Ecco: The Tides of Time

"A hauntingly beautiful adventure"

Sega has had a pernicious tendency to take a good thing and completely destroy any possibility of its success. Think about the Sega CD, the 32x, the Saturn(well, not so much the Saturn) and one sees that the higher-ups at the company don't seem to know when to support a gaming platform and when to let it die. Happily, they supported the Genesis long enough for game developers to come up with some of the most original and creative games ever seen. Chief among these was Shining Force, but one which has been the most overlooked has been (I think) Ecco 2 The Tides of Time.

From the very moment one hears the notes of the opening score and sees the graphic of the dolphins jumping through the title logo, one knows that that much time was spent on this game. This feeling is only increased as one swims through the underwater paradise that is Ecco's world. Very few games have come as close to this in being able to make one really know what it is like to swim freely through the open sea. Even though the gaming area is limited, one has a feel of a freedom to travel anywhere one wants. This is much more true in the beginning, when Ecco has unlimited air. Unfortunately, this power is soon taken from him.

Anyway, the story. Given the fact that dolphins tend to be used in environmentally themed ways by the populatr culture, I expected something like a scene where Ecco goes off and attacks fishing boats. When it instead turned out to be about an alien queen who wants to take over the sea, I was at first a little disappointed(I wanted to see a "dolphin gets revenge" scenario) but gradually realized that this plot worked out a lot better for a story. Not only will Ecco travel the seas of the present, normal time, he will travel to the future, where flying dolphins rule a peaceful(excepting a couple of monsters in your area) earth. Unfortunately, Ecco must travel back to a darker present, where the alien queen has started to darken the waters of the oceans. (Incidentally, the dolphins in the future, the bosses, and the alien spawn look REALLY cool.)

Gameplay is what it should be: simple to learn, hard to master. Rather than inventing weird new attacks for a dolphin to do, the designers simply worked with what mother nature already provided dolphins: sonar. Ecco can send out sonar waves to see a map of the area, and can send out stronger ones to blast enemies like sharks. (Okay, maybe not COMPLETELY following nature, but Ecco's a superdolphin, for crying out loud! The manual said so!) There are lots of crystals and orbs hanging around for you to interact with, and this tends to be the only place where the game gets repetitive. "Find the crystal to break through the other crystal" is what it boils down to.

The music fits the underwater mood perfectly. I am of the belief that an uninspired soundtrack can often ruin an otherwise good game. Happily, this is not the case with E2. I guarantee that you will be remembering the tunes for a lifetime, even if you normally go for upbeat types. Haunting, sad, brooding, and beautiful, the score from this game is among the best composed on the Sega Genesis. I really can't think of a near equivalent.

I only give this game a 9 because some of the levels are so challenging as to have you ripping your hair out. (Me and my friends were stuck on level 1 for two days before we finally figured it out. Just keep sonar-ing the crystals.) Challenge is good, impossibility is not. Get this game on the genesis, or get it emulated if possible (or both.)

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 11/17/99, Updated 11/17/99