JSRF: Jet Set Radio Future

"I didn't think much of skating games until i played this"

Okay, I’ve had this game for a while; I’ve finished it completely, and certainly enjoyed playing it. This review will hopefully act as a helpful guide to new owners of the Sega Game, “Jet Set Radio Future''.

Storey- 5/10

Decent storey, not brilliant, but smoothes out the surface for the game play to shine. A big-shot businessman buys out the police force and sets them loose on the skater's turf, giving them hardly any freedom of speech. You, the GGs, are here to claim turfs, souls (more on that later) and persuade other gangs to join yours. Overall, an alright storyline that’s sets the scene for the game to flourish.

Game play- 8/10

Anyone who has played any of the Tony hawk games will pick this up fast. You can do different tricks with different buttons, and even though there isn't as much variety as a Tony Hawke game in the tricks, the fact that you spray graffiti, beat up cops and rival gangs, and actually have a storey to play is what gives this game a good, solid game play. A bad thing here is the fact hat “beating up'' cops and rival gangs is really only spraying them with graffiti. And even though the fights aren't that realistic, for example, one skater verus 5 tanks, a couple of helicopters, and a whole platoon of policeman, it's still fun. The levels are wide and vast and there are lots of poles, half pipes and civilians to have fun with, i.e. knock them over. Hayashi, the leader of the police force is pretty funny and you will get a few good laughs from his lines. The objectives, if you can call them that are too simple and then the fact that there is only one difficulty level makes this game a cakewalk to pass. You only have to spray a couple of graffiti stops, and spray some cops. And so ends a fairly long description of the game play. Overall, the game play is the best aspect of this game, just beating Unlockables. (I’m not including controls)

Graphics & Sound- 3/10

Cel-Shaded graphics, you either love them or hate them, I am not too fussed about them but still feel that they are not any reason to not buy the game. Okay the Audio isn’t that great either, with everything the characters say coming up in a speech bubble, except for DJ Professor K, whose voice runs smoothly. You can only choose one for your garage, the rest are default. Graphics and Audio are the reasons I didn’t give this game a 9, or even 10. Overall, real mediocre Sound with pretty average Graphics.

Controls- 10/10

An easy learning curve and the fact you will hardly ever need to press to buttons at once to do something, makes this aspect a brilliant aspect. That is pretty much all that needs to be said here. Overall, the controls are perfect and there is nothing wrong with them.

Multiplayer- 6/10

Not too much to offer, a race, another race except you have to hold a ball for one lap, a game where you have to spray the other skater’s backs until they run out of health, a game to see who can spay the most graffiti in a certain amount of time, and a capture the flag game. Only 4 people can play at once, but it still pushes the reason to buy this game out further and into the sunlight where everyone can see it. Overall a borderline Multiplayer.

Unlockables - 7/10

This is pretty much the characters section, as that is all you can unlock, other new levels of course. The characters all feel the same to skate with, the only notable difference is the Stamina and Maximum spray cans amount. But the characters, even though they don’t talk, have around 4 or 5 different one-liners, all look extremely different and unique, and all have their own individual dance moves.( which I’m not a big fan of) That them enjoyable to fiddle around with. But you are probably wondering how you get the characters. Well First, you have to find a tape( a rip-off of Tony Hawke) which shows the objectives to get certain “souls”, for example. This is where you can have some fun. There are 5 categories, each one results in 1 graffiti soul becoming visible. It’s just a matter of getting them. The 5 categories are Tricks, Air Tricks, Grind Tricks, Points Challenges and Special. Once you have all of them in one level, you unlock Test Run mode, which is where you find the get the characters. There is a flag challenge, a trick challenge, a time trial challenge and a graffiti spray challenge. They are called, Jet Flag, Jet Technique, Jet Dash and Jet Graffiti. Every level has Jet Graffiti and Jet Technique, and half the levels have Jet Dash and half the levels have Jet Flag. Beating all the “Jets” in a level gives a character somewhat related to that level. An Overall, an above-average amount of “unlockables”.

Overall Score- 5+8+3+10+6+7 = 39/60 = 7.8/10

Buy or Rent-

I’d say buy, but it’s up to you, you might want to rent first and see for yourself.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 10/08/03