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Nintendo's Stephen Scott writes (in response to Master Gamer's Excitebike
64 Review):
Everyone is entitled to his or her own opinion, but this is the first
review that has had anything bad to say about Excitebike 64. Nintendo
Power magazine gave the game an 8.9 rating (out of 10). I have played
Excitebike 64, and I have to say that it impressed me.
Although Excitebike 64 may not be perfect, I am sure it will bring
countless hours of entertainment to everyone who buys it. There are
various modes of difficulty, giving everyone a chance to compete. Throw in
the Desert Course, the Soccer mode, and Hill Climb option, and this game
should be near the top of the charts. I guess we will just have to wait to
see how the final numbers come out. Thanks for your honesty!
Ivan's Response:
Once again, you're acting like Nintendo Power has credibility as a
legitimate video game publication. Don't you think that being Nintendo
employees might influence the editors of Nintendo Power just a little bit?
I also can't believe how you can say, "I am sure it will brings countless
hours of entertainment to everyone who buys it." You just read a review in
which someone said that the game didn't bring him countless hours of
entertainment, which pretty much disproves your statement right off the
bat...
Chris Charla writes (in response to A Day At The Races):
Your feature is a little long, but funny. I also don't know if I agree
with its results -- I think the Xbox may have a real shot.
Nintendo's Dan Owsen writes (in response to Master Gamer's Excitebike 64
Review):
I wish you had figured out some of the subtleties of the game, and how
the physics engine of the game is way more realistic than any of the other
motocross games. Maybe having a bike that actually reacts to the terrain
in a realistic fashion is what is frustrating you. Do any of the other
motocross games give you the same sensation of big air that Excitbike 64
does? Do any of the others have the same variety of indoor and outdoor
tracks? All of these details add up to make this the better game. I think
Excitebike 64 is by far the best of the N64 motocross games and is on par
with 1080 and even Waverace.
Ivan's Response:
You're comparing Excitebike 64 to other motocross games as if that's a
decent way to establish its high quality. There's just one problem with
that train of thought: Almost every single motocross game ever released
absolutely sucks. Saying that Excitebike 64 is "the best of the N64
motocross games" isn't much stronger of a statement than, "Quest 64 is the
best of the N64's RPGs."
Ben writes (in response to Master Gamer's Excitebike 64 Review):
Allow me to elaborate more about why I disagree with your review. You
said, "The track editor isn't much more advanced than it was on the NES."
WHAT!? Hello? McFly? Well, yes, I suppose that the function of any track
editor is to construct tracks. That hasn't changed, obviously. The EB64
track editor does not, for instance, load the dishwasher for you. It does,
however, allow you to create awesome tracks in full 3D. It allows you to c
create custom jump segments. It allows you to save and load your tracks.
It's an order of magnitude more advanced than the NES version.
At one stage, you imply that the game is unfairly difficult, but it's
all about rhythm, baby. You have to actually *practice* landing those
jumps. You also state, "One of the biggest problems with Excitebike 64 is
that it has been dumbed-down so that absolutely anyone can play it." I'm
detecting some inconsistency right there. Incidentally, have you actually
progressed to the Pro mode? Your review has the smell of being hastily
written after playing just the first few tracks.
Your review says that the graphics aren't very impressive. Again, this
caused me to wonder if you had, in fact, played the game beyond the first
few tracks. EB64 is one of the most visually impressive games on the N64,
period. There is very little fog in the one-player mode. In fact, some of
the tracks (like the congo course) have no fog. You may want to compare it
to other racing titles on the N64. The textures are more detailed, the
game runs at a higher resolution, and believe it or not, there is a great
deal more variety in the textures. Have you actually progressed to, for
instance, the construction yard, or the blizzard blitz track? These two
are my favorites, and there's nothing else on the N64 that even comes close.
You are entitled to your opinion, and everyone's game-playing experience
is entirely subjective, but you make a number of statements that are simply
false. I stand by my "you're on crack" theory.
Ivan's Response:
Congratulations on being the first person to ever include the phrases,
"Hello? McFly?" and "It's all about the rhythm, baby" in the same letter.
I didn't expect Excitebike 64's track editor to load the dishwasher for me,
but I did expect it to be a little bit more advanced than it is. I had
more fun with the track editor than I did with the main game, but the track
editor still reeked with a sort of "low-tech" feeling.
