Super Fighter Team’s first “modern-classic” put the developer on the map, molding a Chinese-developed Genesis game into a reworked and more polished RPG players could tackle in the U.S. or in PAL territories.  1996’s Xin Qigai Wangzi was given an English facelift by SFT in 2006, resulting in the first commercial Genesis game since 1998 – Beggar Prince.

Given the original title translates to The New Prince and the Pauper, it should come as no surprise Beggar Prince borrows its initial premise from the classic Mark Twain work.  Bored with the confines of the castle, the Prince of Shatt sneaks out of the castle and meets a pauper who uncannily resembles him.  Predictably, the two trade places but unbeknownst to the kingdom, the minister has been plotting to overthrow the king and upon witnessing the switch, throws his plan into action.

Seeing as the title is on the Genesis format, even though Prince is a 2006 release, players can’t walk into the game with a 2006 mentality.  That being said, Beggar Princes looks amazing compared to other games on the system, with a ton of detail placed in the environments and while the character models are small, they feature a lot of color, and the spell effects receive the same appropriate attention.  The sound drags down the presentation quite a bit, however, as most of the music is forgettable but the effects do their job.

Thankfully, the developers squashed a great number of the bugs plaguing the original Eastern release, but the title’s extremely challenging game play may make or break the title for players.  In Eastern RPG fashion, the enemy encounters are frequent and since players control no one more than the Prince the entire game, players will have a long quest ahead of them.  Also, unlike most turn-based RPGs, Prince has quite a bit more strategy involved thanks to the stamina system (which can be a good thing depending on how much you like to think).  While players will uncover a good amount of spells, weapons and items to use, the monsters are brutal if players don’t level up properly and the challenge may turn off a number of people.

Those who are looking for a challenging RPG will be right at home with Beggar Prince but the casual need not apply here.  If you’re willing to take the dive, however, you’ll find a visually appealing game that will last you quite some time.  The title is only available in nicely packaged limited quantities at superfighter.net and if production stops on the game, it may raise beyond its current $40 retail value.

GemuBaka Final Review Score: 3 of 5

It’s no secret that when it came to SEGA’s systems, the U.S. got boned on a ton of the company’s obscure and unique game titles. One of the company’s offerings that has a solid fanbase was the Rent A Hero franchise. It even, made an appearance in the wacky Fighters MegaMix for the Sega Saturn, but unlike the never-before-seen instances in a game such as Super Smash Bros., no attempt is ever made to explain Rent A Hero or garner fan interest in the series. Aside from guest appearances in character (Fighters MegaMix) and spirit (Samba de Amigo), the character did enjoy two full-featured game releases – Rent A Hero on the Megadrive and Rent-A-Hero No. 1 on the SEGA Dreamcast. On top of that, the Japanese Virtual Console has featured the Megadrive version since 2007. Back in 2004, it seemed like the Dreamcast version finally had a shot at a U.S. release via a release handled by Cool, which ported the title to the Japanese Xbox after SEGA collapsed as a hardware developer. It just wasn’t meant to be, though, meaning the only way for players to get their hands on the full Dreamcast title was through the means any red-blooded Dreamcast owner took part in – they imported the Japanese version.

If Rent A Hero was such a great title, wouldn’t more people have played it and wouldn’t SEGA have given it more of a chance to release in the U.S.? Why couldn’t Nintendo release the imported Rent A Hero on the Virtual Console? Well, most likely, it stems from the language barrier presented by the game. While most of what Americans get to see makes the title seem like a no-frills action title, Rent A Hero, is more of an adventure, requiring players to embark on fetch quests and investigation before they get to the meaty parts where they just rock the faces of injustice with cybernetic fists. Now don’t misunderstand this – the fetching and investigation do not go anywhere near the degree of that found in Shenmue, so don’t walk away just yet. Rent A Hero is more of an adventure-like RPG (in fact, the original Megadrive version used the Phantasy Star III graphics engine), where instead of participating in random turn-based battles, players engaged in hand-to-hand combat. With this, players will be talking to a lot of people, meaning there is a lot of dialog to translate, but the game’s inherent humor, somewhat to the degree of SeGaGaGa toward the end of the Dreamcast’s life, gives the title some legs to stand on and creates a unique, quirky identity to the title, which also allows it to poke fun at SEGA itself among other references.

