock moves from Yakuza 0. The game also introduces new fighting style called dragon that uses unique traditional moves which is nice edition to the game, but the issue is that in order to unlock the new moves you need to meet the requirements by completing the scenarios such as Majima's everywhere where you're being forced to battle with Majima will increase the player's Majima Everywhere rank and unlock new abilities in Kiryu's Dragon style after beating with him, but I always prefer unlocking new moves with experience points which I find it more easier than just completing scenarios. The battle gameplay does also sometime involves quick time event is where you have to hit the right button which can be appeared on the screen. You can also earn completion points by beating the challenge which you can spend these CP points to person who dressed up as clown which gives you ability to run longer and more useful CP unlockables.

Besides the story mission, you can also do the side-missions depending on which area you went on. You can visit any places in the city such as convenience store where you can purchase the variety of items and the restaurant or fast food is the place you can enjoy eating the amount of food and drinks which helps increases the character's health and heat power. Unfortunately you won't able to play your favourite SEGA's arcade classics from the SEGA's club which is kinda shame, but instead you have a mini-game called Mesu King which is card-based fighting game where you get to play as female fighters depending which Mesu King's card you have it on your inventory items which is kinda like Dead or Alive with rock, paper and scissors battle system. You can also play different kinds of mini-game like Karaoke, Pool, and Darts which can be found in different places in map area. So far the gameplay is just plays good as the Yakuza 0 because it uses same battle gameplay mechanics and open-world exploration area, and I also liked the driving rail-shooter mission where you are in the car and shooting down Yakuzas. I really enjoyed the boss battles of the game that adds up the game's challenge which is by far one of the best part of the game.


Overall, it has epic brawling gameplay, nice open-world exploration, and entertaining boss battles.



Graphics

The graphics is just like the previous game which still retains fantastic character's animation with the use of facial expressions and body figures that adds up the character's personality and the cinematic design is well professionally done which adds the overall atmospheres of the game. The open-world area is fairly just like the series because I really liked the details on the buildings with stunning textures, it has great use of backgrounds areas with no slow downs pop-ups at far-distances and it has numerous of crowded people in whole cities. I loved the gory effects of the game for in-game battle and the cut scene which is looking pretty well done. So far it looked so much better than the grinny looking original PS2 game which the developer team did a spectacular job to make the remake looked fresh and updated because it did improve the use of frame-rate and resolution over the original game.

Overall, it has excellent character animation, decent open-world area, and awesome use of special effects.


Music and Sounds

The soundtrack in the game is quite epic which fits really well for the in-game battle and cutscenes which adds the mood and atmospheres of the game. I love the sound effects of the city background sounds and in-game sound works which is quite awesome and the Japanese voice cast did a perfect job with their characters with fitting voices that adds the right tones of chraracter's voices. The game speaks in original Japanese languages but offered with English subtitles which helps the western audiences to understand the storyline of the game.


Overall, it has epic soundtrack, excellent sound effects and stunning voice cast. 



Special Features           

This game has new game plus with cleared data which adds the replay values, the platinum adventures mode allows player freely walk around the city without focusing on story, it has 2-player local mini-game mode which contains Karaoke, Pool, and Darts. It has climax battles mode where you have to fight the enemies to complete the challenge. This game also have trophy achievements and leaderboards.

Overall, it's has a decent features, but it's kinda shame there's no SEGA's arcade classics from the SEGA club.



Advantages

Interesting storylines

Memorable characters

Epic brawling gameplay

Entertaining boss battles

Nice open-world exploration

Excellent graphics

Cool music

Perfect voice acting


Disadvantages

No SEGA's arcade classics from SEGA Club (WTF???)

Unlocking new moves by completing scenario instead of using experience points for Dragon fighting style.


Final Verdict

Presentation 9/10 - interesting storyline, memorable characters, and well designed cinematic designs.

Gameplay 9/10 - epic brawling gameplay, nice open-world exploration, and entertaining boss battles.

Graphics 9/10 - excellent character animation, decent open-world area, and awesome use of special effects.

Music and Sounds 9/10 - epic soundtrack, excellent sound effects and stunning voice cast.

Special Features 8.5/10 - decent features, but lacked SEGA's arcade classics.


Overall 9/10 - It's by far one of the best looking video game remakes that never disappoint at all. I'm very glad that Deep Sliver did a right decision to release this game at outside of Japan to make fan of the series from the western happier. With the great story, cool characters, epic battles, intense action packed presentation and many more to offer is just worth for buying this game for your PS4 collection. I'm hoping for Yakuza: Kiwami 2 in the future and Yakuza 6 for this year.



