The 3DO Experience

The 3do interactive multiplayer was first released in October 1993 and I still remember walking into my local Babbage's and seeing it on the shelf. I had read about it in the gaming magazines of the time. The new 32-bit monstrosity that would bring home photorealistic images. graphics like nothing you've ever seen before I walked up and saw its price seven hundred US dollars. This bought you the system, a controller, the game crashes and burns, and a couple of demo discs. I wanted one so bad, but I just did it. Since I didn't have that kind of money lying around, I decided at that moment that I would set up a savings plan to get my own 3rd and that's how my

experience

began.

Those early days of having a 3rd hadn't been the best games in the world. The first few months were a trickle and the quality was all over the place, but this was basically the baby steps of what we were about to see with the arcade ports of Sony PlayStation and Sega Saturn polygon racing games that looked great on full motion video games that absolutely sucked at everything the Sega CD and turbo CD had been capable of, in fact the demo discs that came with the system were what I used the most to show off the hardware to my friends thanks to some gameplay demos and an absolutely incredible cutscene. from Batman the Animated Series, the quality of this video in 1993 on a game console was unprecedented.

My game library started like most people who jumped in early. We were all aware of the incredible combat racing classic Crash and Burn and of course I am. completely filled with this game absolutely sucked, the gameplay was terrible and there wasn't much to do to get you excited, but oh my god, did it look cool at the time? The texture mapped polygons were worth almost no drawing and made the rollercoaster style track layouts quite A beautiful thing to behold, the game was like a car version of Road Rash where you had to fight with other racers to get to the line. meta, you could grab weapons while running and your car was so damaged when you grabbed it that it was visual.

It was nice enough that you could put up with it for a while, but there were bigger and better things on the horizon for 3do owners. One of my next games was Total Eclipse, a 3D shooter that looks spectacular. I mean, arcade games had started using polygons. this time around quite often and having a game like this in your house was amazing, unlike the crash and burn total eclipses it actually played half decent too although it was quite difficult in the later stages it's mostly just senselessly shoot at whatever is in front of you. but there are also internal stages in which it is necessary to navigate properly.

The music is absolutely epic, consisting mainly of hard rock tracks that pair well with its fast gameplay. It's kind of a polygonal version of Galaxy Force. And one of the first games you must have. For hardware, another early game was Offworld Interceptor, a vehicular combat-style adventure that was fast-paced and easy to play in those early days. I actually enjoyed it for a few weeks, especially since there wasn't much else to play, it was a really choppy game. Although you had your eyes on hell while playing it, it reflected the total eclipse a lot, but this time on land it may have even used the same engine.

The 3rd was also my first

experience

with Alone in the Dark, the precursor to the Resident Evil-style adventure. The game's polygonal characters against 2D backgrounds were incredibly effective here, and I scared the shit out of myself many nights while trying to beat it. It was a really creepy game that was quite difficult to control and added an intensity to each encounter that I can't. I'll tell you how many times I played in that opening room trying to find ways to avoid the conflict within it. It was amazing the different things you could do to avoid fighting.

Many council kids experienced this type of game for the first time with Resident Evil, while 3D owners would. A year earlier, it was the release of Road Rash in early 1994 that changed everything, although it was a complete package of visual, sound and musical gameplay, an attitude that the 3do needed, it was also one of the first games that had a link direct with the previous one. generation of systems that showed the enormous difference in power that the 3do had over its 16-bit rivals. It was essentially a motorcycle racing game with combat and RPG elements where money invited better bikes, forged relationships with your competitors, and beat everyone else on the track.

While the early stages were very easy, the last level is incredibly difficult and warrants many plays before you are good enough to truly challenge it. The licensed music fits the atmosphere like a glove and even the weird, over-the-top art style somehow works perfectly, it's one of the best. Games from that year and one of my favorite games of all time, like 1994, would wear off in the 3rd and start seeing numerous high quality game releases. EA had really hit the nail on the head with road rash, but then the need for speed arose. It was a tour de force of visual splendor upon release and you could only get it in 3rd at the time, exotic sports cars made up the list of dream machines for you to choose from and the gameplay was a mix of arcade and simulation enough to keep a Solid fun factor.