While both versions of the game share a similar story, the Dreamcast version presents players with the opening premise: Taro is new to the neighborhood as his family has just moved in after his father receives a job in town. The game kicks off with Taro directly in the middle of a housewarming party, which involves the family’s neighbors, including a portly fellow who is eating the party’s food faster than Taro’s mother can prepare it. In a pinch, Taro’s father prompts him to order some takeout food and when he makes the phone call, a mysterious person claims Taro has won a promotion that discounts his dinner and throws in a free prize that is still in its testing stages. Anyone that understands the concept of foreshadowing should gather that when the package arrives, it ends up being the game’s trademark hero suit. At this point in time, in a desperate attempt to liven up the party, Taro’s father has donned a Godzilla-type costume and when he spots Taro fashioning his new super hero suit, he gloats and challenges Taro into a staged fight to entertain the guests. However, after Taro throws a light, playful jab, the power of the suit sends his father flying across the room, smashing him into the wall. From this point on, Taro realizes the suit isn’t just a toy and the events that unfold from here will shape him into a true hero if he can handle the responsibility.

While the story premise is fantastic and becomes much more involved while the player gets into the more serious missions, everything unfolds in text form, which means if you don’t understand Japanese, a good majority of the game’s content and charm will be entirely lost on you. Admittedly, I will say my Japanese is extremely far from fluent and there was a good bit of context I had to look up, meaning players may miss out on a few extras by not being able to read the questions there are being asked in a few of the game’s scenarios. However, this isn’t to say this a fault of a game developed in Japan, it’s just the standard U.S. player will most likely be turned away from the experience or become quite confused as to what they are supposed to do next and without a concept of dialog, players will miss out on the game’s humor and charm.

By accepting the responsibilities of the hero suit, Taro has now officially become the Rent A Hero and the game plays out appropriately based on the title of the game – along with the suit, the Service Café (or SECA to throw out an obvious reference) has delivered a SECA Creamcast (there’s two references) to Taro, which he uses to log onto an online interface to check for people looking to hire him for his services. As a rookie, though, he isn’t going to receive very many high-profile missions until he earns the trust of the city. This means players will get their feet wet handing out promotional pamphlets, delivering a love letter and delivering take-out food while maybe getting to take a few harmless punks until requests that ask you to protect deliveries or assist the police with criminal matters. The game follows a nice, logical progression with tasks that increase in difficulty as the game goes on and the earlier missions really allow for the player to get a grasp on the controls. Even without Japanese knowledge, the Creamcast interface is pretty straightforward and easy to use and players shouldn’t have any troubles launching any of the games missions. A lot of variety is involved with the missions as well and there are a chunk of optional missions that will provide Taro with cash, which become important when he becomes an official Rent A Hero and must pay a rental fee on the suit and purchase other items that will make him stronger.

The game’s controls are extremely straightforward and if you’re a seasoned SEGA connoisseur, the fighting engine will feel all too familiar to you. Players can do the basics such as initiate a single-button combo string, jump and block, but the variety in Taro’s moveset stems from a separate button that players hold down until a charge meter reaches the desired position for more powerful attacks – yes, this is the scheme used in Spikeout, a SEGA game that actually did release notably in the U.S in 2005 for the Xbox, even though low-key arcade versions of the title had been pumped out in the late ‘90s.

While the control scheme is simple, this also means there is very little variation in what Taro can do in a fight as any new techniques learned must be swapped out – you can only have one combo and a handful of charge specials at any given time. This will really turn away fighting enthusiasts who are now spoiled by Virtua Fighter-sized move lists and it doesn’t really help that the fighting mechanics are slightly broken. Rent-A-Hero No. 1 tries to balance out the heavy-hitting techniques a little by having them drain the battery of the hero suit, but when players get low, they can use their cash to purchase more batteries (which turns into a gratuitous plug for Sanyo). However, if you’re keen on exploring every inch of the fighting mechanics, these broken mechanics really work in your favor, providing some really ridiculous juggles and cheap repetition tactics with moves that require no battery usage. While I’m sure it was unintentional on the part of SEGA, the fighting can get a little crazy if you mix and match your moves correctly, but, otherwise, the enemy AI does tend to be a little on the lame side, merely charging in fist-first to try and land their predetermined combo on you before you can pull off a move. This makes sense when Taro is taking on a group of thugs, but it comes off as cheap AI when it’s mano-a-mano.

