"Beat this game and i'll give you a kazillion dollars"

Kid Chameleon is an above average platformer which was held back by only one flaw. The fact that you could play the game non-stop for five hours and make steady progress, and then find that you're only half way through the absolute multitude of levels. If only there was a save feature, it could have been so good!

Anway, here's the story. There's a new game in town. A virtual reality game to be exact, the most superior game of it's kind, and every kid in town want's to play it. There's a problem however, any player that goes in doesn't come out, the evil boss of the game is kidnapping them! Kids all over town keep disappearing (you'd think they'd work out not to play the darn thing once the first few don't come back) until finally there's only one person to turn to, the coolest kid in town, Kid Chameleon!

GAMEPLAY
The gameplay is actually quite good, there's a lot of depth and originality is found in truckloads. The best feature that Kid Chameleon offers is his transformation. Find a helmet and he'll change into one of his various alter-egos, each with different abilities. Knowing when and how to use the abilities of your character is vital if you want to progress further into the game, for example, the fly will enable you to stick to walls and fit into tiny spots, the iron knight can break blocks with his jumps and shimmy up walls and the cyclone guy can fly. There are over 10 different transformations and each of them requires a mastery to finish the game.
The controls are decent, once you've got the hang of them there's not a worry in the world. There's a button for running, one for jumping and one for performing the special move of you're character. They're neither over or under responsive so all of those fiddly jumps can be mode without a hassle.
All of the levels (that i've played, there's just TOO MANY) are well designed, but as you progress it's difficult not to notice the repetition and passing through the levels can quite quickly become a chore. There is a steady learning curve, the levels gradually get harder and harder until you're pulling your hair out in frustration from the ridiculous time-limits and hoardes of enemies. For the most part however, progressing through the game can be some good fun.
There's a two-player mode in there. Rather than swapping once a life is lost the controller swaps hands at the completion of a level, which is a godsend if you've got a short attention span. It's also great since it gives you many well deserved rests as you tackle the mammoth task of completing Kid Chameleon. Without the transforming feature the gameplay would be dead, but with it's inclusion the game is immediately spiced up and much more fun to play.

GRAPHICS
For a genesis game Kid Chameleon's graphics are reasonable. They weren't the kind of graphics that made you're eyes pop out and got the floor all sticky from drool, but they got the job done. There wasn't a huge amount of detail put into the backgrounds, just some fuzzy trees and clouds with a few other things thrown in there. It wouldn't have hurt the developers to put a few brighter colours in as the darker pallette that was used often sets a mood that's just too gloomy for a platformer. The chameleon himself, and all his various transformations that he undertakes look very nice, it's a pleasure to control someone that looks that stylish, but overall the graphics were a bit of a disappointment.

SOUND
The audio is too sparse to have any real impact. The sound effects are few and far between and the background tunes are hardly noticeable. In the way of effects there is a lot of simplicity, most of the sounds are just dull thuds are silly whoooshy sounds, some of the noises that the enemies emit can be intimidating at times, but thats as deep as they go.
The background music often pops up during the times that you're most prone to panicking and can instil a real feeling of urgency into whoever's playing the game. It's just too bad there isn't enough of it.

LIFESPAN
The lifespan of Kid Chameleon isn't outstanding, but the game should last a fair amount of time. Each time the console was turned on for a game a deep commitment was being made as each game could last hours at a time. But everyone has their limits, there's always just one level which will prove their undoing, and once this level has been reached then the future of the game will not look promising. There's only so many times that a person can put up with breezing through the first easier levels.

CHALLENGE
Kid Chameleons challenge is perhaps too difficult for most of us. Only the most persistent gamers could have a chance if finding their way to the end, and that's only a slim chance. The learning curve, as written above, is decent, but about half-way through the game the difficulty peaks and making any more progress becomes near impossible. The fun factor was good for a start, but the more times you start up a new game the less fun there was to be had. IF ONLY YOU COULD SAVE IT!

OVERALL
Overall, Kid Chameleon was probably one of the best platformers you could get on your genesis. With some innovative gameplay and good level design it was very close to being a winner. If there was twenty or thirty levels less then it could have been great!
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GOOD POINTS
- The transforming. The shape changing breathed life into the game
- Provided a better challenge than the ''cuter'' platformers
- One game can last all day

NOT SO GOOD POINTS
- The story's a little hard to swallow
- Dodgy sound effects
- One game can last all day
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GRAPHICS - 7/10
SOUND - 4/10
STORY - 5/10
GAMEPLAY - 8/10
LIFESPAN - 8/10
CHALLENGE - 9/10
FUN FACTOR - 7/10
OVERALL - 7/10

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 05/06/00, Updated 09/10/01