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Top 5 Wrestling Games

Ahhh yes, those our old times when wrestling was used to be so awesome where bunch of wrestlers starts beating the shit out of each other with grappling move, make them tap out, whack them with steel chairs and barbwire, throw them away from the cell, and make their head bleed wide open, that's what you call a wrestling. I remember first watching WCW on TNT channel when I was a kid, so there are lot of memorable rosters such as Hollywood Hulk Hogan, Scott Hall, Sting, Ric Flair, and Macho Man Randy Savage that made the match so amazing, but there's one of the wrestling programme that WWF caught my attention was WWF Smackdown and Raw is War during the Attitude era. They have Stone Cold Steve Austin, Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, Kane, Undertaker, Mick Foley, Kurt Angle, and many of badass roster which offers lot of the best matches, serious segments, greatest PPV events, and holy shit moments that made WWF very entertaining to watch. I also liked the WWE's Ruthless Aggression era which are also good, but until the WWE went absolute shit with PG era which made me stopped watching wrestling these days. 

The success of wrestling sports has spread with many of merchandises, magazines, DVD's collections and of course video games based on wrestling franchises. Today, I'm now focusing to pick which wrestling game titles that I've enjoyed playing a lot, so they also shared quite few of the bad wrestling titles which I'm not going to include it on my list because I'm talking about my best wrestling game that I really liked the most due to well executed controls, fluid graphics, addictive multiplayer battle, and great selection of playable rosters.  

Here is my top 5 favourite wrestling games of all time.     

5 - WWF Raw (SEGA Genesis/Megadrive)

           

WWF Raw is a wrestling game based on WWF for SNES, Genesis/Megadrive, 32X, Game Gear, and Game Boy was bought by Acclaim Entertainment or LJN. 

I have this game for the Genesis/Megadrive when I've bought both the game console and game bundled from the Ebay online stores year and half ago. This game was surprising me well for 16-bit system which offers cool opening intro at the start of the game, great selection of matches such as One-on-One, Tag Team, Bedlam, Survivor Series, Royal Rumble, or a Raw Endurance Match, several of playable wrestlers such as Razor Ramon, Bret "Hitman" Hart, Shawn Michaels, The Undertaker, Bam Bam Bigelow, and others. 

This game is also multi-tap compatible where you can able to play up to 4-players matches. I really liked the button-mashing controls for grappling moves which worked well in the game and the graphics are quite acceptable for 16-bit wrestling titles giving a realistic look on wrestlers, the stage ring and the crowds are looked quite impressive. It was a huge improvement over the LJN's previous titles such as WWF Royal Rumble and WWF Super Wrestlemania, so if you want to have a experienced 16-bit wrestling gaming then this game is worth for give a go.  

4 - WWF Wrestlemania: The Arcade Game (Arcade)

             

Speaking of having experienced 16-bit wrestling gaming, there are WWF Wrestlemania: The Arcade Game for various of console platform was created by Midway, a same team behind Mortal Kombat series. It is arcade-style wrestling game where you get to play as your eight favourite roster to  complete with two championship modes. 

It featured digitised characters animation with arcadey style effects which was inspired by Midway's Mortal Kombat and NBA Jam games. It has variety of crazy moves from the wrestlers such as Doink the Clown pulling out a mallet out of thin air, Razor Ramon's arm transforming into a blade and Bam Bam Bigelow's fists catching on fire that made the game so special. It has classy commentary which was provided by Vince McMahon and Jerry Lawler, who also appear in the game sitting at the announcer's table next to the ring. The game also features two-player modes such as head to head mode is a one on one match between two players and cooperative is where both players teamed up in tag team must defeat every wrestler in the game. 

The gameplay is very fast-paced which takes sometime to get used too, but it is addictive and fun at the same time. The graphics is very fluid looking arcade game for wrestling titles and it also has amazing use of sound effects in the game. While the SNES and SEGA Genesis ports are considered fairly, but not just good as the original arcade version, so if you want a arcade perfect console ports then PS1 and Saturn is way to go.  

3 - WWE Day of Reckoning (Gamecube)

Back in the early 2000's where Yuke's made a such masterpiece wrestling titles for the Playstation platforms behind WWF/WWE Smackdown! series.   

Gamecube has also shared with great wrestling titles such as WWE Wrestlemania XIX and then they later improved the other wrestling titles was WWE Day of Reckoning which was bought by THQ. The game featuring the wrestlers from Ruthless Aggression era such as Triple H, Randy Orton, Dave Batista, Chris Benoit, Rey Mysterio and more playable rosters. It has playable stage events to select from such as Smackdown, Raw, Summer Slam, Survivor Series, Royal Rumble and Wrestlemania. It has several matches to play with such as Hardcore match, Steel Cage match, Hell in the Cell match, TLC match and Ironman match.