However, when you boil it down, each button does what it is supposed to do with great accuracy. There are a few hiccups in having to double-tap a direction to dash while in the middle of a fight and some camera angles do not put your fight in the greatest perspective, but, overall, the fights are well done for what players are given, which, admittedly isn’t much. Most of the fun in the game revolves around the campy humor and references the game throws around, which occur outside of the battles. The control scheme differs just a tad of difference while not in battle, but this mostly revolves around interacting with the environment and alternating between Taro and his Rent A Hero form. On paper, switching forms doesn’t sound like a big deal, but people in environment will react to you differently depending on which form you are in, giving you different dialog bits and sometimes the storyline calls for Taro to be in a specific form.

For the most part, players accept a mission, talk to the person hiring Taro, carry out whatever task they desire (which is most often ensuring the safe delivery or protection of something), rough up any goon that gets in your way and get paid. Even though the game does give players some freedom in deciding what to do and offers a number of different areas to explore (with other areas of city accessed by train), the title’s progress is extremely linear, but players will still be able to sink a handful of hours into it. The best way I can describe Rent-A-Hero, really, is that it is a short attention span Shenmue: There’s plenty of fighting to do, but you’ll have to do a fair share of footwork, fetch questing and conversation to get there. As I alluded to before, it’s not nearly as drawn out as it is in Shenmue, but anyone looking to try and get into this title should be aware that is equal parts adventure to the amount of action. This could really turn away a lot of players, most obviously because of the language barrier, but anyone that sticks with it will find it to be a fairly satisfying adventure.

I’ve often heard stories about Rent-A-Hero No. 1 being a low-budget title for SEGA and if this shows anywhere, it is definitely in the title’s animation and sound. While the graphics and character models are very typical of any SEGA release for the time, the animation is hardly on par with other titles on the system. Of course, the Dreamcast can do better than the graphics presented in Rent-A-Hero No. 1 and they are passable, but the animation is noticeably lacking during most of Taro’s actions, even in his general running animation. There is no voice acting in the entire game aside from some battle groans and grunts, so the game puts the characters through some ridiculously overexaggerated animations to convey the action of conversation. Players will also probably notice all sorts of clipping and pop-in quirks with the game as well. Although these do not tend to occur during fights, they add to the group of nagging elements that are extremely visible throughout the title.

The audio in Rent-A-Hero No. 1, however, has got to be the lowest point of the title. There is no voice acting to be had in any part of the game. While it is fairly understandable that with the expansive amounts of dialog featured in the game, the disc probably wouldn’t be able to contain full voice-overs, having important cutscenes and critical story points pop out with some voices could have taken the game a long way. Overall, the music is pretty uninspiring as well, save for the classic Rent-A-Hero theme that belts out after the first scenario (with the accompanying video providing references to the game’s Megadrive release). A lot of the sound effects are just as serviceable and get the job done, but more effects and some variation would have went a long way for the title. Most of the game’s audio gets the job done, but the real offender overall is in what is missing from the title – a little more in the elements of voice, music and sound could have went a long way here.

Even though this Dreamcast entry is essentially a remake of the original Megadrive version, it does take its own liberties, such as introducing Rent-A-Hiroko (your female “sidekick”), arranging the dialog to bring the references up to date (Ms. Naomi, for example), so if you have for some reason played the original title, there is a whole lot more to experience in this title. Rent-A-Hero No. 1 definitely carries the allure of a character U.S players could never get their hands on (unless you are an Xbox pirate with the scheduled domestic release that got canned; it was reviewed by a few outlets so there has to be some copies floating around somewhere) and it is one of the more quirky titles on the system, which makes it a relatively appealing game. The fetching and language barriers will probably be the biggest detractor for U.S. audiences, however, but with all of the guides available online, if you’re looking for a unique experience, Rent-A-Hero should fit the bill, even with all of its shortcomings.

