Game 27: Gears of War

Gears of War is a third-person shooter for the Xbox 360 that came out in late 2006. The game was one of the first to use the Unreal Engine 3 (seen recently in Mass Effect), a game engine created in-house at Epic. Gears of War's combat system differs greatly from the typical shooter, focusing more on using cover effectively to engage the enemy. Hiding behind cover is built into the game and you either learn it quickly, or die trying. People were obviously looking for something a little different because the game sold quite well and it was just recently released on the PC.

Gears takes place in the future after an alien race has attacked humans living on the planet Sera, a world used to harvest fuel. All the men in the future seem abnormally large, as basically everyone in this game could play American football and dominate the game. I kind of like that style though as it serves the bombed-out, nuclear winter setting well. So I already like the atmosphere, let's see how the rest of the first hour of Gears of War turns out.

For my review on the whole game, please see my Gears of War review at Beyond the First Hour.

(minutes are in bold)
00 - I select New Campaign and the first hour begins. There are three difficulties to choose from, since I've only played Gears of War intermittently here and there, I select the easiest difficulty and the game loads the opening cutscene. Ashes, 14 years after "E-Day. " I'm looking at some creepy, drooling aliens. A very large man opens a door, he's breaking another man out of prison.
01 - I get control already! My objective is to escape the prison, but it doesn't look like they typical guards are on duty. I have the choice of going to either combat or training, I'm going combat, baby!!

02 - My guy is ready for some action, but the game still takes a few opportunities to teach me things. I can look at my squadmates by holding Y. Guess I'll find some use for that.

03 - A chopper flies over shooting at us, whoops, friendly fire. I kick a door open and some corpses wave in front of me.

05 - My first battle is not a good one... should have read the instruction booklet! Or maybe taken the training, right? I die because I mismanaged my ammo and got gunned down trying to reload. Dang.
06 - Ah, I can hold L to aim while under cover, that should help a ton.

07 - Battles are gritty and bloody. Our hero has a lot of weight to him and when he starts running, the camera dips down like we're in a war film and the cameraman is right at my hip. Great stuff.

08 - The bad guys are cutting through the door, dramatic. My friend goes down quickly but I'm able to revive him by hitting the X button over his body. Odd. Why didn't he revive me before?

09 - We're out in an open courtyard now, great textures and graphics. The Unreal Engine 3 is really strutting its stuff. It's not even the final build of it either.
11 - A small skirmish breaks out and my friend and I make quick work of the aliens. I'm really low on ammo. We run to a helicopter as the ground beneath us breaks up and a really giant spider monster erupts out of it! Just like in the commercial!

12 - A cutscene plays now as we're on the helicopter. It's full of ugly brutes. A soldier asks if I'm Marcus Fenix, it appears that I'm famous. No idea why I was in jail though.

13 - The chopper lands and we approach someone who looks like they're in charge. He calls me a traitor and then a woman climbs out of another helicopter. She's not wearing any armor of course (we're only in a war zone). A skirmish breaks out.
14 - We need some kind of resonator so that we can map the alien's tunnels and bomb them back to whatever nasty afterlife they believe in. The cutscene is still going with us getting shot at, sandbags are great protection for bullets I guess.

15 - As the cutscene finishes up the last of the enemies, it's time to head into the building we're outside of. The woman will feed us intel, she sounds scared.

16 - The game explains active reload, if I hit R bumper at just the right time, I'll reload faster. That actually kind of makes sense, a little.
17 - I pick up some dog tags from the ground, a teammate says we should honor our fellow comrades.

19 - Wish I knew how to use my grenades! I just was told to flank a bunch of scum on the left and there's a group of them packed together, ripe for the picking!

21 - Ah, the D-pad, the last buttons I tried. Looks like I can carry four types of weapons, each one associated with a direction on the D-pad. Our current objective is to find Alpha squad, but there's some human remains over there. Doesn't bode well.

23 - Moving through more and more rooms and more skirmishes with the bad guys. I can hold the B button to use a chainsaw attached to my rifle! Just need some fodder now...
24 - Ammo seems like it's on short supply in this game, maybe I'm just being reckless. I have to keep juggling weapons to make sure I have enough.

25 - A cutscene starts as we approach our dead comrades. We can't tell for sure who they are as their dog tags are gone. We still need to find the resonator though. Marcus thinks the bodies may be a trap.

26 - Marcus is a smart man, we just got ambushed!