There's a big difference between a game being too easy and a game being
dumbed-down. Excitebike 64 was drastically dumbed-down during its
development so that anyone could play it. Most racing games have AI that
is programmed to make the races close, but like I said in the review,
Excitebike 64 over-does this to the point of absurdity. The AI and the
control were the things I was referring to when I said that Excitebike 64
has dumbed-down gameplay.
How easy or hard it is to win races is an entirely different matter all
together, and you're putting words in my mouth on that subject. I never
said that the game is too hard, I said that the physics engine is
inconsistent. Just as often as I struggled to get through a series of
hills, I blew past them with relative ease. My point was that I didn't do
anything differently in either scenario; the physics engine is just plain
inconsistent.
You mockingly said in your letter, "You have to actually *practice*
landing those jumps," but I don't find that statement to be true. No
matter which character I chose, I managed to land almost every single jump.
It wasn't even a matter of me being particularly skilled at doing it; it
just seemed to happen almost automatically.
Your basis for praising Excitebike 64's graphics seems to be that it's
one of the best-looking racing games on the N64. I'm not going to praise
EB64's graphics just because most N64 racing games look like crap. I
judged on the graphics based on how much they impressed me, which wasn't
very much at all.
And yes, I did progress to all of the tracks you mentioned before
passing judgment on the game. You said in your previous letter that I
didn't play the game at all, and now I only played through a few tracks
according to you. So which is it? Have I played the game a little bit or
not at all?
3D Realms' co-owner Scott Miller writes (in response to Where's The Hype?)
I read Where's The Hype and I loved it. :-)
Ben writes (in response to Master Gamer's Excitebike 64 Review):
Are you, like, on crack? I ask because your review seems to imply that
you didn't even play the game prior to reviewing it. I can't even believe
you compared it to the other N64 motocross titles, all of which are
obviously far inferior. (Obvious, to anyone with an ounce of
gameplay experience, that is.) You're entitled to your own opinion, of
course, but you may want to ask yourself why noone else seems to be
agreeing with you.
Ivan's Response:
Ah, the old "you didn't even play the game" argument. As I've said
before, it's a lot easier to simply say, "You didn't even play the game"
than it is to accept the fact that I really did play the game and I really
didn't like it. It's also a lot easier to say, "You didn't even play the
game" than it is to come up with a legitimate argument and write an
intelligent letter stating why you disagree with me.
As for my comments about motocross games, I was being sarcastic. I
think the words, "All right, enough with the sarcasm" pretty much give away
the fact that I was being sarcastic (those words are at the beginning of
the third paragraph in the review). Many people didn't pick up on that and
thought I was being serious, but I wasn't. Almost all motocross games suck
for one reason or another.
Also, how many people agree or disagree with any of my opinions has no
bearing on how valid those opinions are. Almost everyone I've heard from
disagrees with my Metal Gear Solid Review, but that doesn't make my opinion
of the game any less valid. Likewise, no one agreed with me when I
professed my hate for Tomb Raider in 1996, but it was still a valid opinion
(and now it seems that everyone has jumped on the Tomb Raider-bashing
bandwagon).
Sony of Europe's "Helene" writes (in response to Master Gamer's Speed Punks
Review):
Well-written review of a game you obviously weren't too keen on!
"KRKNSPOCK" writes (in response to Master Gamer's Excitebike 64 Review):
To be honest, I couldn't read through your whole review ... was the
opening stuff a joke? Motocross games are among the worst-produced games
around, and if you haven't played an N64 racing game you didn't fall in
love with, I find that impossible to believe! Extreme G2? Terrible!
Cruis'n World? Awful! The list of bad N64 racing games far outweights the
good... hopefully that beginning stuff was a joke...
Ivan's Response:
Yes, dammit! It was all a joke! You wouldn't believe how many people
I've heard from who thought I was being serious and didn't finish reading
the review. I tried to make the first two paragraphs as absurd as humanly
possible so that it would be painfully obvious that I was being sarcastic.
Then, at the beginning of the third paragraph, I actually came right out
and said, "All right, enough with the sarcasm." I don't really love
motocross games or N64 racing games, but I do love making fun of them, and
that's exactly what I was doing in the first two paragraphs of the
Excitebike 64 Review.