GemuBaka Final Review Score: 3 of 5

While you’re going to have to know a decent amount of Japanese or have a guide by your side to fully understand Rent-A-Hero No. 1, the title is another example of SEGA of America hesitating to pull the trigger on a U.S. release of a quirky and original concept. That being said, the title does have its share of issues such as its barely serviceable visuals, lack of quality sound, severely broken and repetitive fighting mechanics and sometimes slow pacing. However, the story and dialog is a good bit entertaining and filled with references to SEGA and the title really banks on its humor and charm. Even though the fighting is broken, it does allow for some customization and those who tinker with it will be able to go to town with some impressive juggles. There is very little deviation from the linear game progression, but the wide variety of tasks and characters the player runs into – from your female counterpart to who eventually becomes your archnemesis – are interesting, even though there is no spoken dialog. This title is above average in every single way, but its not hard to see from its originality, quirky nature and inaccessibility in the U.S. why it has a cult following.

In the summer of 2004, CAPCOM’s Mega Man Anniversary Collection (MMAC) brought a tear to the eyes of many a gamer who reveled in the innovation and tight gameplay the Blue Bomber has brought to us since the earlier days of the NES.  Not only did the compilation give us all eight games in the original series, but it added a bunch of extras such as segments of the animated series, extra artwork and bonus games.  Now after much delay and speculation, the futuristic Mega Man X finds itself thrown into the collection treatment and the result is mediocre at best.

Originally, CAPCOM had no plans to release a collection based off the X series, but after much demand, we now have the first six Mega Man X games on one disc.  The rush to put the game on the market results in extremely bland menus to navigate - while it’s straightforward and quick to use, it lacks the substance and flash the interactive menus from MMAC featured.  There was so little emphasis put on the menus, it seems the programmers forgot to add 2006 to the title screen instead of 2005, based on the original November release date.

Yeah, that’s mighty critical of me, but why did I notice this you ask?  Because I sat staring at the title screen for about two minutes waiting for something to happen.  No special intro video, no clever teasers into the game, nothing, and that’s the premise of this disc.  Mega Man X Collection is nothing more than a collection - you get the six X games and pretty much nothing else.  While most of the X series can hang on its own, the lack of any sort of shiny, decorative wrapping paper serves up as a real bummer to the tried-and-true fans who will be expecting an entire world of extras.  Sure, you have the average-at-best, Rockman Battle and Chase, but aside from that, all you have is a bunch of artwork and no real incentives to unlock everything.

The emulation is handled extremely well as the X games have been shoveled over from the 16-bit and 32-bit originals in pixel-perfect form.  Even Mega Man X2's C4 chip was faithfully rendered in, providing the wire framing and rotation effects shown throughout the game.  As an added bonus, CAPCOM opted to go with the 32-bit version of X3, released at the advent of the Playstation and Saturn, which added anime cut scenes and cd-quality music to the series.  The sound is just as spot-on and the extra power in the current-generation systems essentially cuts out all the slowdown experienced in the cartridge versions of the game and load times are virtually non-existent.

Since the collection depends on the games themselves, the dilemma of whether or not Mega Man X Collection is worth thirty dollars arises.  At seven total games on the disc, after paying tax, the bottom line is you’re paying about five bucks a game, which isn’t half bad.  But on the same token it isn’t half good either as, much like the original Mega Man series, the longer the series drags on, the stinkier it gets.  The storylines become more and more incoherent as the series goes on and by X4, I swear the developers started getting robot master names by throwing darts at random pages in the dictionary - in fact, I hear Anorexic Anteater and Flammable Toaster just missed the cut in the series.  Having X-X6 on the same disc gives us the good (X, X2, X3), the alright (X4, X5) and the “wtf?” (X6).

