The Game that Changed the World as We Know It

This game changed gaming forever. It’s legacy still is alive and well today, and forever growing. It changed how we looked at horror games. Of course, I’m talking about Resident Evil for the PlayStation.

This Capcom gem changed the horror genre. It’s intense, heart-pumping, thrill ride gameplay was beyond original, and way ahead of it’s time for it’s release in 1996. The game is responsible for movies, more games, a cult-like following, and it all started here. From killing zombies to solving pretty difficult puzzles, it had everything needed to be a great game.

The T Virus. The virus that started it all, and put a twist to zombie games. Not just the dead anymore, instead mutated creatures which are simply a pain in the ass. The game isn’t just great because of the new style of play, or new camera angles that scared the crap out of so many of us so many times over and over again. It was the story.

Resident Evil gave meaning to a plot in gaming. That it shouldn’t just be fun. There should be a reason. The game should grab and entice you to wanting to finish to know what happens or want to finish so you can know you save someone you’ve wanted to be alive. The Resident Evil story line keeps you on the edge of your seat, wondering what happens next, hoping for the safety and well-being of your character. This game forced competition, and future games to make a good story. Put the user in the story. Resident Evil did it phenomenally. And it knocked the ball out of the park.

The revolution began back in 1996, but it continues today. This game created a horror genre of gaming, and created meaning for actually playing games. Not many games can take credit for revolutionizing the entire gaming world so drastically. But Resident Evil can.

Hidden Gems

We all grew up on this movie series. And 99% of the time, movie video games suck. And that’s a generous percentage. However, this game, for some reason is just so fun to play, even if some anal game reviewing sites don’t think so.

I’m talking about Toy Story 2 for the Nintendo 64, PlayStation, and Dreamcast, . I haven’t met many people who have played it, and when I looked up reviews, generally it was average. However, I have as much fun playing the game now, as when I did when I grew up with it. You take control of the awesome Buzz Lightyear, and just like the movie, you have to find and save Woody from Big Al. In order to do so, you have to collect Pizza Planet Tokens, and each level has at least 5, and collecting certain tokens causes you to unlock some pretty interesting items.

There’s many reasons to like this game, as long as you have a heart or some kind of decent childhood. The same music from the movie appears in this game, and it just gives you a nice heart-warming feeling to hear one more time. All our favorite characters make an appearance on almost every level, with an occasional surprise guest sometimes.

Now you would think the game play would suck, I’m just so high on this game because of the atmosphere right? Wrong. The game play necessarily mechanically wise, graphically wise, and physically wise I will admit is not the best. But it isn’t so bad where it is unplayable, and for the Nintendo 64, the graphics are duable. It’s the wide variety of missions and goals that keep you intrigued.

Each level there’s a race with RC, which was always a nice little random mission, and past the first level is extremely difficult without power ups. Then you have the unique boss for each level, which are all difficult, with the exception of the first one of course. Then you have a “collect coins” for Hamm every level which can be fun because of the random spots of the coins.

It also has a collect 5 things mission unique to each level, which isn’t as easy as it sounds. Lastly, there is always something random. For example, on the level Andy’s Neighborhood, you have to randomly blow up a rubber duck pool floaty and then jump on it as hard as possible to jump up to a token.

When you beat this game, you feel so accomplished, even more so then the first time when you see the heart-felt ending to the actual movie. I’ll even go as far to say, not only is this my hidden gem, I also will go out to say, personally, and I could also argue this if I really wanted to, that this is the best movie converted game out there.

The childish tasks, comforting atmosphere, and my personal bias towards Toy Story that makes this game to me feel like a hidden gem.