What really made this game awesome is the story mode where you get to play as the created wrestler through the ranks as a rookie and into main event stardom on either of WWE's brands RAW or SmackDown!. 

The gameplay system is quite similar with their previous titles with better grappling attacks, strikes, and reverse moves which makes the game very responsive and easier to control. Most of the matches in the game is very entertaining to play especially most with hardcore, TLC and Hell in the Cell match which is great for both single-player exhibition mode and local four-player battles. It is always fun to create your own wrestlers to give you an options to customise your own moves, abilities, appearance, and entrance. 

This game will not disappoint Gamecube owners with such high quality wrestling game like this and there are a sequel to this game are also gives them a new experience of wrestling gaming. 

2 - WWF No Mercy (N64)

One of the best N64's game developer AKI Corperation was well known for past titles such as WCW vs NWO: Revenge and WWF Wrestlemania 2000. They made the last wrestling game before the end of N64's lifecycle was WWF No Mercy, which is the 1999's follow-up game to WWF Wrestlemania 2000. 

This game features a classic wrestlers of Attitude era such as Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson, Stone Cold Steve Austin, Triple H, Mick Foley, Edge, The Hardy Boys, Big Show and of course the playable womens wrestler such as Trish Status and Lita. This game is being notable for improving over the previous installiment such as much more extensive Create-a-Wrestler mode with more moves, more customizable body attributes, better-organized clothing options, and the ability to create female wrestlers. The game offers up to date graphics, the story mode has extensive Championship mode giving a more in-depth of the storyline, and various match types made their Nintendo 64 debut in this game, including ladder matches and special referee matches. Another notable feature that was added to the game is the "Smackdown! Mall" where you can able to earn the money from the story mode, so you can able to purchase unlockable characters, clothing, wrestling moves, props, tattoos, weapons, and venues.

What's really cool about this game is you can able to fight opponents through outside of the backstage environment such as locker room, bar/lounge room, and all others which I was surprised to see how the whole game is been crammed into the N64's game cartridge giving a overall magnificent results. The game also retains the same gameplay style as the previous titles which never gets too old due to fun local multiplayer modes, epic matches, and amazing single-player's championship mode.  

Do you think you liked the WWE 2k games better? IT DOESN'T MATTER WHAT YOU THINK!!!

WWF No Mercy is the greatest WWF licensed game on the system, IF YOU'RE SMELL!!! WHAT THE ZEESH IS COOKIN!!!

1 - WCW vs NWO: Revenge (N64)

WCW vs NWO: Revenge is by far one of the best wrestling game for N64's library. This game gains much critical praise by video game critics and fans alike and becoming tremendous commercial success as being one of the best-selling wrestling game on N64 console which sold 1.88 million copies in the US. 

It features the large rosters in the game such as Hollywood Hulk Hogan, Bill Goldberg, Chris Jericho, Diamond Dollar Page, Sting, Raven and many more wrestlers. It was well known for addictive local multiplayer matches including tag team matches, handicap matches and battle royal matches which adds the nostalgia of wrestling gaming. It offers five epic single-player championship modes, newer wrestling moves, improved gameplay aspects, and more colourful graphics that keeps the game more refreshing and playable. The game has the badass opening intros with excellent presentation of WCW and NWO wrestling, and has really cool original N64's soundtrack that adds the overall excitement of the game.           

This is definitely must own wrestling game for all wrestling fans out there who grew up watching the classic wrestling from the 90's and early 2000's.            

Let me tell ya something brother,

  

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My 5 Christmas Wish List of 2017

Yep, it's another Christmas this year. This holiday season brings all the families and friends together while celebrating Christmas with amazing set of decoration & trees, making lovely Christmas dinner to eat and drink, dressing up as Santa Clause and his Elf, singing Christmas songs, and giving nice gifts to everyone in the house, so this is what Christmas celebration is all about. 

I've already made my last year's another 10 Christmas wish list on my blogger, so if you haven't seen it from the last year then here's my link down below:

https://zeeshanmirzasblog.blogspot.co.uk/2016/12/my-another-10-christmas-wish-list.html


I love spending time playing and collecting all retros and modern video games during the holiday season and I decided to make not 10, but my 5 wanted games that I planning to get one for the Christmas. So here is my 5 Christmas Wish List of 2017.