The following letter is from Mazhar Bashir, and it's in response to Master
Gamer's Speed Punks Review. Mazhar works for Funcom, the company that
developed the game.
Personally, I think that the good game play is not described well enough
in your review. I find Speed Punks to be a pretty fun game. The
comparison with other games is fair enough, but this is really due to the
fact that the genre itself has been exploited a lot, and thus will every
game suffer. Seeing adults have fun playing a game like this shows me at
least the game was not intended just for kids, and it's pretty fun to play
even with some drawbacks. In the end, it's the eye of the beholder who
decides.
Ivan's Response:
You're absolutely right that it's the eye of the beholder who decides.
I realize that some people might like Speed Punks; I'm just not one of
them. You're also right that it takes a lot for a cart racing game to
stand out, but a good one can still do that easily. Crash Team Racing has
a lot in common with Mario Kart, but it still manages to be a good enough
game to stand up on its own two legs. I can't honestly say the same for
Speed Punks.
Peter Polacho writes:
You said in your response to my previous letter, "Cigarettes cause
cancer, while games may or may not make children more violent." While it
is obvious to us, normal people, it is impossible to prove because of
confounding factors. The industry can just say we got cancer from a hot
dog and it works just as well. The only thing that can be proven is a
correlation, which is not legally binding. This was just some FYI.
Ivan's Response:
Sure, plenty of people get cancer for reasons other than cigarettes.
But whether you want to admit it or not, there are many chemicals in
cigarettes that have indeed been medically proven to cause cancer. I don't
want to be offensive, but you're feeding me a load of BS.
Angelo Mike writes:
Do you know anything about having to let Dreamcasts boot up before you
play a game in them? One of my friends used to be the manager of a game
store. I told him that I was having some frame rate and sound problems in
NFL 2K, and he said to let the system boot up and then put the disc in. It
usually works fine, but sometimes when I'm close to the red zone the frame
rate still drops so friggin' low. Plus, I tried to play games like Dead or
Alive 2 without booting up my system first, and it was all screwed up.
Nobody else seems to be having this problem that I know of, so do you know
what could be wrong with my Dreamcast?
Ivan's Response:
I'm not what could be causing you to experience those problems. I
recommend you try to exchange your Dreamcast for a new system at the
retailer that sold you the system. If they won't let you do that (and they
really should), call Sega's customer service line at 1-800-USA-SEGA. They
probably won't be able to solve your problem over the phone, but they will
be able to give you an address that you can send your system to. I had to
send my PlayStation to Sony for repair a couple years ago, and it has run
flawlessly ever since.
I don't recommend that you rely exclusively on the "boot-up fix."
Remember, everyone (including me) believed at one time that turning your
PlayStation on its side or upside-down helped prevent it from over-heating.
It may have done that in the short term, but in the long term it mis-
aligned the laser inside the CD-ROM drive and prevented the system from
working at all. The moral of the story is not to believe any of the quick
fix solutions to video game technical problems. You should exchange your
defective system for a new one, or send it to Sega for repair.
Michael Shumake writes:
I was just reading over your Q&A section, for no real reason, mostly
just to see how in the know you are (I'm sure you can't blame me for
thinking a good site on Geocities could never happen). I have to say I'm
pretty impressed with what your doing with your site. You have a decent
amount of content, and I can't help but thinking that you probably have one
of the best sites hosted on Geocities I've seen in a long time. Just
wanted to let you in on some of my insight to one of the questions in your
Q&A section...
One of the questions is someone asking about the Dreamcast, and how Sega
plans to get it to actually play games well over the Internet. There was
nothing wrong with your answer, but you might also want to add that while
PC games such as Quake run poorly sometimes, a big factor would be the fact
that Quake servers are mainly run by fans of the game, so the quality of
the server you're playing on is guaranteed by nobody. Sega, on the other
hand, is going to be hosting these games on their servers, so you can be
sure you're playing at the best place you could be.
Also worth noting is the fact that with PC games, all the players have
different hardware configurations, which in some cases can effect everyone
in the game. For instance, in Quake 3 when a player is on a slow
connection, he will appear to be jumping around even though I'm on the
sweet T1 connection here at Gamers.com. With the Dreamcast, everyone has
the same hardware, meaning no one will ever have any compatibility problems
with their games, plus you have the added bonus of not having to worry that
other players have an advantage due to having better hardware than you do
and players cheating using hack programs and such.
