Project Justice

"Interesting "Project" from Capcom?"

Project Justice is the sequel to Rival Schools, a Playstation game made by Capcom. Actually no, it is the sequel to the sequel of this game (Rival Schools 2) which was basically just an add-on with 2 new characters. This is confusing, right? Let's just say that Project Justice on Dreamcast is the true sequel to Rival Schools. The first game was considered as brilliant by many fighting games fans across the world, and even by people who usually don't enjoy this genre. It was some kind of 3D dumbed-down Street Fighter (most people would compare it to Marvel vs Capcom 2 nowadays) which was based on a team system: your partners only appeared on the screen during your super attacks, though. It featured schoolboys and schoolgirls fighting against a great evil: the principal...
Rival Schools was an extremely fun game, and many were eagerly waiting for its sequel when it was announced on Dreamcast. How did the game turn out to be? Is it a great game or a disappointment? Sadly, things are not that simple...

N.B: Please note that I am reviewing the Japanese version of Project Justice (''Moero: Justice Gakuen'') and that there are a few differences with the US and PAL versions of this game -the board game and the dialogues- so I will deal with this problem at the end of my review.

graphics/animation 7

This game looks pretty good even though the graphics are nothing new and are not necessarily impressive. For some reason, I cannot point out why I enjoy watching this game... It might be the overall anime feel, or just the simple character models, but there is something I really like about Project Justice. Don't get me wrong, Soulcalibur and Dead Or Alive 2 probably look a lot better than this, but PJ has character... Take the manual for instance (Japanese one): it has great artwork, which seems to be a trademark of the Rival Schools series. The characters are very charismatic and fun, they portray different stereotypes your average high-school student is familiar with: the jock, the musician, the chairman, the soccer/volleyball player, the teacher, the nurse, the swimmer, the punk, the brat... This game has very cool characters, and they belong to different -rival- schools. One of the characters, Kyosuke, was popular enough to be picked to represent this series in the upcoming Capcom game ''Capcom vs SNK 2'', I think that says it all. The backgrounds are pretty cool also, they are original and very colorful. To conclude on the subject, PJ is not the most BEAUTIFUL 3D fighting game on Dreamcast, but it looks pretty decent, and if you are an anime fan you will probably love it.
The animation of the game is average compared to other fighters on Dreamcast. It is not bad, but it is nothing special either... The moves are detailed and there is no major problem with the animation of the (crazy) moves. I don't have much to say here really.
On the other hand, the overall presentation of the game is great. Capcom spent a lot of time on the design of the different menus, in-game artworks and the character select screen. This contributes to giving Project Justice a peculiar atmosphere since it fits perfectly with the general feel of the game: it's crazy!

gameplay 6

I know what you, humble reader, are thinking now: ''why only a 6?'' I can understand such a reaction at first. But while the gameplay is not flawed, it is also rather dull... First off, this is not a tournament game. The biggest complain I could have against it is that it is not very deep. Apart from Air Combos, there really is not much to master in the game which might be one of the reasons why I got bored with it so fast...
I have to say that the controls are very good and as usual with Capcom you won't have any trouble pulling off special moves. The game does feel kind of slow but this is not much of a problem here. The controls are, simply put, perfect.
This could be described as a ''dumbed-down'' Marvel vs Capcom 2. The moves are crazy and exceptionally fun, and I often found myself wondering what went through Capcom developer's minds when they made them. You can sidestep to avoid being hit, and of course you can use throws. Each character has a decent number of special moves and super moves, as is usually the case in most fighting games. Then why pick a team, you might ask? Team supers. That is the reason why. Each character has a different team super... You will have to use them wisely since some of them are offensive and others are defensive (= life up, guts up...).
Most combos from Rival Schools are still in the game... Actually some might say that this game is very similar to the Playstation game. But there are a few new characters, such as Zaki, the mysterious woman who is fighting with a chain, Momo, my personal favorite, who is 3 feet tall and slaughters people with her tennis racket, and Ran, the reporter who fights with her camera.
Another big difference with the first game is that even though team supers still have incredible priority, you can now counter them using your third character (it takes one super bar though). If you decide to counter the team super (by pressing Strong punch and Strong Kick at the same time right after your opponent has activated his super), both player's third characters will face each other for a few seconds, and the one who gets the first hit wins. If it is the player who pulled off the team super, it will hit. But if it is his opponent, the team super will miss and the fight will continue. This adds up a little to the strategic aspect of this game, but let's face it, this is not a deep game.

story -

I usually consider story as an important part of a fighting game, contrary to most fans of the genre, or so it seems. But I could not really judge this game's story because I only played the Japanese version and I have not gathered enough info to have an opinion on it. I hear that the story is fun but kind of stupid. It has a good point though: all the characters interact and there are a few interesting plot twists I won't spoil for you. But then again the overall feel of the game goes in the same way so... There is a story mode in which the characters talk to each other and which features cool artworks though. So at least this game has a story.

audio 8

I think the music in this game is pretty good... There are different styles, but I never actually felt the need to cut the music or anything. It fits in nicely but you probably will not remember it after a few weeks. I think Capcom spent some time working on the music to create a peculiar atmosphere and it shows.
The sounds effect are also very good. Everything in the game is made to be funny, and this includes voices. The voices are in Japanese but they are very clear... Surprisingly enough, the voices are not particularly annoying, and I personally find Momo's hilarious.

replayability 6

I am probably being harsh here, but compared to most Dreamcast fighting games, this game does not seem very interesting in the long run. After a while, the fun and original side of this game disappears and then Project Justice will probably just look like a simple fighting game... Mastering all the fighters is a fun task, but you will soon find out that most of them have not changed at all since the Playstation game. This is a common habit of Capcom, but still: the game should probably have been deeper. If your friends are into fighters, then you should probably get this game: it is fairly cheap in the US and is the ideal game to start learning fighters because of its simplicity.
However, it has a decent amount of modes: there are 2 different arcade modes, versus and training modes, but also tournament modes (for when your friends come over at your place!). But for some reason, I get the feeling that Capcom included these modes because they were aware of the fact that the game itself was not very deep.
The Japanese version had an interesting ''board game'' in which you could make your characters evolve and win special/super moves. You could even create your own fighters in this mode. But this has been removed for the US and PAL versions.

buy or rent?

This is a tough choice, but for once I would recommend renting it first even if you are a hardcore fighting game fan. I actually consider this game as a really good rent, because it is fun and easily accessible. If you liked the first game, then you could probably pick this one up safely but keep in mind that things have not fundamentally changed... Even though they are not really in the same category, I think this game is the best 3D fighter on DC after Soulcalibur and maybe Dead Or Alive 2. Most hardcore fighter fans might only see it as a ''project'' (pun intended ^_^') because it feels somewhat incomplete. But then again, they might not be Capcom's target here. For once, Capcom makes a game which is accessible to everyone... I will not blame them, just keep in mind that there are better fighters on Dreamcast in my opinion. But you should at least try it once in your life, if only to see Momo in action

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 06/02/01, Updated 02/02/03