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Either someone put an undetectable substance in my tea this morning, or I’ve just spent the past fewhours playing a game that has none of the whizz-bang graphics to emulate typical Roger Dean artworkthat a Voodoo 3 can achieve, but does have gameplay to compete with the some of the best mentally-challenging games around. You’re a rabbit, but dispel all thoughts of Bugs Bunny. You’re more akin to the Simpsons when theybegan life as crudely-drawn fiiller material during The Tracey Ullman Show. If you were brought upin the 1980s on the Atari VCS, Asteroids and the Vectrex, you’ll know what to expect in the visualdepartment. Prepare to reminisce as your stick-figure rabbit walks the ribbon that resembles ahospital’s heart monitor in glorious white-on-black monochrome.
The idea is simple: stay alive by jumping over potholes, looping loops and climbing hills withunrivalled eye-to-hand co-ordination, the land creations arising from the game’s interpretation of thetinkly Japanese pop nonsense whining away in the background and pressing the correct buttonsprovides the way forward, a la Parappa the Rapper. Succeed and the game speeds up, obstaclesbecome more tricky as they combine – requiring two simultaneous buttons to be pushed – and you’rea winner. Fail to complete the task and you’ll morph into a frog. Do even more badly and you’ll turninto a worm with a TV for a head (!)
The music does improve though, but you only have yourself to blame if you don’t like it. Vib Ribbonallows you to remove the game disc, pop in your own CD and dance to your own tune. Sony have evenplaced downloadable tunes online from Nightmares on Wax, Utah Saints and Moloko. I’ve yet to tryThe Best of Val Doonican though.
Overall, you have to see it to believe it. When I first read the description for our Vib, I thought it wasas enticing as school exams. The gameplay took some getting used to but it’s certainly worthpersevering with and pretty soon you’ll be fighting off anyone who dares steal your joypad for theirslice of entertainment.
As platformers go, it has an air of originality about it – and how many games can claim that trophythese days?
Overall: 4/5
This review was on Freeloader.com before they closed down.
Review copyright © Dominic Robinson, 2000.
Reviewer of movies, videogames and music since 1994. Aortic valve operation survivor from the same year. Running DVDfever.co.uk since 2000. Nobel Peace Prize winner 2021.