1 - Yakuza: Kiwami (PS4)

One of the SEGA's fans favourites series Yakuza was known for incredible story driven adventures, epic-brawling combat, badass cast of characters and amazing open-world exploration. The series was very popular in Japan gained much heavily acclaimed reviews and earned game awards while the western received generally favourable reviews from critics and fans, as the 2016 the series has sold over 9 million copies.

I really enjoyed three of the fantastic titles such as Yakuza 3 and 4 for PS3, and Yakuza 0 for PS4. I decided to give a try with Yakuza: Kiwami for PS4 which is a remake of the original 2005's game for PS2, featuring improved graphics, redone plot, and retaining similar combat style from the 2015 prequel's Yakuza 0.

I'm definitely looking forward to see this game because I'm a huge fan of Yakuza series after playing three of the awesome titles and I hope this will turns out to be looked better than the original 2005's.



2 - X-Men: Children of the Atom (SEGA Saturn)

Capcom was the top dog of fighting game genres from early 90's. The same publisher that bought you many of the greatest fighting game franchises such as Street Fighter, Darkstalkers, Cyberbots, Rival Schools, and of course the vs series titles such as Marvel vs Capcom, Capcom vs SNK and Tatsunoko vs Capcom.

X-Men: Children of the Atom was one of the very first Capcom's fighting game based on famous Marvel Comics series X-Men was originally released for arcade system in 1994, featuring playable rosters from X-Men series, voice actors from the series, comic-book styled animations, adding newer combo systems and multi-tiered fighting environments. The game was later released for PC, PS1 and Saturn in between 1995 to 1998. It gains positive overall for Saturn version as being one of most faithful ports from the arcade version due to better framerate and more animations than the other versions such as PS1 and PC has received poorly in comparison with Saturn version.

I was really surprised I still have Marvel Super Heroes for my Saturn collection last year and I hopefully able to get this game for this Christmas.



3 - Arcana Heart 3 (PS3)

            

Arcana Heart is a fighting game series, made by Examu, that I've never actually heard of it before, but after I've discovered the game it's a 2D fighting game for PS3, X360 and Arcade where you get to play as cast of females fighters with similar fighting styles as Arc System Works titles such as Blazblue and Guilty Gear series.

It features 23 playable characters with their own unique powers and uses force gauge allows the player to perform an Extend Force. The console version adds fully voiced characters for story mode and HD anime graphics for super moves, but they also include training mode, score attack, and online play.

I'm a huge fan of collecting every fighting games titles for any of game consoles, so I really loved the looks of cutesy anime-style graphics, interesting characters and overall presentation that made me want to pick this game up. 



4 - Super Turrican (SNES)

Turrican series is always be a greatest run 'n' gun classics by same developer behind Star Wars: Rogue Squadron series. The very first original game was first debuted on Commodore Amiga in 1990 which was well received for the release, while it was spawned with sequels such as Turrican 2, Turrican 3 (Including Mega Turrican for Genesis/Megadrive ports), and of course Super Turrican 1 and 2 for SNES.

What really made Super Turrican so special on SNES is the unique presentation with interesting opening sequences at the start, well presented level design with quality looking 16-bit graphics showing the power of the SNES's hardware, innovative weapon's power-ups and realistic SNES's soundtrack with dolby surround support was done by Chris Hülsbeck is one of the best video game composer knew how to make really great soundtrack that handles well on the SNES's sound chip.

This game is quite expensive to pick up from the online store or retail store, so I will still have to wait and see until I find this game with better price cost. 



5 - Diddy Kong Racing (N64)

Imagine combining both Mario Kart and Donkey Kong universe together which turns out to be Diddy Kong Racing for N64 was released in year 1997. It was made by same developer was the mastermind with their famous titles for Nintendo's consoles such as Donkey Kong Country, Killer Instinct, Goldeneye 007 and Banjo-Kazooie.

This game is very similar to Mario Kart series, but it really has shares with interesting concepts such as 5 worlds with 4 racetracks each and ability to drive 3 vehicles such as car, hovercraft, or pilot that newly adds the fun of the racing game genres. It features eight playable drivers such as Diddy Kong, Krunch the Kremling, Tiptup the Turtle, T.T. the Stopwatch, Pipsy the Mouse, Bumper the Badger, and two playable guest such as Banjo the Bear from Banjo-Kazooie and Conker the Squirrel from Conker's Bad Fur Day.

The game was received critical acclaim upon release and has sold 4.8 million copies since release, as being the Nintendo 64's eighth best-selling game on the list. It's a shame that Rare are no longer part of the Nintendo's third party developers due to Microsoft had purchase Rare for £375 million in 2002 meaning there will be no sequel to Diddy Kong Racing, but I definitely still considering to get this game for my N64 because it's still a classy racing titles for N64 library.   




