Blue Stinger Review

After a spectacular opening scene, (which is FMV but looks no better than the real-time cut scenes - presumably they made the choice to use FMV to load different scenes quickly), you're familiar with your situation. Eliot Ballade is the guy in blue clothing you've probably seen screenshots of before, and is a rescuer from ESER Especial Sea Rescue. But he's just as confused and lost as those he's supposed to be rescuing. His ship sunk in a meteorite catastrophe, and the angelic Nephilim character - the flying, glowing white creature - is left to resuscitate him.

You quickly meet up with Dogs Bower, a slightly less friendly character but whose guidance on the island, supposedly, is needed. The two of them later come face-to-face with their new colleague, Janeane King, a bird with a nice arse. The scene is set for some awesome adventure-RPG action.

You control either Eliot or Dogs, and pick up new weapons as you go along. Dogs can use some weapons that Eliot cannot, and vice-versa. Similarly, Eliot has strengths that Dogs hasn't, like being able to swim. Dogs can defend himself by guarding, Eliot can get down to business with some nifty close-quarters combat - as a team they work quite well, although thus far I've found Eliot my character of choice. A quick rundown of the main characters:

Eliot G. Ballade

Eliot is from ESER: Especial Sea Rescue, and is your typical action man hero-type. He fancies Janeane (and Nephilim) and excels on-foot, underwater and in in close-quarters combat. A pretty well thought-out character.

Dogs Bower

Initially not as 'amiable' as Eliot, Dogs is a deep-voiced, harsh-speaking character. He has a 'rough 'n' ready' appearance, but opts out when it comes to fighting, preferring to just guard against attack or use weapons. Dogs knows Dinosaur Island better than Eliot, so they're both needed in the mission.

Janeane King

An attractive girl who instantly captures Eliot's imagination. She has a particularly well-rendered arse (how many polygons did they use for that?) and she basically sits in the 'brain' control center of the island, while you're out looking for a passcode. Just remember, she's your sweetheart...

Nephilim

An angelic, enigmatic creature. Despite being revealed in the opening scenes and following your character around throughout the game, she remains a mysterious character. Based on a 'limited edition' of the angel-in-a-bottle collection, Nephilim proves that angels can have nice arses too, as well as nice lighting effects.

When you kill the mutated monsters that inhabit the many levels, and after their limbs have rolled off, spouting blood everywhere, they throw out money which you then collect. The money can be used to buy ammo or health, or other freebies with inventive uses, from vending machines which are plentiful in quantity.
The other rudiments of the gameplay are finding keys, passcards and codes in order to gain access to new areas, with some 'hotspot' areas having to be frequented. The levels themselves are great: average-sized but with jaw-dropping levels of detail, and well-thought out constructions.

Baddies are often tactically positioned, meaning you actually have to think about what you're doing sometimes. For example, there's a bit where you can go into killer-fish-infested water, and you can kill the fish, after a lot of effort. This lets you swim into the next area, giving access to a footbridge containing some power-ups. The footbridge leads back to the first area, except now you're dry. But the fish are alive again. It wasn't until later that I realised you have to find the key to a fishing shop / pier, which gives you access to some fish killer, that the whole puzzle became easier. Without it, it's catch-twenty-two.

What is really good about the game is the way that different outcomes arise and affect how the game pans out. For example, there's a freezer section where you have to do things quickly or else freeze to death. It quickly becomes apparent that you have control over the temperature of the level. Turn the heating on, and the ice melts. This causes water to fill up in another part of the same level, meaning you go for a swim and eventually do battle with a huge bull-like creature.

However, turn the temperature to a more comfortable room-level, and there's no water at all in that section, the ice is still there, you walk to where the bull is, only to find him frozen and pretty static. You can still p[ass the section without killing him, by shifting a few objects and using your head.

Other neat touches, like on the Hell(o) Market, having to collect a series of Pen Pen Triicelon-endorsed stamps before gaining access to the elevator, and thus more goodies. It's all very impressive, but nothing revolutionary.
What makes this pretty close to said status, though, is the graphical quality of the areas and rooms you explore. Some parts are out in the open, and there's one part near the beginning of the game that stands out: you run across a massive bridge and the camera zooms out to show the entire thing. Then there's the indoor rooms, of which several stand out as being jaw-dropping.

In the Market area there's a Staff Room, with an awesome level of detail inside. A photocopier, cupboards, desks, chairs, papers everywhere and a bloke laying on the floor (he'll be dead, dying or alive, depending on how you did (or are doing) in a time-challenge to find him some medicine). It's a small room as well, and so the density of detail is also excellent.

Another impressive room is Rat's Place, the local bar. It looks like a real public house, with nice lighting, plants and booze everywhere. There's also a snooker table that covers a trapdoor, which in turn leads to another impressive room. These rooms are complemented further in terms of graphics, because the whole engine is pretty nifty:

A solid frame rate and high resolution is expected, and the lighting in the game is phenomenal. The shadows are some of the best I've ever seen. You can walk down an eerily-lit corridor with crates, boxes, overturned chairs and paper scattered everywhere, and your shadow maps the floor, walls and objects in a near-perfect manner with little or no break-up at all. Very impressive.

There are some rather lame bits though. The very first playable scene is below-average in terms of graphics. The water ripples with a low frame rate as in Sonic Adventure, and that looks crap. And yet, later in the game, the water looks great, complete with impressive splashes, ripples and spray. It's probably quite fair to generalise that the graphical quality improves a lot as you progress, and you will be impressed if you're not to begin with.

There is a lot of animation in there, most of it is pretty good, but it would have been nice to see REAL 128 bit power and some realtime-generated animation, or something. Anything a bit more innovative, would have been nice. But you can't really complain with what's on offer. Sometimes your character runs a bit too slow and things get slightly frustrating, but the techniques were designed for the smaller, explore-'em-up areas rather than the big, open areas, and it's probably assumed that you won't be in those very often.

The cut-scenes and overall level of presentation is very high, and it helps the game's to progress. Some of the voice acting is cheesy, but it doesn't really matter. The sound is good, the music is great, and the whole game has a rather cinematic and orchestral feel to it, in terms of look and sound respectively.

Even if you don't thrive on adventure, you'll be happy with the large quantities of impressive weapons on offer, and take pleasure in blasting, burning and exploding the crap out of the many monsters and bosses in the game. It's a good balance overall.

What about the all-important lastability? I've been playing for many hours and haven't got half-way through yet. More accomplished gamers will probably see the game through in two or three days of solid play, whereas mere 'reasonable' players will have a veritable challenge-fest of a game here. It's probably quite similar to Panzer Dragoon Saga in terms of lastability, although I can't see any motives for playing through again after completion, other than to see and experience the awesomeness once again. Then again, I many be wrong.

So is it really THAT good, is it worth buying on import, what? If you're an adventure fan, and you liked games like Tomb Raider and Panzer Saga, then buy this now. The adventure and exploration elements ARE hardcore, and the later stages are giving my Grandia-conquering-accomplices headaches as we speak.

If you're very impatient, and prefer immediate arcade thrills, then try before you buy, and there's every chance you'll be turned on by Blue Stinger's sheer charm and atmosphere. Nobody hated PDS, even if they only liked the story, characters, plot and presentation. Blue Stinger works in a similarly effective way, and is a definite adventure hit for Dreamcast.