Hybrid Heaven

"Nintendo 64 still needs a true RPG"

Some time back, when I had a 64 and that was it (along with SNES). I got pretty bored of just playing sports, and platforming games. There were no RPG's on the 64 at that time. I was very disappointed with this, it was one more reason why I was about to buy a playstation. Finally I waited it out, and got Hybrid Heaven. I popped it in, played it for about 10 hours, and stopped. That was when I got my playstation.

STORY:7
Johnny, the main character is suppose to meet with this guy in the beginning and johnny gets killed, I wont tell anymore. Afterwards, the story kind of goes downhill. It didn't really kept me playing.

GAMEPLAY: 8
If my gun didn't have any bullets in it, I would've taken it back to the people that sold me it and demand a refund..... Your gun in this game is a defuser or something like that. You shoot down little robots with your defuser, and when a bad guy comes around you fight him with your fist. This is probably the best part of the game, the combat. The combat is well put together, with reversals for every move, half the chance they don't succeed, but from time to time, you'll counter an attack. After the battle you get a rank, and your statistics go up, and you gain a item, cool! In combat there is quite a list of moves to learn. Some moves are moves you see on T.V, like the piledriver. Imagine that move in a RPG game, its pretty sweet! There are other basic moves like the low and high kicks, punches, but the coolest part is grappling, and doing body slams. Did I mention there are also submissions? You might even call this a wrestling RPG!

GRAPHICS: 8
The graphics could've been better, some of the items are just squares and triangles put together. The character designs are done nicely, the environment is done decently. The lip sinking is done terrible though.

ENTERTAINMENT: 6
This is where the game sort of pummels, although the combat system seems pretty cool, it gets old really quick, and the story doesn't advance a whole lot. You play this game beneath the city, so your basically stuck in one place the entire time. I'm not saying the game is horrible, but its not that great either, parts of the game about half of it your shooting down guys with your defuser gun. Shooting them down seems cool, but trust me, konami made it boring. This is probably the best RPG game for the N64.

OVERALL: 6
N64 should've never let squaresoft get away during this time (as of now 2002, there back on there side), because of this the N64 failed in the RPG department, and this is what made playstation a success. Don't get me wrong, I'm still a loyal fan of Nintendo, its what made video games become popular, they put it on the map, and others followed. Hybrid Heaven is worth a rent at least, just so that you know what i'm saying, I did manage to get this game for $10 however. Nintendo 64 is no longer making games, and as a result the N64 never had a true RPG....

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 07/22/02, Updated 11/11/02