27 - I hop on a gatling gun and literally rip one of the aliens in half! Awesome!

28 - I finally get to use my chainsaw as a rip a nasty in the chest! "Nothin' but bits!"

29 - We enter a courtyard with a statue in the middle. This is not a good position to defend from.

31 - And defending is tough, I go down, but I guess no one wants to revive me...

34 - That was kind of a difficult battle, all about working the cover though and watching your health carefully. Health in Gears of War regenerates, when you're really injured though almost the entire screen goes red indicating to take cover! That's the only sign of your status in this game, and it works.

35 - Locusts; that is what the aliens are called. The men discuss having nightmares about them. Maybe I will too now!
36 - Our team has to split up, I take the left path. I'm going with a soldier named Carmine.

37 - I rush into a room and get blasted down. Geez, slow down, Greg.

39 - I take out a spotter with my pistol but there's still a big stationary gun in the room, someone has got to flank that guy. Probably me...
40 - The controls go wonky on me as I try to chainsaw him... he kills me.

41 - Dom goes down so I try to raise him, then I get killed in a gushy mess.

43 - The same stupid gunner kills me again by punching me or something. This is getting really annoying.

46 - Finally! I clear the room, and then we get ambushed from behind. I jump on the big gun and start mowing them down, however, right when I'm having real fun, Dom gets killed and I have to resurrect him. Lame!
48 - My next objective is to gain entrance to the House of Sovereigns. Ha! Another wide open courtyard with tons of cover, I wonder what will happen?

49 - Well, I made a good run but I get blown to shreds by another large gun.

50 - I think I just got killed when my own man tried to take the same cover spot I had. It looked like he took cover and I splattered. Glitch?
52 - This time I take a different position and run into the building right away, hitting the Locust from behind and the side. Works much better, pretty intense sequence.

53 - A short cutscene of the disposable guy (red shirt) in our group getting sniped. Now we have to defend the area we just attacked. Could be tough with only three men.

55 - I actually do it the first try though and we move back into the building.
56 - Ouch, I just got shotgunned up close. I want that weapon. Now.

58 - Okay, what the frak? Why didn't the game checkpoint after I cleared out the courtyard and entered the building? That seems like two distinct sequences to me. Well, I replay the last area quick, this time grabbing the shotgun. We head up some stairs, Alpha Squad is alive! At least one of them. He gets shot down and I go down to the courtyard to save him.

59 - The survivor's name is Cole, I guess he was a famous football player but is now part of the war effort. Think Sam from Battlestar Galactica. We all head downstairs together but a new door is blocking our way. Our little robot friend who I guess has been following us the whole time uncloaks and starts working on the door.

60 - Oh crap, wretches! Small and nimble little aliens drop from the ceiling and scream, breaking all the windows in sight. Looks like I'll get good use out of my shotgun! Very awesome sound design here.

Now for some scores out of 10.
Story: 3
I'm not really sensing much of a story in the first hour of Gears of War. We have Marcus Fenix, a man who was in prison until the game started for who knows why being broken out by who knows who and fighting an alien race for who knows what. The only clue we get is from some guy calling Marcus a traitor and another soldier who can't believe it's actually me. The game is trying to play the mystery card but doesn't pull it off well. I also had no idea the game didn't take place on Earth until I read its wiki page and my only tasks in the future are to rescue some soldiers and then bomb the world to bits. I might have given this game a break but the number of cutscenes would seem to indicate I would come away knowing more.
Graphics and Sound: 8
The Unreal Engine 3 shines as usual and even most of the sound design is good. I've read some complaints from people saying that there is basically no art design in Gears of War, but I'd have to argue otherwise. Epic created an apocalyptic world and while it's dark, it has a certain appeal to me and if you take the time to examine the environments, I think you will be impressed by the detail that went into them. The characters are scarred and those old wounds can tell a story too. The Locusts don't seem incredibly original, but they do look evil and sometimes downright scary. Gears is chock full of one liners, which can get old after a bit, but the last scene with the wretches really impressed me. The high-pitched screams and the glass breaking is a moment I won't soon forget.
Gameplay: 8
Overall, I really like the cover system in Gears of War, and other game designers must have enjoyed it too because we're seeing it in games like Mass Effect and Uncharted: Drake's Fortune (not saying taking cover is a totally new thing, but these games were obviously inspired). The characters feel appropriately heavy and ripping apart aliens with my machine gun just plain works well. The game stumbled a few times though, especially in close combat. The game seems to fall apart a bit when the bad guys close in, the combat system works much better at a distance. Another complaint I have is with your squadmates, they sure seem to die a lot. And it seemed a little odd that they can't revive me even though I can revive them. It would have been nice to maybe give the A.I. 15 seconds or so to lumber up to me and wake me up.
Fun Factor: 9
Gears of War's first hour was a lot of fun, sometimes not having much of a story can help out the other categories and give them a chance to show off. There certainly is a variety of gameplay near the beginning and it's cool when Dom tells you to flank the Locusts and you really feel like you're working together as a team. There was just something about the combat experience that makes it feel really real. Bullets tear through the enemy, grenades are exploding, and your shotgun blows things away like a shotgun should. It's all a very satisfying feeling. Some parts seemed pretty challenging for playing on easy, but it was still fun to tackle places I had failed from different directions.
Minutes to Action: 1
Overall: 8
This game probably would have scored a bit lower if it weren't so darn fun. Of course it looks great, it's an Xbox 360 game in HD; and of course it plays great, it's a game from Epic. But I think where Gears of War really comes through is from the combination of the setting and the combat, if it didn't have either the dark and gritty atmosphere or the cover-focused combat, I really don't think the game would have done as well as it did. But either way, I enjoyed the first hour of Gears of War and it gets a really solid score from me, not to mention if you're looking for a game that gets right into the action, this is it. If you own a 360 or a nice PC, I would definitely recommend checking it out, I hear it even has great multiplayer...

