The game takes place in the year 2097 A.D. in NEO N.Y. The city is run down and controlled by a warlord named Raptor. Raptor has unleashed an army of ruthless, mutating Morphs upon the city to enforce his brand of order. Only two special forces agents, Slash and Alix do not submit to Raptor's will. Raptor decides to hatch a plan to kidnap Alix, so Slash, and more importantly his magic X-Kaliber sword, will come to him in an attempt to try and rescue her. The game consists of two modes. The first modes gameplay consists of side-scrolling action. The player can jump and swing a sword at enemies. The player can also deflect projectiles with the sword. The game also features one on one boss fights that are set up similar to a fighting game. The second mode is a two player duel that is set up like the one on one boss fights but is between two human controlled players.
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Have you ever watched somebody play a game, said somebody being one of your friends or somebody online, and they just… you know… suck? Like, they COMPLETELY suck. Whether they are playing the game for the first time, or they have a good amount of experience with it, they just can’t seem to get the handle of it, whether it be trying to pass a specific challenge or just try to play the game in general, and you watch as they just can’t figure it out in. In some scenarios, you could potentially offer your input to try to help them out, or, if you are anything like me, you sit back and laugh at their misery all the way through. Not only that, but you also think to yourself “Hey, you know what, I’m good at video games… I could do a much better job at playing this game then this CHUMP could”, which was basically my mindset whenever I went into X-Kaliber 2097.
I had never played this game before the day I am typing this review, nor do I really know anything about it, but I have seen it before, primarily through a YouTube video featuring Arin of the Game Grumps playing the game. He didn’t really get far at all, getting destroyed by the first boss, which could be looked at from two different perspectives. On one hand, maybe the boss was just actually pretty difficult, or, on the other hand, considering some of Arin’s previous endeavors when trying to play games meant for children, maybe he just straight up fucking blows, which is a distinct possibility. I figured, since enough time has passed, I would give the game a shot myself to see if it is actually as hard as it looks, and from my experience, I can say that it is not… or at least, it isn’t completely impossible anyway. But anyway, you all came here to hear me review a game, not show up some rando on the internet, and from what I played, I can say that X-Kaliber 2097 is………. ok. It’s fine for what it is, and it has some appeal to it, but it doesn’t offer anything too special that plenty of other games at the time were also doing.
The story is typical for a game like this, where in the far future of 2097, the world has fallen, and crime has run rampant throughout, all run by a mysterious individual named Raptor, who ends up kidnapping one of the only humans unaffected by the crime known as Alix, so it is up to Slash, Alix’s partner/friend/possibleloveinterest, to equip himself with the X-Kaliber blade and go rescue her, which… I mean, what do you want me to say, it’s a Mario plot, and Mario plots are about as exciting as waking up in the morning. The graphics are alright, having detailed visuals for the enemies, stages, and bosses, but it all looks very generic for a SNES title, which can also be said for the music, which, while not bad by any means, isn’t anything all too special, and some tracks are repeated over and over again, but it sounds good enough for what you will be doing in the game, and the gameplay/control is simple enough, having some complex mechanics for the combat, but most of it is your standard SNES platformer affair that you know all too well.
The game is a 2D hack and slash platformer, where you take control of Slash, go through six different stages full of generic SNES-era environments we have all seen plenty of times, slash your way through plenty of enemies while combating any enemy fire that you will see along the way, gather plenty of food items to heal yourself in the nick of time so that you don’t end up as a rotting corpse on the floor, and take on plenty of one-on-one fights with the game’s bosses, who will provide a great amount of challenge and will test how much you can spam your sword swipe when necessary to fend them off. It is a game that solely relies on its difficulty most of the time to carry itself, which in this case isn’t necessarily a good thing, because outside of all that, there isn’t much else to get too excited about here. But hey, it still manages to be decent, so I guess I can’t fault it for that.
What you see is what you get with this kind of game, as it is as straight and narrow as you would expect. You run from left to right, up, down, or whatever direction the game chooses, you slash a bunch of dudes, you get items, you cry whenever you get hit and inevitably die, it is all too familiar for platforming enthusiasts like myself. It feels like it is trying to be something like Strider or Run Saber, except it forgot about the part where the gameplay needs to be fast and exciting in order to achieve a fraction of that likability. Outside of the main game though, there is also a Duel Mode present in the game, which pretty much functions like a fighting game mode. You pick between six of the game’s characters, fight a friend in a one-on-one battle, and see which one of you is the best person in the friend group while everyone else cowers in shame. I didn’t play this mode for this review, but from what I have seen, it doesn’t really look like anything too fun, and is just something tacked onto the package just in case you are tired of getting smacked from the main mode.