I'm sure if we wait and see what happens, the Dreamcast could actually
have quite impressive Internet play because of this. Anyway, once again,
keep up on the good work with your site.
Ivan's Response:
I have mentioned your second point several times before, but I've never
really thought about your first point until now. That will probably make a
big difference because like you said, the quality of games run on personal
servers isn't guaranteed by anyone. On the other hand, Sega and GTE
Communications are working hard to make sure that their own servers run
reliably and smoothly. Even if Sega's servers aren't significantly faster
than most personal servers, just the fact that they will all have similar
performance will be a welcome change. You never really know what kind of
performance you're going to get when you play a game on a personal server.
It could be extremely fast, extremely slow, or anywhere in between.
Still, it's worth pointing out that the quality of Sega's servers is
still questionable. Even with the help of GTE, building a nationwide
backbone of high-performance servers from scratch is no small task. I've
got to believe that Sega and GTE are going to do everything they possibly
can to accomplish this task, but it's still not a foregone conclusion that
they will.
Also, it's not yet known exactly how the Dreamcast version of Quake 3
will work from an Internet connection standpoint. What is known is that
Dreamcast owners and PC owners will be able to play against each other.
This would seem to imply that least in Quake 3's case, the game will be
played over personal servers rather than (or possibly in addition to)
Sega's servers.
"EDemuro" writes:
need codes
Ivan's Response:
What's with all the letters about codes lately? To EDemuro and everyone
else who has e-mailed be asking about codes, there are none on Master
Gamer. If all you're looking for is codes, you've come to the wrong place.
Wendy Haney writes (in response to Master Gamer's feature Games And
Politics Don't Mix):
I enjoyed your commentary on politics and games, and I agree with all of
it. Can you believe how much money and effort these silly politicians are
putting into "helping" parents understand game ratings? And legislation of
video games just seems half-backwards and ridiculous to me. God forbid
that a parent would take the time to actually sit in the same room as their
child and play the game with their child, thus totally bypassing government
influence and opinion altogether. Oh my! What a concept! Parents and
children all over the country playing video games together! Perhaps the
next legislation will be throwing a parent in video game jail for allowing
their child to view such "violence."
Politicians are like sheep to me... doing whatever their "damage
control" advisors say to do. A bunch of mentally-imbalanced children take
their parents' or grandparents' guns to school and end up shooting their
classmates dead, and who do these silly politicians blame? The video game
industry, of course! These politicians don't have the courage to go up
against the NRA, to challenge the ridiculous practice in this country of
freely owning any kind of weapon, including an AK-47. Nor do the
politicians challenge the practice of real people in this country teaching
their real children how to shoot and kill real deer.
Then we have tragedies all accross this country involving the same
children who may have played a few video games and then chose to play Rambo
at their local school, and the politicians totally overlook where the child
got the gun to do the damage. They have even hired a bunch of shrinks who
have never played a video game in their ever lovin' life just to have
"study" info to "back up" their silly claims. The politicians must think
that the rest of us are as out of touch as they are.
Ahh, the sadness and ridiculousness of it all. Bottom line, Ivan: I'm a
girl, I'm a parent of girls, and we play "violent" video games together and
we have lots of fun and neither one of my girls (or me) own a gun, much
less live the attitude to shoot 'em up and kill 'em. Would that surprise
the silly politicans and their silly psychology testers? Politicians are
just plain out of touch with reality. As in all things relating to
children and their growth and perception of the world, parents should
actively be there, not the freaking government for crying out loud.
If you don't want your children to blow a fuse and shoot the town up,
don't allow them access to guns and it might help to know your child a
little bit and show him or her that you actually care about them. A
PlayStation or any other game console available cannot hurt a person, but
if parents and children play these games together, just think of how much a
child will know you care. And perhaps shooting up the town for angry,
frustrated reasons won't ever become a possibility. Interesting concept,
I do believe!