Art by Dann Perez - used with permission.

Game 25: Mass Effect

Mass Effect is an action role-playing game for the Xbox 360. It was recently released in November and has received many great reviews and accolades since then. Of course, this doesn't always mean I will like it, but I have high hopes for it as it comes from a distinguished line of video games (notably Knights of the Old Republic and Jade Empire). Mass Effect takes place in the future after humans find out they're not alone in the universe and end up joining in a peaceful truce with many other powerful alien races. The human race has to deal with brand new styles of diplomacy and communication, but have also benefited from an influx of advanced technology. The concept of mass effect itself is similar to "the force" from Star Wars, but more grounded in technology and physics. It basically allows control over dark energy that species can take advantage of through the use of biotic implants and training.

For my review on the whole game, please see my Mass Effect review at Beyond the First Hour.

I'm starting 2008 (and Day 2 of reviews) where I left off with 2007: a new Xbox 360 game. And I'm actually really excited to be able to play Mass Effect finally (I've been borrowing a friend's 360 for about a month now, and have wanted to play this game more than any other, I even read the prequel book). Let's just hope my self-built hype for this game doesn't implode on itself, but from everything I've heard, I don't think it will. I'd like to quickly apologize for the choice of screenshots, they don't really fit the text but they are neat to look at! Now let's get started with Day 2 of The First Hour and my review of Mass Effect.

(minutes are in bold)
00 - I click Start New Career and the first hour of Mass Effect begins. I enter the Alliance Military Personnel Database. The database looks for me, Greg Shepard (Shepard is the last name the game gives me, so all the voice actors can actually say my name), but can't find me. Looks like I get to create my own character!

01 - Lots of options available, but I don't want to spend too much time on this. Character creation doesn't seem as deep as it was advertised, but there are still lots of options to tweak and the human head in front of me looks really lifelike.. Not as many hairstyles as I'd like though.
02 - I get to decide what Greg's childhood and military career were like before the game. I'm a Sole Survivor from Earth and a Soldier. Just the defaults really, a few cool things you can do is modify your history, like where you were born (on Earth or in space) and how you became famous (all my fellow soldiers were killed in an attack).

03 - The game starts loading... A view of Earth. Some men are talking about me, Greg Shepard. They seem to know my history. There I am looking out a spaceship's viewport.

04 - The men say I'm the only man left to protect the galaxy. Some text appear on the screen, detailing the discovery of a super technology that thrust humans to the technology state they are in now.

05 - A few shots of a ship flying by, Greg Shepard is walking through the ship. A man voiced by Seth Green is noting some technical details. Greg stops, he looks rugged and experienced. The ship is approaching a really large space object, a mass relay it's called. The mass relay sends our ship at faster than light speeds across the galaxy to another mass relay.
06 - Joker, Seth Green, reports our arrival. An alien behind him says "good job" and Joker complains. Shepard walks up behind them. I get to respond to Joker's complaints. I tell him to "cut the chatter!"