The races were rally type, meaning you had no laps and instead went from point A to point B. There was also a bad Dai opponent who talked trash to help motivate you to win. It was the masterpiece of the system that made all hardware owners proud and was available on 3rd almost two years before the Saturn and PlayStation versions appeared. GEX also appeared in 1994, finally giving the brand its own mascot, the constant prankster and wisecracking lizard, he appeared in their standard 2D platform adventure and the gorgeously colored in detailed world 2 looked incredible, the animations were top notch and Gex's ability to climb ceilings and walls gave the game variety beyond simply jumping over enemies' heads, there were hidden areas in each stage and you needed to find the TV remotes to move on to new worlds, each map had as a theme a popular movie genre and the challenge was up there with the best once 3do died and disappeared.

Gex became a cross-platform game for PlayStation and Saturn, just as good as the games they started with. to get on a 3do, it was the port of Super Street Fighter 2 turbo that finally sparked interest, the price of hardware had dropped significantly at that time and, although Super Street Fighter 2 turbo on the 3do wasn't arcade perfect, it was until now. ahead of any other console port of the game, it felt as close to being as visually beautiful as the game was, it was actually the CD soundtrack that really made it stand out, the music in this one was the best, the original.

In my opinion, games once played and you could easily hear them outside of the game. The only real problem was that the system's default controller only had three buttons, which meant there was a lot of tweaking to be done to get a lot of luck for the more adventurous. Among Us Capcom released their soldier platform Hori released their own 6 button variant and there was even an arcade stick available. This game is one of my best memories for the system and my friends and I played it a ton, you win the full move. The video genre had a huge impact on 3do, particularly its visual presentation.

The 3do z's expanded color capabilities meant that these games looked significantly better than on other consoles, which in turn made the genre a little more palatable to me. I remember the first time I saw his night trap port, which blew me away at the time, it still played the same of course, but it looked so much better, you couldn't help but admire it. Dragon's Lair was a look or two now much closer to the laserdisc arcade version there were some other Sega CD staples in the 3rd including that timeless classic sewer shark that had you destroying radioactive rats while some yelled at you all time, body killer, light gun slash, not like a shooter game with the guy I fell asleep at the Seinfeld Olympics and Star Wars Rebel Assault, a not too terrible game that made you train to Be a rebel fighter and face the Empire.

It even had its own exclusive full-motion video games that were often much more adult-oriented than anything else. Sega had even allowed some nudity and swearing, it wasn't until I played horror theme D that my appreciation for the full motion video genre became more than just a few passing laughs, this one really let you explore and gave you puzzles. to resolve. and the story was light years away from the silliness seen in other games of its type, it set out to be a serious thriller and in that it succeeded, the 3do was also one of the first consoles to truly embrace the first person shooter genre.

One of the first experiences I had was with Escape from Monster Manor, a 3D Wolfenstein-type game that took place in a mansion full of monsters that you were desperately trying to escape from. It wasn't triple-A stuff, but the fairly fluid gameplay worked well and the explorable environments and boss fights made for a great initial experience. It even got an amazing 3D version of Wolfenstein complete with a really solid technical presentation. They looked and worked as well as could have been expected and really made the hardware stand out. Is one of the best. Unfortunately, the versions of the game from that era look a lot like the Saturn port of Doom 2, the 3rd was a tragic software disaster, although it looked fine when the screen was absolutely still, everything goes to hell when you try to move if you thought about Saturn.

The version was bad, this one will leave you in disbelief, even the screen is small, it works like a complete idiot. The poor software engineer who got the shaft on this project probably did the best he could, but the end result really screwed consumers out of their hard-earned money. It was a completely wasted opportunity to bring this game home and turn it into something special. Sports games would see a huge improvement in 3D over what we had seen in games like the Super Nintendo on the Genesis. I was already a fan of the Madden games and 3do put out a version of that that was at least closer to an actual NFL broadcast, it lacked the players license though something that really bothered me at the time, even though it had the names team officials, it just wasn't the same.

I came back for a move as number eight in place of Steve Young. Fortunately, the PlayBook and AI were halfway decent, making this a great way to experience the sport. The golf genre was packed in the 3rd. EA's PGA Tour 96 was excellent and really gave you some really impressive environments to play in. I loved the gameplay. An intuitive interface here, but my goodness, the down times were terrible. There was 5 to 10 seconds of loading between each hit, which made a short game almost impossible, even soccer was strong with FIFA. International football now runs on a 3D playing field with 2D sprites.