Ivan's Response:
You bring up several valid points, Wendy. Your comments about gun
control bring up the old argument, "Guns don't kill people, people kill
people." That statement is true to some extent, in that a world without
guns would still have murders. But guns also represent a way for anyone to
kill people with a relative ease that wouldn't exist in a world without
guns. Different people have different beliefs about whether there's
anything wrong with hunting itself, but I agree that it teaches a lot of
kids how to use guns like an expert, kids that might otherwise never be
taught how to use guns.
I agree with you completely that parents should have more control over
their kids' lives than the government, and that parents bear more
responsibility for their kids' actions than anyone else except the kids
themselves. Politicians and psychologists conveniently fail to mention
personal responsibility in all of their talk about violent video games.
Tyler Lukiwski writes (in response to a recent entry in the Gaming Journal
about how Jimmy Payne should get off his butt and finish Final Fantasy 8):
Don't listen to 'em, Jimmy. I love Final Fantasy, but I only made it
through the first disk of FF8 before I stopped playing. If you don't like
it, you don't like it. A great ending does not a great game make.
Contributing Writer Jimmy Payne responds:
I do like Final Fantasy 8, just not as much as FF7 so far. The main
reason I haven't been playing it is because there are other games that I
can't stop playing long enough to really get into FF8. Before it was Crazy
Taxi and Soul Calibur, and now it's Resident Evil: Code Veronica and Dead
or Alive 2. The longer I go without playing FF8, the less I want to go
back and pick up where I left off.
Angelo Mike writes:
I would like to write not only to vent my disappointments about the
PlayStation 2, but to open up everyone else's eyes about this machine.
First of all, I'm tired of hearing from so many people that they're not
buying a Dreamcast because they're waiting for the PS2. If the damn
machine's is worth buying, then buy it! The Dreamcast already has a solid
line-up of software with at least 14 titles worthy of purchase, plus many
more in the pipeline such as Sega GT, NFL 2K1, NBA 2K1, Shenmue, Ecco,
Draconus, Seaman, Eternal Arcadia, and so on.
The PS2's line-up so far has been re-hashes of the same games with
better graphics. If I want to play PlayStation games, I'll play them on my
PlayStation. I really don't care for the same games with better graphics
if the Dreamcast is coming out with better games (which they are). The
only PS2 games that I know of that really try to do something different are
Munch's Oddyssee, Final Fantasy X and XI, Unreal Tournament, and, well....
that's it.
On top of this, Sega's online network is going to be up and running by
the PS2's American launch. To make things worse for Sony, the cable modem
they intend on using with the PS2 won't be out until 2001. First of all,
cable modems are a bad idea because they more people that have them, the
slower the connection is. Second of all, the modem should be built-in, not
an add-on. I don't want to pay extra for a modem to play FFXI online when
I can play it on my computer without paying for the extra modem and monthly
fee for it.
Sony needs to really shape up their act for the PS2. Before I was 100%
sure I was going to get the PS2. Now, I'm pretty torn over the decision
and I will have to wait longer to really find out more about the PS2's
line-up. It looks like the only games for the PS2 that I actually want are
already on the PlayStation, are coming out for the PC, or are coming out
for the Dreamcast.
Ivan's Response:
I agree with you that the PlayStation 2's first-generation lineup
doesn't look very good, and I agree with you about Sony's online strategy.
It's a big assumption on Sony's part that broadband penetration will be at
decent levels by the end of 2001. If the rumors are true that Sony is
going to add a 56K modem to the US version of the system, that changes
everything. Having the modem packed-in with every console would make a
world of difference, but it would still be just that: A modem. Even if
they managed to pack a 56K modem in with the system, odds are that their
online network would still be nothing compared to Sega's.
Despite all of this, I still believe PlaySttaion 2 will do well in the
long run. Every video game system would suck if you judged them by their
Japanese launch line-ups. The Dreamcast launched in Japan with one average
game (Virtua Fighter 3tb), three horrible games (Pen Pen TriIcelon, July,
and Godzilla Generations), and that's it. With as much third-party support
as the PlayStation 2 has, it's just a matter of time before the awesome
games show up.
"Plmpfamily" writes:
u need 2 put codes
Ivan's Response:
The hardcore gamer that Master Gamer targets doesn't use codes very
often, so I'm not going to post them on the site. What I will do once
again is direct you to the best codes site I know of: GameSages.
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