Which speaking of, that is one thing I can give this game, because where it fails to bring the same energy and fun that Strider and Run Saber has, it does bring in the difficulty that those games had, because HOLY FUCK, it is hard. For the record, I did play through the whole thing on Normal mode, and even then, there were plenty of enemies coming in to take shots at me, throwing in attacks that I couldn’t quite avoid in time, and a limited amount of range for your attacks which can lead to some disastrous encounters if you aren’t prepared. Not to mention, the bosses are on an entirely different level when it comes to their difficulty, as it feels like luck whether or not you can win some of these… but then you get to bosses like Raptor, who you can just defeat by repeating the same basic attack over and over again with how open he leaves himself most of the time, so reality, maybe I really am just a chump who can’t play most of this game properly without getting smacked down.
Overall, despite how the main gameplay does work well enough, as well as how brutal the game can be at times, X-Kaliber 2097 is one of the most average and lifeless games I have ever played from the SNES, having all of the ingredients here that could make for a pretty great hidden gem for the system, but not knowing what to do with any of them, which ends up making one of the most forgettable gaming experiences that I have had in recent memory. I would only recommend it for those who desperately need something new to play, specifically from this era, because otherwise, there are many, MANY better options for you out there. But anyway, before we end this review off, I would like to point out that, for some unexplained reason, this game has SEVEN difficulty options… SEVEN, ranging from Very Easy to Hardest. Normal is just the third difficulty option, so I can’t even imagine what it would be like to try to play on the Hardest setting. My guess is that, once you enter the first level, Slash just immediately has a heart attack and dies, giving you an instant game over. It would be a much better alternative then going through what he does have to go through.
Game #556
I had never played this game before the day I am typing this review, nor do I really know anything about it, but I have seen it before, primarily through a YouTube video featuring Arin of the Game Grumps playing the game. He didn’t really get far at all, getting destroyed by the first boss, which could be looked at from two different perspectives. On one hand, maybe the boss was just actually pretty difficult, or, on the other hand, considering some of Arin’s previous endeavors when trying to play games meant for children, maybe he just straight up fucking blows, which is a distinct possibility. I figured, since enough time has passed, I would give the game a shot myself to see if it is actually as hard as it looks, and from my experience, I can say that it is not… or at least, it isn’t completely impossible anyway. But anyway, you all came here to hear me review a game, not show up some rando on the internet, and from what I played, I can say that X-Kaliber 2097 is………. ok. It’s fine for what it is, and it has some appeal to it, but it doesn’t offer anything too special that plenty of other games at the time were also doing.
The story is typical for a game like this, where in the far future of 2097, the world has fallen, and crime has run rampant throughout, all run by a mysterious individual named Raptor, who ends up kidnapping one of the only humans unaffected by the crime known as Alix, so it is up to Slash, Alix’s partner/friend/possibleloveinterest, to equip himself with the X-Kaliber blade and go rescue her, which… I mean, what do you want me to say, it’s a Mario plot, and Mario plots are about as exciting as waking up in the morning. The graphics are alright, having detailed visuals for the enemies, stages, and bosses, but it all looks very generic for a SNES title, which can also be said for the music, which, while not bad by any means, isn’t anything all too special, and some tracks are repeated over and over again, but it sounds good enough for what you will be doing in the game, and the gameplay/control is simple enough, having some complex mechanics for the combat, but most of it is your standard SNES platformer affair that you know all too well.
The game is a 2D hack and slash platformer, where you take control of Slash, go through six different stages full of generic SNES-era environments we have all seen plenty of times, slash your way through plenty of enemies while combating any enemy fire that you will see along the way, gather plenty of food items to heal yourself in the nick of time so that you don’t end up as a rotting corpse on the floor, and take on plenty of one-on-one fights with the game’s bosses, who will provide a great amount of challenge and will test how much you can spam your sword swipe when necessary to fend them off. It is a game that solely relies on its difficulty most of the time to carry itself, which in this case isn’t necessarily a good thing, because outside of all that, there isn’t much else to get too excited about here. But hey, it still manages to be decent, so I guess I can’t fault it for that.
What you see is what you get with this kind of game, as it is as straight and narrow as you would expect. You run from left to right, up, down, or whatever direction the game chooses, you slash a bunch of dudes, you get items, you cry whenever you get hit and inevitably die, it is all too familiar for platforming enthusiasts like myself. It feels like it is trying to be something like Strider or Run Saber, except it forgot about the part where the gameplay needs to be fast and exciting in order to achieve a fraction of that likability. Outside of the main game though, there is also a Duel Mode present in the game, which pretty much functions like a fighting game mode. You pick between six of the game’s characters, fight a friend in a one-on-one battle, and see which one of you is the best person in the friend group while everyone else cowers in shame. I didn’t play this mode for this review, but from what I have seen, it doesn’t really look like anything too fun, and is just something tacked onto the package just in case you are tired of getting smacked from the main mode.