CAPCOM patched up the nagging control issues of MMAC for the Nintendo Gamecube by switching the default jump and shoot controls to their natural order.  However, the options menus in the game will accommodate whatever control scheme you wish to implement.  The extra options, while they are commonplace in just about any game, really fix the major fault of the previous collection.  Being able to switch around the control scheme may come in handy as having the default jump, shoot and dash spread across three buttons on the same plane on the controller may provide to be a thumb-stretcher for some players.

Basically, what Mega Man X Collection comes down to is how much you enjoyed the X series.  The collection gives players a faithful re-creation of the original six games, but not much else.  It seems this disc was a means for CAPCOM to give yammering X fans a reason to quiet down, as not much effort was put into the collection aside from porting X’s first six adventures to the current-gen systems.  The addition of the Battle and Chase game adds a little charm to the title, but not enough to make it shine like Anniversary Collection did.  While X collection shows how great the series kicked off, it unfortunately also shows how stale the series has become.  Providing a mix of good and bad, Mega Man X Collection will serve the true X-heads and collectors alike, but casual gamers may find the absurd plot lines and progressively difficult game play a little detouring.

Gemubaka Final Review Score: 3 of 5

Arguably seen as the last console to give light guns a chance, the Dreamcast had its share of rail shooting titles that made use of the various console pistols that were available for it. A lot of these favors were due to the fact SEGA was riding on the final waves it had made in the ‘90s with Virtua Cop and The House of the Dead before the genre took a short fizzle while the world became enamored with first person shooters. For a time it seemed every other arcade effort from SEGA was a light gun rail shooter that used one of the two aforementioned games as a foundation and luckily for Dreamcast owners, a good chunk of these titles made it to the white-box underdog. Among the last batch of black-labeled releases SEGA pitched out to the system is perhaps the most obscure title to bank off the long-running Virtua Cop series – Confidential Mission. Dropping the goody-goody law enforcement gimmick for a sauve, hi-tech spy shtick, Confidential Mission strays from the path a bit, offering a shred of innovation that would make its way into other SEGA shooters even if, when you boil it down, players are basically still playing Virtua Cop.

As a SEGA shooter, Confidential Mission follows all of the same clichés and practically a carbon copy setup as any other game it has ever produced in the genre since Virtua Cop. We have a male and female character, which allows up to two players to blast and reload, all the while protecting the innocent as they track down bosses over three stages: Seriously, that describes nearly every light gun game SEGA has made since 1994, with most even falling in under the three stage department. Confidential Mission introduces yet another SEGA three-letter acronymed organization in the Confidential Mission Force (CMF), with players assuming the roles of Howard Gibson, the most blatant imitation of James Bond ever, and the deadly Jean Clifford. The duo’s latest mission has them tracking down a man known as Agares, who has hijacked a satellite that can nuke any global coordinate he chooses … sounds a bit like a certain movie from 1995 starring Pierce Brosnan that was later made into a legendary first-person shooter …

Typically for a SEGA arcade shooter, the story is just “there” and is never really explained in detail. The beginning of the game spells out the aforementioned scenario and players are immediately dropped into the first stage museum level to find information on Agares’ plans and whereabouts. The rest of the story is thrown out in bite-sized cutscenes that hardly flesh out any characters or plot and are filled with painfully cheesy one-liners.

Unlike many of the other arcade-to-home transfers, however, Confidential Mission actually gives players a lot to do, even if it is crammed into the confines of three arcade levels. Obviously, players can tackle the straight-up arcade port of the title, but two players can also test their trigger fingers with a partner mode, which paints enemies red or blue – only player one can kill red enemies while the blue enemies have to be downed by player two. Even though the mode may seem mild, it is a true test of teamwork and serves up a good challenge to players that think they have the game down. A single player can also visit the Agent Academy, which is filled with quick challenges that pit players against the clock. The mode throws out a variety of tasks that involve justice shots, protecting civilians, shooting in patterns and more. If players can clear out 18 challenges, a much-more challenging “another world” mode opens, which remixes the positioning of the arcade mode elements, while adding in more enemies and civilians at random positions and even adding in a few more scenes exclusive to the mode. On top of that, clearing out the remixed mode adds super-difficult challenges to the academy and dedicated players will unlock various other features such as the ability to disable all HUD information and toggling other game settings. Compared to other rail shooters by SEGA, the new modes actually change up the gameplay experience and while the offerings don’t jam the disc full of content, there is a deceptive amount of items to toy with here given the genre and ported-over origin of the title.