07 - Captain Anderson comes on the comm and asks for me. I now have control of Shepard and start walking around the ship.

08 - I approach Navigator Pressly, he says there's something odd about this mission. Something about Spectres, top covert agents, being on board that makes things fishy.

09 - The dialogue options are really nicely laid out, I get a few short choices (one to three words) and Shepard expands on that option. Really cool design. The characters look so real too and I can even see some emotion in their faces.

10 - I ask Pressly a few more questions, he seems biased against this Spectre who is a Turian (an alien race). Next up I approach Jenkins the soldier and Chakwas the doctor. They argue a bit, Jenkins really wants a battle, but the doctor is sick of healing him!
11 - Everything I say is kind of mean, this is fun. I tell Jenkins not to play the hero. After our conversation I get +2 Renegade points. Sweet.

12 - In the captain's quarters is Nihlus, the Turian Spectre. He asks me about Eden Prime, the world where our mission is to take place. I tell him I'm a marine, not a tourist. Shepard's got some wit.

13 - Captain Anderson approaches, he has the voice of the Arbiter from Halo 2 and 3. Very deep and military like, his voice matches his character very well. Anderson was the main character from the book so I'm pretty familiar with him.

14 - Anderson and Nihlus explain the mission: a Prothean beacon has been found on Eden Prime. The Protheans are some long extinct but super advanced race so finding their artifacts is a very good thing. Nihlus is also around to evaluate me to become a Spectre. Must be a pretty elite squad as there isn't a single human Spectre.

15 - Eden Prime will be our first of several missions together. Joker interrupts, a message from Eden Prime. We get a jerky handheld camera view of an ongoing battle.16 - Looks like someone beat us to the planet, the three of us watch some soldiers get shot and a giant spider like ship floats in the air. Then the transmission goes dead.

17 - We arrive at the planet, Shepard and his team are going in. We need to find the beacon, top priority. Nihlus is going in solo. Not sure how he'll monitor Shepard if he's not with me.

18 - I have control now on the planet, time to check things out. This all feels a lot like Gears of War: behind the shoulder camera, holding L aims, R shoots. I'm liking this setup.

19 - We turn a corner and that fool of a soldier Jenkins gets shot. Well, he sure didn't last long, shouldn't have worn his red shirt today.

20 - My first battle! It felt really awkward shooting these little flying drones with my pistol, didn't feel like I was hitting them at all, but I must have because they soon blew up. Even my remaining partner, Kaidan, hit one.
21 - Kaidan asks what to do with Jenkins' body, I say to forget about him. More renegade points!

22 - More shooting, and more similarities to Gears of War: you can cover behind objects by pushing in the left stick. The game is being super lenient with the shooting, not sure if this is just because it's the first mission or what, but I'm pretty sure I'm not even close to hitting the enemies.

23 - I take a moment and hit start and check out the Squad Screen. Here I can assign talent points to various attributes such as pistol skill, assault rifle skill, and even intimidation. I spread my points out, not trying to focus on one thing. I can also give points to Kaidan. He's got totally different options though, he can Throw (mass effect throw, like the force), and has a specialty in first aid. That should come in handy.

25 - A cutscene begins of a woman in pink running away from some drones and then shooting them down. Woah, a man just got speared by something from the ground. And now I have to shoot Geth Troopers! I take them down easily with my enhanced pistol skill.
26 - Ashley Williams, the woman in pink armor approaches me. She was patrolling when the planet was attacked. She says they're fighting Geth, but no one can believe that it could actually be them. I tell Ashley to come with us, could always use a helping hand.

27 - Holding L2 gives me a quick look at the weapons we have equipped and what ones I can choose. Everyone seems to have a pistol, assault rifle, sniper rifle, and shotgun, but we're all not necessarily trained in them.

28 - The game quickly shows me how to use cover and then throws more enemies at me.

29 - My super soldier mows them down and we approach the dig site where the beacon should be, no dice though. Looks like we have to continue on looking. The actual control of this game plays a lot like Knights of the Old Republic but the shooting feels like Gears of War. It's a really weird combination but it seems to be working.

30 - Nihlus comes on the comm and tells me to head to the space port up ahead. Not really sure where to go so I guess I'll go straight. There is a radar map but it doesn't seem too informative. Just points north.
31 - We approach a burned out camp, and some spikes are poking out of the ground, but with bodies speared at the top. Ouch. The spears retract and the (used to be humans?) zombies come to life and approach. These guys can take a lot more hits so I whip my shotgun out and blow out their innards (not actually graphic though).