It was a huge visual step up from what came before. It was one of the first times I was able to sit down and play a game of football and have fun, and that's saying something considering I hated this sport as a kid, as you'd expect, the 3rd has a few games in other regions that were worth checking out: The 3do sold well in Japan and some other Asian regions despite its high price, attracting third parties there to take advantage of it. This would be the first platform I saw Policenauts on in the classic Konami adventure that was similar to Snatcher.

I really wanted to play it despite the Japanese language barrier and I credit it for being the starting point of my obsession with finally playing it. English years later, I still pull it out from time to time to watch the introduction which, believe it or not, is completely in English. There is also the 2D fighter, the eye of the typhoon. This Street Fighter knockoff features your usual suspects fighting one-on-one battles until only One remains. The screen movement is choppy and the animation leaves a little to be desired, but it's not a terrible game by any means.

It doesn't really look better than a 16-bit effort, but it was still nice to see something that was. Although it is no longer available on other systems, it reminds you of one of the first Neo Geo fighters. I also chose Battle Pinball, a two-player game that actually allows you and a friend to play against each other. Certain scores and bonuses made it more difficult for the other player to keep the ball in play, such asshorten it like fins or create distractions on the board, it was a pretty weak game visually, but it didn't play that badly, it even had a one on one YuYu Hakusho fighting game.

I loved the cinemas. which connects the fights by telling the story of your team and the enemies they faced, the arena you fought in has a sort of 3D feel as you fought back and forth and zooms in and out Samurai Shodown style as you you put some distance between you and your opponent. I had difficulty with the AI ​​in this one, I never understood how it played, some of the later fighters just decimated me over and over again, but I still had some fun, of course there are many more. games in the 3do library that I want to review, so here are some other standouts that I really enjoyed or that made a big impression on me When 3do was released, NeoGeo was still in its completely mythical form as an arcade platformer with a cost that did. untouchable for my poor ass so when Samurai Shodown came home with the 3rd I instantly picked it up and played it to death, it was the arcade version at home and the kind of software you brag about to your friends of course, Over time you would have more experience.

It made me realize that while visually it was definitely closer to the arcade than any other console at the time, it was still cropped in numerous places, making it not the perfect adaptation I had been convinced of for years. before, it was cut to animation frames and the screen scrolling was quite choppy, still, this is still a very playable version of this game and I have great memories. I still remember when I picked up Star Control 2 for the first time. I had never played anything like this. I had no idea what. I was doing it and I hated it with a passion that I put it aside for months and didn't touch it until one night I spent some time reading the instruction manual and it became pretty clear that this was something I should have done the first day because a Once you put a little effort into this, it actually becomes a moment.

Consuming an epic that swallows your life, you need to gather resources, explore, fight and spend time listening to the new species you come into contact with, some will forge alliances with you while others will simply want to destroy you. There are hours of history here that are really interesting. doesn't make things easier for you, nor should you be prepared to explore and be destroyed numerous times before gathering enough to delve deeper into the game. The technical presentation here belies the richness of the game it contains. If you like substance over style, this is a game you should play.

The out-of-this-world death simulator is now released in 3do with some seriously slick graphical upgrades compared to the 16-bit versions that preceded it. You know it well. You are shot through time and space to another world where almost everything is trying to kill you. I need to run, shoot and solve some puzzles to survive. Good game, but not for those who get nervous easily. The 3rd was the first place I would play. Return fire to a marksman from above who had you in command of different attack vehicles in an attempt to capture your enemies and tag him back to your base.

The game takes some getting used to here, but it looks and sounds great. Performance does get a little choppy in some areas, but slower gameplay rarely suffers. There was an expansion that was released shortly after called. death maps that added a lot more to think of it as a sort of desert raid game with less story and more action. There are people who love Primal Rage, but I'm not one of them. I can tell you that the 3do version is one of the best looking and sounding versions of its time, however, if you are a fan of this game, 3do takes 1, it was pretty impressive in its day.

God, I wanted BC's running backs to be good in the 3rd. I mean, it was a much weaker hardware port, so surely this runs at 60 frames per second, well, surely not, and this was a big disappointment back then, everything else is fine, the graphics are colorful, They added story cinemas and the music is there, but it just works so poorly that the game really requires a hammer, it's not as broken as something like Doom, but it should definitely be a lot better than what it ended up being on a next-gen device. $700 32 bit. The actual pinball was a Nokia scheme that had some decent stuff. looking for boards and completely ball physics, you must have your ball physics writer, you are going to have a hard time.