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Resident Evil 7: Biohazard PS4 Review

History of Resident Evil Franchise:

I'm grew up playing Resident Evil series back then it used to be a king of the survival horror franchises because we had such influential titles such as very first Resident Evil for PS1, Saturn and PC which made the game very successful in mid-90's and it was considered to be the most important game in horror genres. The success of first Resident Evil has spawned with sequels, spin-offs, novels, action-figures and films. Most of the fans had said that Resident Evil 2 is one of the better sequel in comparison with the first original, due to better FMV cutscenes, another great characters, darker tone atmosphere and better puzzle-solving gameplay that made the game memorable and it was one of the commercial success in US after the game's releases. I also enjoyed playing several of the sequels such as Resident Evil 3, Code: Veronica, and the prequel to first game called Resident Evil Zero, but my favourite game in the series goes to Resident Evil 4 is by far one of the best video games of all time that revolutionised the third-person shooter and survival horror genres.

Unfortunately the series went downhill after the success of Resident Evil 4 which they later bought Resident Evil 5 is one of the first sequel that departures the Survival Horror genres which spreads the fans disappointment, but I'll admit this game aren't that bad as what everyone says because it's still has the great storyline, memorable characters and fun single-player campaign which is better off to give this game a chance and same goes with Resident Evil: Revelations are also sounds decent until Capcom has screwed up with Resident Evil 6 and it was the worst game in the series, due to relying on action-oriented shooter than the horror approach, poor single-player campaign, horrid graphics and cryptic combat gameplay that kills off the most beloved video game franchise.

Capcom decided to go back to survival horror roots with the Resident Evil 7: Biohazard after the fans backlash from Resident Evil 6. It was meant to be a lot different from the previous entry that gives a true horror experience for the fans of the series. Does the game lives up with our expectations? Lets find out my review, shall we? 


Resident Evil 7: Biohazard PS4 Review

Resident Evil 7: Biohazard is a Survival Horror game for PS4, XBONE and PC, which was developed and published by Capcom, and it is eleventh main entry in the Resident Evil franchise.

After the disastrous of the Resident Evil 6, this game does gives me what I want to see the triumph return of the survival horror roots. I've bought this game from Amazon for Black Friday Sales to try out this game and see if this game turns out to be just right, but the answer is yes because Resident Evil 7: Biohazard is pretty damn amazing game that Capcom has finally just got the game right. It retains the original style of puzzle-solving, limited combat, and darker atmosphere is finally what you called a true Resident Evil game that we been asking for ages. The game has great story, insane villains, deadly monsters, excellent gameplay elements, gorgeous graphics design and fantastic soundtrack, while this game shares with problems such as unmemorable protagonist in comparison with most of original protagonists from previous game, long loading times and lack of battle mode. So far, I really liked the game and it was one of the most surprising game of 2017 in my opinion.

So without go further do, let's start the review.



Presentation

This game starts off with a civilian named Ethan Winters is drawn to a derelict plantation in Dulvey, Louisianato to search for his lost wife Mia, who has been missing for the past three years. He visited to an abandoned house to explore and being encountered by groups of Baker's family and Molded creatures. After he learns his wife are being infected, he receiving a call from a woman named Zoe, who are also infected, to give Ethan assistance. His goal is to rescue and cure his wife and escape from the Baker's family house.

The story in the game is very well done because it explains the mysterious plot of how lucky of Mia Winters is been still alive in Baker's house after the three years absence is kinda sounds mystery. What really makes the game disturbing is that the whole house environment is full of horrific places where bunch of Baker's family made such disgusting food and supper with full of maggots and human flesh organs for dinner and the unhygienic bathrooms left with full of slimy materials which makes everyone wanted to puke badly after seeing this. It does looked creep out in the game because this game shares the influence from the 70's horror movie such as Texas Chainsaw Massacre which adds the excellent overall atmosphere. I think Ethan Winters is just an average faceless character that aren't interesting as the originals characters from the previous game because of his shallow and boring personality and same goes with Mia which I finding her little quite annoying, but I think Zoe is doesn't look too bad in the game. The best part of the characters in the game are Baker's family members because I finding these people quite scary as hell, such as Jack Baker is a chaotic bold-head old man that has ability to break through the wall and starts beating the shit of the Ethan, so that what you call a one tough old son of bitch. The rest are sick-minded freak Marguerite that surprise you with unexpected jumpscares and that crazy asshole Lucas that really threatens the hell of Ethan is just makes these villains so insanity, but entertaining at the same time. Instead of Zombies from the older Resident Evil games, we have sick-minded family members and mouldy monster which adds up nicely to the series.   