Which speaking of, that is one thing I can give this game, because where it fails to bring the same energy and fun that Strider and Run Saber has, it does bring in the difficulty that those games had, because HOLY FUCK, it is hard. For the record, I did play through the whole thing on Normal mode, and even then, there were plenty of enemies coming in to take shots at me, throwing in attacks that I couldn’t quite avoid in time, and a limited amount of range for your attacks which can lead to some disastrous encounters if you aren’t prepared. Not to mention, the bosses are on an entirely different level when it comes to their difficulty, as it feels like luck whether or not you can win some of these… but then you get to bosses like Raptor, who you can just defeat by repeating the same basic attack over and over again with how open he leaves himself most of the time, so reality, maybe I really am just a chump who can’t play most of this game properly without getting smacked down.
Overall, despite how the main gameplay does work well enough, as well as how brutal the game can be at times, X-Kaliber 2097 is one of the most average and lifeless games I have ever played from the SNES, having all of the ingredients here that could make for a pretty great hidden gem for the system, but not knowing what to do with any of them, which ends up making one of the most forgettable gaming experiences that I have had in recent memory. I would only recommend it for those who desperately need something new to play, specifically from this era, because otherwise, there are many, MANY better options for you out there. But anyway, before we end this review off, I would like to point out that, for some unexplained reason, this game has SEVEN difficulty options… SEVEN, ranging from Very Easy to Hardest. Normal is just the third difficulty option, so I can’t even imagine what it would be like to try to play on the Hardest setting. My guess is that, once you enter the first level, Slash just immediately has a heart attack and dies, giving you an instant game over. It would be a much better alternative then going through what he does have to go through.
Game #556
1 estrela pela história que daria um bom enredo para um anime. De resto: horrível e chato. Os chefões são extremamente difíceis, exceto, que ironia, o ultimo chefão. Horrível, horrível.
Joguei a versão americana, e não a japonesa. Não pretendo jogar a versão japonesa, e se eu jogar será para ouvir a trilha sonora, pois é diferente.
Joguei a versão americana, e não a japonesa. Não pretendo jogar a versão japonesa, e se eu jogar será para ouvir a trilha sonora, pois é diferente.
A decent sidescroller action game clearly inspired by the Highlander films and featuring a cool OST. Check it out if you're running out of SNES games to play.
Motivos por ser um jogo de merda:
1. esse jogo é uma merda
2. inimigos chatos, muito repetidos
3. personagens duros demais
4. bosses com momentos muito especificos pra atacar
5. dropei esse lixo
1. esse jogo é uma merda
2. inimigos chatos, muito repetidos
3. personagens duros demais
4. bosses com momentos muito especificos pra atacar
5. dropei esse lixo
This is a pretty absurd game. Generally it's just average, or slightly below, but there's some things of interest to talk about.
The biggest selling point apparently is that these guys Psykosonik did the OST, but it's just okay and reuses songs very often. For example, the opening theme is also used for stage 3, 6, the final boss, and the credits. Also, the entire soundtrack is different in the original Japanese release. And the character names, and the story, and even the title (Sword Maniac). The English localization can pretty much be summed up as insane 90s futuristic bullshit, and I have no idea what the original is about.
Gameplay doesn't change any, though. The stages are okay, but the bosses switch to this 1v1 fighting style and they are all ABSURDLY difficult. They all work about the same, but I never really got down a strategy because they always block a grand majority of attacks and it seems random when they don't. I ended up just abusing save states at each one until I was past them.
Other than those things though, there's not really much to say. Weird ass game all in all.
The biggest selling point apparently is that these guys Psykosonik did the OST, but it's just okay and reuses songs very often. For example, the opening theme is also used for stage 3, 6, the final boss, and the credits. Also, the entire soundtrack is different in the original Japanese release. And the character names, and the story, and even the title (Sword Maniac). The English localization can pretty much be summed up as insane 90s futuristic bullshit, and I have no idea what the original is about.
Gameplay doesn't change any, though. The stages are okay, but the bosses switch to this 1v1 fighting style and they are all ABSURDLY difficult. They all work about the same, but I never really got down a strategy because they always block a grand majority of attacks and it seems random when they don't. I ended up just abusing save states at each one until I was past them.
Other than those things though, there's not really much to say. Weird ass game all in all.