Gebockers

"A clunky, lackluster game."

I initially received Gebockers in a lot of games I purchased. To my surprise, I could find no information on it. After playing this game it's apparent that a review should be in order. Gebockers was released in 1996 for Saturn. It's very similar to virtual on, but instead of robots, one controls cartoon characters. There are eight playable characters and eight different levels. There's not much to the game besides the gameplay and it's very clunky.

Gameplay: 3
Gameplay on the back of the game box is described as the final battle of 3D shooting. It is that, but the idea could have been carried out better. One moves around in a huge open arena with the options to shoot, jump, dash, and use a special against the enemy until its health is depleted in the given time limit. The concept is rather simple and the controls are unresponsive. In story mode (which is anything but that), one goes through each level fighting the different characters on their own turf until the final round. That's it. Nothing more. The game can be beaten in hour on the normal difficulty. Although difficulty, number of rounds, and health can be modified, it's still the same game. Which gets rather monotonous. Two player mode allows the option to use a link to another Saturn and another TV with another copy of Gebockers, but doesn't help anything for the game. The game is a bit more fun when facing a friend, but still is lackluster.

Story: 1
Defeat all of the characters until the final boss is defeated.

Graphics: 5
Average Saturn graphics. The character sprites are animated 2D characters moving around in a big 3D floor which is what all of the levels are. To make up for it, there are two cinemas in this game which are pretty nice considering the time.

Sound: 5
Nothing too spectacular or to remember, but nothing that will annoy.

Controls: 2
As stated before, the controls are very unresponsive. Unfortunately this game isn't compatible with the 3D stick controller which is a let down. It's hard to move your character in a 3D environment with the only choice to go 4 directions or slide to the left or right. The controls could be compared to Mobile Suit Gundam: Journey to Jaburo but worse. With all of the bad factors of Geockers the controls only bring it down even more.

Overall: 3
Unlike virtual on, or fighting games this isn't fun. There's no real depth or substance to the game which gets boring after a while. I would recommend virtual on instead of this which is to be avoided. It may be fun to play with another person a few times but has no real replay. To sum it up, the concept may seem original with all the wacky characters and 3D shooting, but turns out to be a let down.

Reviewer's Score: 3/10, Originally Posted: 09/26/04