I really liked the horror settings of house environment which made the game bit similar from the first Resident Evil game, while the outside of the house is quite just like from the forth game regarding the games design choices.

Overall, it has incredible story presentation, great horror atmosphere, amazing villains and impressive settings design.



Gameplay

You take control of Ethan Winters makes use of weapons and tools in the fight against the Baker family and the mouldy monsters.

The game involves exploration where you had to find the key to open the door, collecting items to keep your stuff on your inventory screen, finding clues for puzzle-solving purposes, reading documents and watching VHS type to reveal information. The game was played on first-person perspective which borrows the similar elements mixed between cancelled Silent Hills (P.T) and Alien: Isolation regarding the combat and the use of stealth gameplay. Using the combat weapons which keeps the player survived as possible, so you have got pocket knife which is quite basic for close-combat because it's a useful survival choice of weapon that you can able to slash and stab the enemies which works perfectly than the ones in older entry of the series. The handgun is also worked too because you can switch any of those handgun clip such as regular handgun clip are used for balanced shot with mild damage, while the enhanced version does give a powerful shot at the enemies. The shotgun is good for close-range distance with heavy damage shot, while the machine-gun is good for long-range distance with lower-damage shot which really balanced the combat gameplay very well. I also liked the grenade launcher and remote bomb where you can blow them up and my favourite weapon in the game was flamethrower where you can burn them alive faster. The inventory screen lets you examine, combine and use items that you have already collected. You can craft your items such as handgun bullets for handgun clip and first aid bottle to increase your health, so it is required to collect chems, herbs and gunpowder in order to combining the items. The inventory spaces can be also expanded by collecting bagpack which increases the inventory slots that lets you keep many items on your inventory list. The save rooms has cassette types which lets you save the game to continue where you left off and keeping the items safe on the safe box which saves your inventory spaces for collecting more important items that you will need.

I got to say that the combat gameplay plays really good due to excellent weapons type that keeps you well satisfied to play and I also liked the use of stealth gameplay where you have to hide behind the walls and objects which prevents you from getting caught by Jack Baker nearby, but sometimes it may not be very easy to do because Jack sees you hiding behind, so you need to be very perfect with your stealth movement once you getting used too. The puzzle solving elements are also quite impressive because some of the puzzle gameplay such as projector statuette where you had to match the right shadow into the image frame which reveals the secret passage, Dog's head door where you had to find 3 dog's head to unlock the door and Incinerator Room is where you had to adjust the clock to open up the chamber is giving the player a worth for challenge. The VHS type events are also quite amazing such as Mia's attempting to escape from Baker's House and Clancy's birthday puzzle which adds not just the backstory information, but also part of the clues for puzzle-solving purposes. I really liked the mid-boss battles where you had to fight against Jack and Marguerite which is quite amazing except the final boss is pretty disappointing because it was short and wasn't good as the most of the final boss battles from older Resident Evil games. You can also pick between the ending does also adds the nice replay values.

Despite the amazing single-player mode, it's kinda shame that this game doesn't include the battle mode from the past Resident Evil games, so it would have been nice to include the battle mode on this game, so we can enjoy shooting hodes of enemies. Whats really cool about the PS4 version is that you can also play the game with the VR headset which giving the player a more horror experience which is also nice edition for PS4 version.   

Overall, it has amazing combat gameplay, excellent puzzle-solving and useful items inventory.



Graphics

I got to admit this is by far the best looking graphics in 2017. The character models has realistic use of animations and greater details to make them look more human-alike which is very damn impressive for next-gen gaming. I also liked the dark setting of house environment and the shady lighting are quite fascinating to see what the game developers could do with the overall game design. The game is quite gory because it has blood particles everywhere in the whole room and the use of gibs effects are also quite bloody which is pretty amazed to push the next level of horror genres. I'm sure the graphics on VR headset does look pretty awesome for whole game.

Overall, it has realistic animations, dark environments and horrific use of gory effects.


Music and Sounds

Resident Evil 7: Biohazard is definitely has hands-down the best overall soundtrack in gaming. I really liked the terrifying ambient soundtrack that fits well both the in-game mode and presentations. The save room theme music does have a The Last of Us vibe to it which I kinda prefer this save room theme music lot better in my opinion. The song "Go Tell Aunt Rhody" was performed by folk singer Jordan Reyne did a impressive job for the main theme of the game. The sound effects in the game are actually pretty well done due to marvellous sound works and background noise that surprises the player a lot which giving their positive overall horror experience and the voice actors are pretty okay for some characters, but could have done more professional job than this.

Overall, it has outstanding soundtrack and marvellous sound effects, but okayish voice cast.