Visually, Confidential Mission is nothing to write home about; the graphics do their job, but nothing more to wow the player. While the title brings the arcade straight into the home, looking at other titles in the Dreamcast library, it’s easy to see the system isn’t being put to its full use with Confidential Mission. The environments measure up well for the most part, with notable segments such as the museum’s evolution and Egyptian exhibits, but the characters are just an eyesore to look at, most specifically when you can see their face. The faces remind me of the static slapped-on scans of the Nintendo 64 era and the fact that there is no animation for the characters’ faces when they talk just looks petty when even a game like Ready 2 Rumble could muster up some respectable facial animation. Most of the characters’ movement animations look off as well, most notably whenever one dives, rolls or jumps – it comes off as slow and floaty like they are fresh off the original Virtua Fighter roster (well, okay, it’s not quite that bad). Nearly everything in Confidential Mission looks awkward and fails to utilize the Dreamcast’s power, but given SEGA’s rail shooter track record, the graphics in these games have done little to evolve since the ‘90s. You do get a few slightly impressive rendered scenes and everything does its job, but when a player views an in-game object up close, it’s a potentially cringe-inducing experience that will remind some of their Nintendo 64 days.

As generic as Confidential Mission’s audio is, I would have to say the title has what I would consider among the best sound offered a home SEGA light gun shooter up to its release. That’s not really saying the sound is superb, but I’ll take a mediocre performance over wishing I didn’t have eardrums any day. When you talk about sound in a SEGA game, the biggest bull’s eye to shoot negativity at is always the voice acting, but Confidential Mission nails a solid performance in a handful of areas. Unfortunately for anyone, one of these areas wasn’t the main characters as they feature the most uninspired, wooden performances that lack proper timing since The House of the Dead 2. What actually steals the show in this title are the vocals of the first boss and Agares, which is not to say they qualify for an award, but finding respectable voice acting in a SEGA arcade game is like finding a needle in a mountain of hay. You also get some quality civilian screaming and baddie death grunts along with the constant barrage of your firearm firing and reloading. A lot of the music sounds like it would have been better placed in Virtua Cop, with its funky movie detective/cop-type feel, but it is still easy on the ears even though it commonly gets lost in the action. Unfortunately, just like its graphics, Confidential Mission’s sound is about as average as it gets, leaving players knowing their Dreamcast is capable of much more.

Thankfully, though, this is where things start to get better for Confidential Mission – in short bursts, it’s just plain fun to play. The title makes no effort to hide its Virtua Cop origins, as Confidential Mission features pop-out enemies that target the player with a reticule that blends from green to red as they lock on and prepare to pull the trigger. Similar to just about any game ever released in the genre, players remedy these villains by aiming and firing and reloading when necessary. To enjoy the game properly, players will have to invest in a light gun, but players can also man a standard controller or even the Dreamcast mouse. While the light gun gives the player the most freedom of movement and emulates the aim of the game more appropriately, cursor speed settings still make the use of a controller bearable and, perhaps, button mapping the reload function as opposed to shooting offscreen may make things even easier for the player. Then again, if your light gun has an auto-reload feature, you’ll still get the upper hand there, but the point is, no matter how you control Confidential Mission, there is enough options available to make it playable and through proper calibration, the light gun never fails to please. You fire at the screen to dispatch enemies or off it to reload, so, rest assured, no one will have issues with the controls.

Just like in Virtua Cop, Confidential Mission is measured in its mindless reaction shooting, but, thankfully, there are a handful of additions that elevate the title beyond a mere carbon copy. The most obvious addition is in the quicktime challenges that affect the flow of the level’s gameplay. These challenges often get to show off the spies’ gadgetry to remind us we’re playing a James Bond-esque shooter and offer up a satisfying variety of tasks – players try to use adhesive bullets to plug up a poisonous gas vent, a grappling hook is used to cross buildings and more. While players always end up at the same location, passing or failing these events determines how they get there and, often times, failing results in a bit of an extra fight against more enemies. These events break up the twitch shooting nicely and have proven to be such a welcome addition that SEGA still uses the mechanic in its newest games such as Ghost Squad and Rambo.