33 - I just realized I leveled up, so I spend some more available talent points on my heroes. Plus I can put points into Ashley as she's a new team member. Cool. I put more points for her into Assault Rifle.

35 - I open some crates and find supplies, and then approach a security door. I have to play a quick game of Simon Says to open it. That was easy enough. There's some scientists inside, looks like they were hiding out. We ask them what happened to the beacon, Nihlus was right, they moved it to the space port. One of the scientists think that the beacon could be the greatest discovery ever, the other thinks it is the fall of mankind.

36 - I leave them in their boxcar and then a cutscene starts. It's Nihlus, he's found another Turian, Saren. Nihlus asks Saren what he's doing there, but then Saren shoots Nihlus in the back of his head! Guess there won't be any more Spectre evaluating.
38 - As we approach the space port, we see the giant spider space ship flying off into the sky. Maybe that's Saren leaving?

39 - Not too much time to wonder though as we get into another firefight. Well, it's actually us shooting at the Geth and them running at us like suicide bombers. They don't seem to be doing any damage though.

40 - Haha, I shoot at an exploding crate and Kaidan dies. Whoops. He gets back up a moment later though. We approach Nihlus' body. A man appears from behind some more crates and says he saw another Turian shoot Nihlus. He said Saren shot him right in the back of the noggin and then headed towards another platform.
42 - I push the guy a little further asking how he wasn't killed, turns out he was napping on the job and when the Geth attacked he was sleeping behind the crates. The three of us rip on the guy pretty badly. We leave the guy and head for the other platform too.

43 - Dang, Shepard is a really good shot with the pistol! I also take out a thug by blowing up the barrel he was standing next to. Loser.

44 - We're supposed to head down a narrow passage now, but there's tons of bad guys. This may take a few minutes. A Geth Destroyer shoots what looks like a rocket at us!

46 - My team ends up making pretty quick work of them. We reach the end of a platform, hop on a mini train and a cutscene begins. It's Saren, he says to set the charges. He approaches the beacon and he's suddenly lifted up off the ground. No explanation there but it looks like he's received some kind of power.
47 - Woah, I have four minutes to dismantle four bombs. I head to the first one and shut it down. Three more to plus there's bad guys shooting at us.

48 - I press Y to heal my squad and then dismantle the second bomb.

49 - I overheat my gun by shooting too much, it doesn't seem that I have limited ammo though, just can't fire too many bullets in a small length of time. Another bomb down too.

50 - Shepard disarms the fourth and final bomb. We're safe in that respect at least.

51 - I'm able to press right on the D-Pad to tell my squad to attack the guy I'm attacking. Pretty nice tactics there.

52 - I take out the last of the Geth and level up, I also receive a 360 achievement. I head to the talent screen to assign a few more points to weapons and training. Well, actually I'll max out my intimidation skill!
53 - I walk up the beacon, looks like I beat the mission. Shepard reports in to Normandy (the ship) that we found the beacon. Williams approaches the beacon and she starts getting sucked into it! Shepard runs up and throws her away from it.

54 - But now he's getting lifted up! I see a bunch of bloody red flashes of something on my screen, and then I must have passed out.

55 - A cutscene with Saren and The Matriarch (no idea). She tells Saren that one of the humans (me) touched the beacon. Saren gets ticked off and throws a tantrum. Loading.

56 - Shepard wakes up in the infirmary, Ashley calls for the doctor. The doc tells me I was out for 15 hours. Ashley blames herself for the incident, I tell not to worry. She smiles... I think she likes me.
57 - The doc says she detected some abnormal brain activity and I tell her about the red vision I had.

58 - Captain Anderson approaches and I ask why Ashley is on board, he says she's been reassigned to the Normandy.

59 - Anderson says the Council wants answers, things are not looking good. He tells me that Saren is also a Spectre, but that he's gone rogue. He has allied himself with the Geth.

60 - We talk a bit more about my vision and Saren. This guy is obviously a bad dude as he doesn't like humans and seems to have the firepower and willingness to knock us out, and maybe all the other species to boot! I like games that introduce the main bad guy early on! Well, that's it for Mass Effect's first hour.

