Fantastic Four

"4 Plus 1 is 5"

In this world of complex, online gaming it's a treat to play a game technologically impaired. You can could Mario Bros, Pac Man, Tetris, and now "Fantastic Four". I'm not a video game historian by any means, but this little baby came out relatively early in the PSX gaming career.

I love bad games...good games rock, but bad games sparkle. "Fantastic Four" is devoid of any sense of flow or even clarity. Players are presented with an unfortunate menu right at the start. Seemingly illogical, you get to stare at an extreme close up of The Thing. After you've waded through that mess you can start the game. Mr. Fantastic, Invisible Women (formerly just a girl), The Thing, Human Torch, and the lovely and darling She-Hulk (a nice addition...she's awesome) have all been faithfully given the PSX shine. Once you played a round of the mindless racing load screen (for a load time that I wasn't offended by) you can get into the action.

The graphics aren't too bad. Very "B Movie" quality...but not too shabby. The character models are nice too. Be warned though...Shulkie is huge. Bigger than any of the other characters in the game (including Hulk himself). The sound is horrid...or I should say the soundtrack. It tries to be funk...but it's just plain funky. As far as play control, it's good enough for what it is. Thankfully the game doesn't require you to do any fancy fingerwork, so just hitting the buttons works out swell.

The game really doesn't make much sense at all. You play a level for a bit (with powerups strewn in random places) then you have a load screen (time t o burn rubber) and then you get to fight a fellow Marvelite. The kicker is that these battles play out like playing the game against a five year old. The opposing character just does the same move over and over again. Must be an inside joke over at Acclaim.

I love these side scrolling, butt kicking, button mashing kind of games. And I throughly enjoy "Fantastic Four". It's a game that doesn't take itself seriously, and in current climate of hyped up soundbits, it's truly fantastic.

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 03/23/05