Confidential Mission also throws in a bit more item hunting than some of its SEGA-spawned brethren, giving players a lot of incentive to shoot even the things that don’t move. While these points and their resulting rankings were more suited for the arcade’s Internet ranking mode, there are a lot of goodies that can yield extra firepower and health tucked away in the game as well. The title also has two endings to see, depending on your performance at the end, but most of your time is going to be spent in the Dreamcast exclusive modes that really mix the gameplay up a bit. There are some challenging, lofty goals to aim for in order to uncover the game’s extras, but while the replayability hangs up there a bit, this is definitely a title players will tackle one gameplay at a time instead of spending hours on end on the light gun. In that regard, however, a blast through the game’s main mode will only hold a player over for about half an hour, but that makes it perfect for a pick-up-and-play title for one or two players.

The spy skin gives Confidential Mission a bit of a fresh spin even though it is basically a blatant mash of Virtua Cop’s gameplay with 007 Goldeneye’s plot premise, but the sauve attitude and hi-tech gadgetry is what makes the game appealing, moreso than the endless army/zombie/police shooting games in arcades. Even though Confidential Mission does a lot of borrowing, there are some great gameplay moments such as sliding through a tube while fighting off turrets, fighting while undercover as a chef or attendant and blowing away snowmobiles from the top of a moving train. The game is a cliché to end all clichés, but in quick bursts, anyone who enjoys rail shooters won’t regret a bit of time spent with Confidential Mission.

GemuBaka Final Review Score:  3 of 5

Confidential Mission is yet another arcade to Dreamcast port that fails to use the power of the system, but, still ultimately delivers with potential fun and a few genre innovations that have stuck with today’s SEGA shooters. The graphics border on polished 64-bit quality and the sound is forgettable even if its decent by SEGA rail shooter standards, but the gameplay gives players a quick burst of pure arcade goodness and the Dreamcast exclusive modes will give players a reason to come back every now and again. By no means is Confidential Mission among the greatest titles on the Dreamcast, but along with The House of the Dead 2, arcade fans will have enough on their hands to get nostalgic over a time when games came to the console from arcades instead of the other way around.

Thinking back to 2001, I recall the two final brand new Dreamcast titles I bought from retail were Confidential Mission, and this downright bizarre point-and-click adventure game from Xilam. It wasn’t by chance, really, as if you were a child of the late ‘90s, you may per chance recall a very obscure Saturday morning cartoon renamed for the U.S. audiences as Space Goofs (Some of our foreign readers may also have known the series as Home to Rent, depending on your territory). While the series quickly went nowhere, much like other shows of that nature, it definitely has its cult-like status among people from that time looking for some nostalgia. It was a strange and crazy animation birthed out of France in 1996, so it made perfect sense that when the game was announced out of nowhere, Ubisoft would be bringing the U.S. this late Dreamcast title under the series’ original name.

The title, which was also developed for PC, served as a sort of United States “conclusion” to the series, which in 2001, came two years after the series stopped airing. The premise of the game sets up the introduction of the series as a whole – a group of five aliens are vacationing in space, when a collision with an asteroid sends their spacecraft crashing into Earth. Conveniently, they crash land right next to an empty home for rent (hence, the U.K. title) and take to occupying the abode until they can figure out how to get back into space. What is thought to be a simple process of repairing a spaceship turns into several years where the aliens remain out the sight of humans, while chasing away potential buyers of the house. The game kicks off just as the genius alien Etno finally pieces together a means to return home, but at the same time, a mysterious evil doctor pinpoints these alien life forms and sends a bounty hunter out for their heads and technology.