Now for some scores out of 10.
Story: 9
Mass Effect has a huge story to tell, and the amount you want to take in is really up to you. During my review I didn't dive too deep into conversations and just skimmed any Codex entries I received. This allowed me to progress the main story and experience more action, but I started another new game and barely got off the Normandy in the first hour because I was reading so much information. The game also has a prequel novel available written by the game's writer, so there's plenty of history and backstory. However, looking purely at the first hour I experienced, the game still manages to pack a lot of cool development in. We get to meet an alien race, explore an advanced spaceship, and get to see a trusted super agent knocked off by the game's villain. There's drama and action, just what its genre of action role-playing game promises.
Graphics and Sound: 10
Mass Effect is running the Unreal Engine 3, so you know it's going to look great. The characters look awesome, more realistic than Gears of War (same engine) if you ask me. There's some funny looking texture draw-in that can draw your eye away from the real scene, but it's not too bad. Honestly, this game is like a movie, the default graphical settings have a white noise effect on and motion blur that gives Mass Effect that unique and realistic look. Sound wise the voice acting is outstanding. Shepard's voice sounds really good (both male and female versions, male in this review) and the other cast members are recognizable and even fit the part. The presentation in this game is outstanding and the best I've experienced on the 360 yet next to Call of Duty 4.
Gameplay: 8
Running around and interacting with objects in Mass Effect feels a lot like Knights of the Old Republic. This is both good and bad. The good is that the system is familiar and it works pretty well, the bad is that it feels a little last gen. I still feel like I don't have 100% total control when moving around. The action feels a lot like Gears of War. This is also both good and bad. The good is that this system is also familiar and it works pretty well, the bad is that it's hard to live up to a system like Gears of War, things just don't feel as fine tuned and a little sloppy. When I'm shooting at things it doesn't really feel like I'm hitting them, there's a health bar at top and that's really the only indication that I'm doing any damage. Assigning weapons to my squad is very easy though and they seem rather intelligent. The dialogue system is brilliant and works a lot better than the past games.
Fun Factor: 8
I was pumped to play Mass Effect and while I enjoyed it, I was surprised by a few things. I was super surprised by how the action played out, and was pleased with it at first. The shooting engine started showing its flaws along the way but my soldier was so strong I had no problem mowing down enemies. I think I had the most fun during the conversations, examining the character's faces and their reactions to what I said was really interesting. You can tell Bioware spent a lot of time on all the small muscles in the face. The story was also fun to follow but it took a while to get to the action, even longer if you want to read everything (but then maybe you don't really care about shooting things).
Minutes to Action: 20
Overall: 9
Mass Effect really does a lot of things right in its first hour: the graphics are amazing, the voice acting is outstanding, and the story is engaging. I have a warning though: if you are expecting an RPG with guns, you will probably be disappointed. The game is very action orientated, a lot more than I thought. Jade Empire also had a lot of action but that was martial arts, actually shooting something takes a lot more thumbstick skill so be prepared. Either way, I'm really excited to play the rest of this game. The minutes to action score (20) is probably the worst I will ever give to a game I scored a 9, but keep in mind that's just when the shooting starts. There's plenty of interesting cutscenes and dialogue trees to work through before then. When I reviewed Star Control 2 I made a conjecture that the classic game may have inspired Bioware to create Mass Effect and I look forward to seeing if that's true.

Game 21: Jet Force Gemini

Jet Force Gemini is a Nintendo 64 third-person shooter game released by Rare in 1999. Looking back, it seems like such an odd game: twins Juno and Vela fly around in a space ship and save furry creatures from the evil empire. But when I think about it more closely, Jet Force Gemini really seems like the ultimate Rare amalgamation of their other Nintendo 64 games - Goldeneye 007, Banjo-Kazooie, Perfect Dark, and Conker's Bad Fur Day specifically. That collection of animal fur and blood and guts really comes together on this cartridge.

The game also has some interesting history during development. I used to read IGN very closely and I remember the day when some new character art was released and the twins went from being bland to sexy. Now it seems like they did this just so they could give Vela boobs, but I suppose breast sells and that's their right. Anyways, now you know all of Jet Force Gemini's exciting history (there wasn't much to cover), so let's get right into the review.

(minutes are in bold)
00 - I enter my name for a new game and then start the opening cutscene. We're looking at a glowing planet with an asteroid belt around it, a ship flies by. Some epic space music starts and the camera pans to give us a peek on the inside of the ship. A teenage boy and girl are running the ship, along with their dog.
01 - An alarm goes off, "Alert!" The boy throws down his coffee and runs to the console. We cut to a scene on a planet, a bunch of furry teddy bears are getting shot down by a squad of blue ants. Somehow our heroes are watching this too.