Special Features

The game comes with downloadable content such as Banned footage vol 1 which includes two scenarios and new game mode called "Ethan Must Die", while vol 2 has another two scenarios and another new game mode called "Jack 55th Birthday."

There are more upcoming DLC chapter which is going to be released on this December such as Paid DLC chapters "End of Zoe" that focuses on Zoe, while the Free DLC "Not a Hero" where you get to play as the returning character Chris Redfield from the older Resident Evil. 

You can purchase these released DLC available on PS Store, Xbox Marketplace and Steam services, while the upcoming DLC will be released soon on December.

Overall, it has fantastic DLC content that we need it for this game. 



Advantages

Incredible story

Horrific horror elements

Chaotic Villains

Amazing combat and puzzle-solving

Gruesome graphics

Outstanding soundtrack

Fantastic DLC content



Disadvantages

Long loading times

Lack of battle mode

Weak protagonists 

Disappointing final boss battle   



Final Verdict


Presentation 8.5/10 - incredible story presentation, great horror atmosphere, amazing villains and impressive settings design.

Gameplay 8.5/10 - amazing combat gameplay, excellent puzzle-solving and useful items inventory.

Graphics 9/10 - realistic animations, dark environments and horrific use of gory effects.

Music and Sounds 9/10 -  Outstanding soundtrack and marvellous sound effects.

Special Features 9/10 - Fantastic DLC content.   


Overall 8.5/10 - Its by far much better than the lackluster Resident Evil 6. Capcom finally has taken the right direction by sticking with the survival horror roots is just what Resident Evil is supposed to be a fantastic horror video game franchises. Resident Evil 7: Biohazard is surprisingly a great horror titles of 2017 which offers an incredible stuff for fans to enjoy the overall single-player mode with stunning story, impressive combat, darker tone atmosphere, and brilliant puzzle elements.

This is definitely must play game and I hopefully to look forward a another sequel and of course my hopes on the Resident Evil 2: Remake. My second opinion is Resident Evil 4 are always being one of my favourite game in the series along with Code: Veronica, first and second.

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Top 5 Hidden Gems PS1 Games

We all know Sony Playstation is one of the best-selling consoles in fifth generation era completing with their rivals such as SEGA Saturn and Nintendo 64. It's one of the Sony's first game console made a first debut in year 1994-95 which are very known for amazing 32-bit graphics, ability to play music's CD, introducing memory cards designed for saving and loading the game files, innovative game controller including DualShock version and of course it has the best games library that made the PS1 a huge success such as Crash Bandicoot, Tony Hawk Pro Skater 2, Gran Turismo, Ridge Racer, Time Crisis, Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, Resident Evil, Silent Hill, Final Fantasy VII and Metal Gear Soild.

Despite PS1 has well known games, I'm now focusing on the most obscure PS1 games that are not so popular, but it's considered to be must own PS1 games for collectors. The terms Hidden Gems is where the game is somewhat being undiscovered for long time due to weak sales or not many people have heard the game before, so there are quite impressive PS1 titles that plays really good and to give reason why these are worth picking up for your video game collection.

I'm now going to make my top 5 Hidden Gems PS1 Games.  

5 - Super Dropzone 

        

One of the sequel to Archer Maclean's 1984 original called Dropzone is a 2D shoot em ups game for SNES, PS1 and GBA. This game takes place in the surface of Jupiter's moon where human scientific research base is under attack by aliens. Your mission is to wipeout the aliens and rescue the scientists by returning them to the base. 

This game borrows a similarities from the Midway's arcade classics Defender for the arcade style gameplay which can be played on a horizontally side-scrolling game field and it also introducing added new weapon types and end-level bosses. The goal of the game is to to rescue the scientists to the base's dropzone, so the player must shoot the enemy aliens and catch the remaining falling scientists. This game has addicting gameplay with excellent weapons types and challenged waves of levels. The graphics has cool level design and arcade style animation that really suits the game's presentation. 

It may not be well known as the original game, but you can get this PS1 version for less than £5 up to £20, so I'm lucky I got this for £1.99 from Ebay. 

4 - Sanvein 

  

Another great arcade title for PS1 Sanvein (AKA Shooter Starfighter Sanvein) is a is a top-down shooter game which was developed by Success in 2000. This game involves the attempt to escape and destroy a giant corrupted space station called St. Schutz. You take control of Sanvein to battle with station's defense mechanisms. 

Your goal is to survive through the stages by wiping out many of the enemies and bosses within time limits, so the player has the options to select each floor they want to go. 