Stupid Invaders only offers up the single-player adventure, but this alone will keep players wrapped up for a number of hours. The game’s story elements are ripped straight from the animated series and judging from the dialog and gags thrown, it is evident the developers stuck as close to the series’ original material as possible. Given the lapse in time and the media the game appears on, the game goes a little bit further in fields of raunchiness and maturity than the Saturday morning cartoon and on most fronts, the game does succeed on being funny. The player gets to experience a number of viewpoints as the title switches control between the five aliens, switching up the main character personalities and material to keep the story elements fresh. Even though there is a lack of modes in the game, Xilam packed everything it had into the adventure and it explodes with Stupid Invaders charm.

Contrary to the cartoon, everything in the Stupid Invaders game has been rendered in 3D, however, the graphics sport a heavily-inked look with an emphasis on colors to resemble a typical animation. In 2001, the title didn’t have to fight amongst a crowd of other point-and-click titles as the genre was all but dead, especially to consoles at that time, making Stupid Invaders one of the most detailed adventure games seen for its time. Everything from the characters to the environments look great and animate well, aside from a few hiccups here and there as players navigate through environments and approach certain items. The in-game text and action icons don’t exactly have the same pop and are rather small in size, but, overall, the graphics are a treat for those who appreciate animation.

Thanks in part to the cartoon voice actors reprising their roles in the game, the sound in the game stays true to the source. The rest of the cast is slouch, though, as every character confronted in the title is voiced appropriately, which really makes the interactive segments of the game enjoyable. Outside of voice acting, though, the sounds and music are appropriate to the environment and there a number of areas where the ambient nature of environment is given favor over music, emphasizing the surreal nature of the situations. Through some of the scene changes, there can be an awkward pause in the music or sound effects, but, overall, the audio in Stupid Invaders really sets the tone of the title.

Gameplay and control-wise, there is not much to really explain about Stupid Invaders. Just like any other point-and-click adventure ever created, players use onscreen cursors to navigate characters and manipulate the environment and progress is made by using collected items in the environments or conversing with other characters. Stupid Invaders keeps things simple by limited players to just examing or grabbing items and the inventory allows for some items to be combined. The results leave players with a simple command scheme that is easy to understand due to the different icons used.

Although Stupid Invaders revolves around puzzle solving per the nature of its genre, it does serve as a suitable challenge, mostly due to the obscene amount of ways players can die. There are a number of bizarre ways to perish in the title, making players load their previous save back up. Admittedly, a number of these animations are quite humorous, but when players repeat the same death over and over without any inclination of what they are doing wrong, it can become a tad frustrating. Some of the item interactions can be a little nonsensical at times as well and most of the time it isn’t obvious what players are supposed to do until they die in a trial and error process. Regardless, Stupid Invaders is a suitable challenge for anyone looking for more in the adventure genre and the humorous nature of the title makes the challenge a little easier to swallow.

Given the title only features a single-player story to run through, there is virtually no reason to go back to the title once the player has finished the title. Some may want to experience new dialogs, experiment with different death animations or do a speed run, but it’s hard to believe most players will come back for more. The story is good enough to make players see through to the end and maybe come back after a couple of years has rolled by, but the first playthrough will take up only around four to six hours and if you use a walkthrough, you severely hurt the game’s longetivity as players that know exactly what to do can brush through the title in about an hour.

With the recent resurgence of adventure titles hitting the market, Stupid Invaders is a good title to come back to, especially if you are a Dreamcast fan. It is quirky, stuffed with humor and is a good throwback if the words Space Goofs mean anything to you. The wide span of characters is wholly entertaining, even though there are a few sections where the point of view is needlessly switched for an extremely short time and the presentation definitely makes the cast stand out.

GemuBaka Final Review Score: 3 of 5

If you’re a sucker for challenging adventure games with amusing death animations, there’s no competition on the Dreamcast. Stupid Invaders cleverly leaves of from where the decade-old Space Goofs cartoon series left U.S. viewers and cranks it up a notch with a bit more crudeness, all delivered with superb presentation. The game does get hung up with virtually no replayability, some of the puzzles lack logic and frequent deaths may frustrate players but there’s nothing like else like Stupid Invaders on the Dreamcast and it’s a one-of-a-kind experience.