02 - A giant mothership is passing over our hero's ship. They run down the hallway, but a swarm of blue ants burst in! The girl and their dog head into tubes and land on.... treadmills? They then take off in their own personal transport ships. The boy continues to fight off the ants, and then runs into a tube himself.
03 - He lands on his own treadmill, his name is Juno, and he's ready for action. I hit A a few times and he gets teleported into his own orange ship which takes off for the planet.

04 - It's a green planet with plenty of water. Juno lands his ship on what looks like a landing pad made just for him. I take control of the blue-clad hero.

05 - I encounter Yoda, well, maybe not Yoda, but it sure looks like a dark green version of him. Yoda is a Tribal, the furry creatures on this planet, and he tells me he saw Vela and Lupus run through a moment ago, must be my sister and dog. Guess he knows who we are.
06 - Yoda tells me that green doors mean forward and red doors mean back. That's probably an indication of poor level design and that it is easy to get lost. I check out my controls, Z shoots, and the C-buttons (remember this is on the Nintendo 64) control various jumping and rolling maneuvers. R brings the camera directly behind Juno's back to aim.

07 - I proceed forward. The next area is very wide open, but the large textures are truly awful.

08 - I enter a hut and talk with a Tribal. He asks me to rescue as many of the furry creatures as I can.
10 - Another Tribal tells me I'll have to destroy all Mizar troops to proceed from stage to stage. Figures.

11 - While using the R-button to aim you use the left joystick to aim your gun and the C-buttons (aka right joystick) to shoot. This is the opposite of basically every first person shooter I've played since Halo and I'm going to have a hard time getting used to this in the next hour.

12 - Goldwood Forest - My first liberation zone. The game pans around the area, telling me what to shoot and what not to. Kinda obvious. Oh snap, Sniper Drones!

13 - Blah blah, let's get going. Kill ants, free Tribals.
14 - Finally, A hostile area! I take out my first Sniper Ant with some well placed shots.

15 - After that I rescue my first Tribal, cute little furball.

17 - Phew, just cleared my first large area. The switched joysticks are disorienting me in combat, not sure how I ever played games like this! I dig around in the options looking for a change. Hmm... nothing.

18 - Two different doors to enter, I enter the right one.

20 - It's a long tunnel with ants lined up all the way. There's really no point in aiming it seems, just run and gun. I take on a ton of ant soldiers and then rescue a few Tribals at the end of the tunnel. Only one left to rescue in this level.
22 - I manuever my way through a line of ticking land mines while dodging ant bullets. The imprecise controls are making this difficult, Juno takes wide turns.

25 - I accidentally fall down a waterfall hole then crawl underwater through a small crevice. I'm out in the open again. I wish there was some kind of map, I feel really lost. Oh, area cleared! And I rescued all the Tribals (I did?), not bad!

26 - Next area has what looks like to be a collection of exploding barrels.

27 - The music here is really upbeat, lots of drums. A Tribal gives me a Red Key, used for opening doors with Red Locks. Thanks! There's also a door behind him that I can't enter. He says its a Mizar door, why they would have a door on this planet I don't know.
29 - I have to shoot a target to proceed... How annoying! I'm wasting all my ammo. Try as I might, I can't get it open. I head through another door.

30 - Okay, there's a giant bug boss in here. Am I ready for this guy? I save my game.

31 - I'm fighting him pretty good, but then I fall in the pit. Wonky controls. I fall again trying to get some red gems.

32 - All right, he went down real easy once I bothered to try. I got a machine gun as a reward! This sucker is high power and should open that frustrating target easy.
33 - The door goes down in a flurry of bullets.

36 - I'm picking up ant heads as I run around, wonder what they do?

37 - I take out a few more snipers, cool physics as their guns bounce around after they're dead.

38 - I get taken out by one of those giant bug's laser beams. Ouch. Direct hit.

39 - I get right back on my feet (after miraculously coming back to life a few hundred feet away) and take the bugger out.

40 - The game thinks it's funny to place a sniper right above a door entrance. Lame. I'm also starting to notice how hard it is to get the camera to swing around to where you want it.

42 - Woah, I turn the corner and there's a ton of floating gunners! I take a minute to pick them off one by one, luckily they're horrible shots.
43 - I fall off an invisible cliff and die. No continues left now... gotta be careful.

44 - Sweet, I just shot an enemy grenade out of the air! But then I die again, continues gone. Lame.