The player has three different elements for their ship's movement, normal and special attacks. It include Gluon that fire attack patterns in spread-shots while its uses special fired missiles, the Photon fired concentrated shots while its uses short-range laser blade and the Graviton fired the explosive bullets and special laid land mines. 

I was far impressed with the ideas of having to select any of different floors which adds the replay value of the game and I also liked choosing the choices of weapons and movements to suit the player's style. It has unique levels, cool boss battles, and decent gameplay controls. It might not be everyone's cup of tea, but if you're into with arcade genres then you should able to pick this game up for less than £5 before the game goes expensive later.      

3 - Apocalypse 

   

Imagine having badass 90's action star Bruce Willis in video game seems to be an awesome ideas for development teams to make, so they bought the amazing third-person shooter game for PS1 was Apocalypse which is a game that are not based on the movie. It was developed by Neversoft made their first original game before they launching their later popular franchise Tony Hawk series. The story starts off with evil scientist named The Reverend has created a powerful theocracy based on the idea of a apocalypse. He uses his expertise to create his demonic beings known as four powerful horsemen of the Apocalypse in order to take over the world. The one and only hero Trey Kincaid (voiced by Bruce Willis), who managed to escape from prison, has his mission to save the world by stopping The Reverend's devious machinations. 

This game has 11 single-player mission and it was played on third-person view with 3D multi-directional gameplay which is quite similar to classic twin-stick shooter such as Smash TV and Robotron allowing the player to shoot in 360 degrees directions. This game features awesome weapons type such as machine gun, laser gun, rocket launcher and flamethrower, and it has wicked platforming stages such as the first city of level 3 where you run down the streets, across the lava pits and running along the roofs of apartment buildings which giving the players a well challenged platforming shooter with amazing level designs. The story in the game is very well done with simple plot, impressive FMV cutscenes and fantastic voice performer from Bruce Willis thats adds the overall presentations. 

It's a shame that this game had become time forgotten, so is it the fans of Bruce Willis's films have never owned the game consoles or have they not heard the game before? I suggest you to go buy this underrated gems under £5 because it's by far one of the best shooter for PS1 system.  

2 - O.N.E

     

One man, One solution, One state of mind. This game is simply called O.N.E for PS1, which was developed by Take Two Interactive's teams Visuals Concepts are known for various of 2K's Sport titles. It is a 3D Run N Gun game that you take control of John Cain, who suffered with his memory loss, awakens on the floor of an apartment building with a gun in place of one arm and escapes the buildings from the attack of the police helicopter. His goal is to battle and evade from military and police forces in order to survive the attack. 

The game features 6 mission levels to complete and the gameplay style is somewhat pretty similar to 3D Run N Gun titles such as Contra: Legacy of War and Millennium Solider: Expandables. What I liked about the combat in the game is the speed of firing attack which depends on rage rate of character's health. For example, if you shoot many of the enemies without damaging the player then your character's health increases the rage power allowing player to fire rapidly and the more powerful you can damage the enemies easily which is really cool ideas for Run N Gun genres. It has epic action stages with intense environment and excellent boss battles that will satisfy your Run N Gun experience. 

It may be hard to find game on online store due to bizarre name title on the cover and the price is raised up to £10, so you can able to get this game from Ebay faster before it's runs out of copy.  

1 - Silent Bomber 

          

Silent Bomber is a top-down action game for PS1, which was developed by CyberConnect who are well known for their gaming franchises such as .hack (simply pronounced Dothack) series and Naruto Series. The story starts off with war criminal named Jutah Fate being drafted into a covert military operation by his home planet of Hornet. His mission is to destroy a space cruiser called Dante that is threatening the planet.

The game borrows the similar arcade style gameplay like Bomberman series where the player blows the enemy up by using bombs instead of shooting. It has 14 levels to complete the game and your player has ability to detonate and blow the enemy by stacking many of bombs on the ground or launching them with lock-on recticle which is pretty straightforward to play and what makes the game interesting is that you can able to collect E-Chips to upgrade your character's ability which increases the bomb capacity lets you stack more bombs, the reticle range that improves the targeting distance and shields protection level that keeps the character's health last long which is very unique and creative for the game's genres. The game is considered to be hardest PS1 game I ever played, but I still really enjoying 14 epic action levels and fantastic boss battles that are worth for challenge. I liked the overall graphics design which is looked pretty good for PS1 hardware, it does have wicked soundtrack that fits the action of the game and overall decent story with cinematic design and characters in the game. 

I wish the developers team should able to make another sequel to such amazing game that nobody has played before, so it will cost in between £7.50 to £10 at the online store. This is one of the most obscure PS1 titles that everyone should must own this game.       

           

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