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The Total Recall |
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| Artist touch: Why does the Japanese ninja Hiryu look like a American dude that's about to come out of the closet? At least the background looks good. Cover art rating: 5/10 |
Month
it won: August 2006
(Sega/Capcom, 1991) |
Special note: This
Strider was one of the final Sega Master System releases in the US.
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| Introduction and Story: |
One
of the smartest things Sega did to get attention for their consoles in
the 1990's was to reprogram popular Capcom arcade hits to the home market.
One big game Sega required was Capcom's Strider. The game was an awesome
experience thanks to it's perfect combination of stylist graphics, unique
soundtracks, and intense arcade action all rounded into one. If you are
looking for a great game I can't recommend Strider enough for the Sega
Genesis, the Sega Master System version here on the other hand just
flat out sucks! This
is going to be a pretty damning review but here's the story anyway so
you know what's going on here at least. In the game you control an agile
super ninja named Strider on a mission to stop a mysterious madman (who
looks like the evil Emperor freak from those Star Wars movies)
that wants to conquer the world and repopulate it with his own strange
groups of mutants and creatures. The Emperor
has a lot help here and you have to finish off 5 stages before you get
to fight him one on one. The story is cool but if you are buying games
for the words in the manual you better find another hobby. |
| Controls and Game Play: |
| Strider
is not only good with a laser sword and climbing up walls but he can also
get robotic friends to help him fight across the world. You are going
to need all the help you can get to survive several cool but deadly locations
like a futurist Moscow city to a remote jungle filled with giant dinosaurs. Sure that sounds cool so far and it really works well on the Genesis but sadly for us the Master System game is very hard to control at best. For a deadly ninja Strider here is slow as molasses here and because the game is loaded with graphical bugs there are times when the controls don't even work all the time. It's that bad! Not only are the controls inconsistent but it even looks and sounds really horrible. |
| Graphics and Sounds: | |
 Don't do it Strider, you got so much to live for! On second thought go ahead. |
That of course moves me to the presentation here, or lack there of. One thing that helped the original Strider become such a arcade hit was its amazing artwork and stunning character design. For example when you reach the first boss you would see an huge Russian senate actually transform into a giant metal creature with a vicious looking sickle weapon. All you get here though is some flickering beast that just appears out of no where. Not only is there far less detail but all the boss does is go in the same stupid circular pattern every time so can kill it way too easily. The Master version here also has tons of missing content too. Remember how the Arcade and Genesis versions had the music suddenly change once you reach a new and exciting part of the level? Well that's gone here too because there is only one weak soundtrack throughout the entire game and it will drive you nuts. |
| The Bottomline: | |
 Ahhhh!
Don't be fooled by the fact this is a arcade translation (unlike the lame
NES version) and the colourful still art on the back of the case
here. This is easily the worse Strider game ever made. It has non-responsive
controls, cheap looking graphics and animation, one super annoying sound
track and so much more. This slow game here is so horrible that it is
even worse then the very disappointing Genesis version of Strider
2 too. Unless you are a collector
looking to get every SMS game out there you should avoid this mess of
a cartridge like a drunk misses the toilet. |
 I when against the Master once too and that's why I'm wearing this chain and my butt is sore, eh? Oh well. |
| Conclusion: | |
STRIDER overall rating: 23/100 Find this game on eBay here! For 1 player only graphics: 3/10 sound: 2/10 gameplay: 4/10 replay: 1/10 -StarSoldier (Ryan Genno) 2006 See other Total Recall duds of the month |
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