46 - This time I take out the horde of gunners with my machine gun. Much faster this time.

49 - Wow, the game really likes overwhelming odds. Right now I'm fighting off a large group of much more accurate gunners. Not fun.
50 - I take out the final gunner as he kills me, at least they won't be back now.

51 - Moving on finally, I'm able to rescue a bunch of Tribals, but in the next room a swarm of green flying gunners awaits me. I grab an invincibility power-up on the ground and blast through them. Level complete. But I missed four Tribals. Whoops.

53 - I make it back to my ship, no sign of my sister of dog. I take off to the heavens.
54 - There's a long sequence as my orange ship docks in the main ship. Juno just ran through a solid wall after he got off his ship. Odd.

55 - Somehow one of the Tribals got on my ship. He starts a cutscene, looks like the ants are on MY ship? Maybe I'm not on my ship but the alien mothership? It's not clear. Vela is doing some reconnaissance. Well, until she starts blasting everyone!
56 - She takes off after some ants but then gets captured by a giant purple bug. Now I gotta rescue her I suppose. How did this Yoda know all this information anyway?

57 - I'm back in control and take off into the unknown.

58 - This is a cool indoor area, I like it better than the forest. I rescue some Tribals from the giant purple bug.
59 - I'm clearing out another room of bugs and gunners. This game could be a lot more fun if it helped you aim at the flying guys too.

60 - In my final minute I manage to rescue another Tribal and spatter some ants. Nothing too exciting.

Now for some scores out of 10.
Story: 2
Jet Force Gemini's story in the first hour is extremely lacking. It basically entails to a pair of twins and their dog are chilling out in orbit around a planet when the furry inhabitants of that planet are suddenly attacked by some evil ants. That's it. There is no explanation why Juno and Vela were by that planet, there is no explanation on who the Tribals are and why they would get attacked, and there is no explanation on who is attacking them except that they're Mizar. Considering it takes 15 minutes to actually get rolling, you would have expected a lot more.
Graphics and Sound: 6
The characters are probably the best looking things in this game, they're relatively detailed and Juno and Vela specifically look really good. After that, everything kind of goes downhill. The 3D areas seem pretty large, but Jet Force Gemini employs some really awful looking textures all over which spoil the expansiveness. There was a decent variety of environments in the first hour; though I spent the most time in the forest, the last few minutes placed me in a large spaceship cargo deck. I actually enjoyed the music so that helps out this category's score. The sound effects were typical but the soundtrack seemed above average. But Rare has always had pretty good music in their games. Oh, one note, Jet Force Gemini runs in widescreen mode (as you can see by the screenshots in this review), this is a great method of future-proofing by Rare.
Gameplay: 4
Besides the polygonal graphics, many Nintendo 64 games suffered from crappy gameplay. My theory behind this is that the controller simply wasn't ready for both 3D movement and dynamic camera control. Throw in some simultaneous aiming and moving/strafing with only one joystick and all of a sudden you have a 10 button controller that is simply inadequate for the games developers want to make. Jet Force Gemini suffers from this and thus the player suffers too. Is it good gameplay when an experienced gamer has to constantly think about what buttons to press? No. Does it make sense that the game forces you to use an inaccurate joystick (or is it just a bad aiming system?) to pick off sniper ants that just span a few pixels? No. I could go on but the first hour of Jet Force Gemini's gameplay is simply a disappointment.
Fun Factor: 5
Gameplay and Fun Factor categories are usually directly related, if the gameplay sucks, you're probably not going to have much fun. This would be the case for Jet Force Gemini if it didn't have that unique sense of style that's a trademark of Rare games. It's so satisfying splattering the ant drones' green blood all over nearby rocks or "accidentally" shooting a Tribal here or there. The characters have a certain roguish appeal, but they're way too underdeveloped in the first hour, unfortunately. This score would be higher if it weren't for the frustrating moments where you're just getting picked off in the distance by gunner drones and your crappy aim can't hit anything. Too bad.
Minutes to Action: 14
Overall: 5
This is a disappointing score for me, Rare had such a great track record on the Nintendo 64 and doing a quick recap in my mind, Jet Force Gemini probably had the worst first hour out of all their releases on the system. I also really can't see how the game could recover from this considering so much of the fault lies on the below-average gameplay. The story may become a classic and the soundtrack might keep kicking along, but if the gameplay sucks, well, you can't really do much. Here's to the alien blood splattering run-and-gun action adventure that was not to be.