This one is still notable in my 3do history because one night it pissed me off so much that I threw away the controller that was connected to a second controller. through the chain setup of the 3d O, when I threw the first pad across the room, the second pad whipped around behind it and hit me in the back of the head. I destroyed them both that night with my trusty hammer. Oh, doom, and they rest peacefully buried in the backyard of my old house, seeing Star Blade in the games room back in the day was something truly special.

The massive cabinet had an incredible speaker setup and a huge screen that really immersed you in its 3D visuals. The 3do version here was almost as impressive and for a while. At first the Rails shooter was close to perfection, it was very short but challenging and you had to love the super awesome graphics that gave you the option of the original polygons with flash or a new texture mapped mode, it's tame for the current standards, but it was an evolutionary step. of polygon development that showed a glimpse of the true future of gaming, it also decimated Sega's CD version that was released around the same time.

Lucien's Quest was your typical micro-cab old-school Japanese RPG, the guys who gave it to Saturno Mysterio fans. the story is pretty weak here, focusing on characters who don't really take things seriously, and nothing seems as important as your group having fun while others suffer around them. The battle system is also strange and takes place on an isometric playing field. where trees and bushes really need to be destroyed to get to your enemies, scrolling is also choppy, given the impression that the game runs poorly overall, it's not terrible and of the few RPGs on the system it's pretty much your only one. option if you like this style of adventure, it was ported to the Japanese Sega Saturn, its sword and sorcery soccer guy is one of my most hated games on the 3do platform, it doesn't look better than a Super Nintendo or Genesis game and Stiff, unintuitive gameplay is lightweight. years behind the games that came out before I hate their main hero - this ever smiling red shirt has everything under the sun trying to kill him and the best he can muster like a soccer ball to defend himself, you might be wondering why I'm even mentioning this horrible experience, yes I hated it so much, a kid I had gone to school with spoke it so well that I swapped it alone in the dark for a few minutes, I knew he had completely screwed me over and he refused to swap it back.

It was a good lesson in making sure I knew what he was getting before I got it. Burning Soldier was a full motion video shooter that was a little better than most in the genre. Here you get some nice visuals that have your usual variety of enemies. to shoot, but this also has some Panzer Dragoon-style lock-on mechanics to spice things up. I wasn't generally a fan of these types of games, but I liked this one and enjoyed it quite a bit. It's surprising how attractive this style is. The game was once the visuals cleared up and you could actually see what the heck you were shooting.

Guardian War was a micro cockpit turn-based strategy game and here you can see the building blocks of what would eventually become the masked area of ​​3D rendered sprites. The interface and even the way everything moves reminds you of the foggy area at all times. Your job here is to awaken all the guardians of the land to fight a new evil that is trying to destroy the world. As you awaken these guys they join your team and add new abilities to your party instead of giving you a map to explore, instead you have an overworld that has areas that need to be attacked and taken.

These areas are connected to other Guardians that need to be awakened. Each fight becomes bigger and more challenging as you progress. follow this one is ugly, but if you're a fan of long battles and deep strategy this might be for you. Cannon Fodder was a point and click strategy game where your troops perform various missions in each area, sometimes it's just to kill everything. sometimes you destroy a base, the game is very easy to use, basically one button moves your guys and another eliminates your enemies. Changes in terrain affect your troops' ability to survive, and later missions require you to split up your teams to take on multiple enemies and objectives.

The images are simple but it is very fun. Overall, the 3do's legacy has been completely lost due to its woeful market share in a library of games that would go to other systems, often with major improvements in graphics and content, leaving all three in order. of a void of nothingness that is only fondly remembered by the few who actually owned and supported it at the time of its release; Those who track back to play the 3rd today will find games that look and run better on tons of other hardware and devices. He didn't tell anyone, almost all of the featured exclusives found their way to more powerful systems that did a much better job of presenting it and even when the 3do gets a rare win, it's usually something like the sound software, which was An incredible experience.

Those that did not make it to any other console of the time, such as Super Street Fighter 2 turbo and Road Rash, are now remembered on platforms that had much larger installed bases, even their own mascot is remembered by more PlayStation owners than those who They played for the first time in 3. The sad reality shows how incredible it was to have a 3do back then, seeing how the fifth generation of consoles began in 1993, almost two years before Saturn and PlayStation appeared in North America, was something which I will never forget, although the price kept it away. For most people it was a trip.

I don't regret taking the sign or Dex, thanks everyone for watching and I'll see you next time.