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When I was a teenager, I used to see this game on the shelves of game shops and think to myself, 'Who would want to play that? It looks like an old, ugly arcade game.' How foolish I was.

Rez has so much style. It's actually quite difficult to describe because it's both a geometric and rhythmic experience. This game encapsulates a certain idea of 2000s techno music. Musically, it falls between trance, synthetic acid house, and hard tech. It's important to note that the artists who created the music for this game (Ken Ishii and Joujouka, at least) are recognized electronic music producers who were important in the 1990s and still are today. One wonders if the game was created from the music or vice versa.

The level design remains a mystery to me: it feels like constantly diving into a neon fractal in a world that defies all physics. Level 4 is particularly epic. The game operates solely on its flow, linking a certain form of visual abstraction that perfectly syncs with the electronic music played as a mix, not track by track. The game can truly take you to an 'out-of-body' state that only a nightclub with lasers, strobe lights, and smoke machines can evoke.

You can still feel Sega's total mastery over the arcade game genre.

I know this is a little late now but Merry Christmas everyone! I would've put this review out on Christmas but I was busy and also timed my playthrough of this game a bit wrong. Either way, hope everyone had a great holiday! I definitely did and it also ended with a bang since I played Rez.

I kinda don't have a lot to say about this one at all. The main takeaway is this game is an absolute treat visually. That's the main appeal of the game and I'm telling you, it's insane. You really just need to play it and witness it yourself cuz it's amazing and the biggest reason I'm rating it so high.

The OST is very good. I wouldn't listen to it outside of the game personally, but alongside the gameplay it's perfect and very much fits the game I think.

The actual gameplay is pretty simple actually. It's an on rails shooter that has a single powerup you can use when you obtain them and you level up and down depending on if you get hit or not. It's extremely straight-forward so it may be lacking to some people who would want a more complex game mechanically but for an audio-visual delight of a game like this, it's perfectly fine.

The game is also only like two hours long but tbh I think that's an absolute perfect length for a game like this, otherwise the wow factor might wear off if it was longer.

Like I said before, you really need to play the game yourself to see just how damn impressive the visuals are because...man they're absolutely insane. Another Dreamcast banger, this console's on fire so far!

8.5/10

From a pure audiovisual standpoint, Rez is one of the coolest games ever made.

A psychedelic rail shooter where you crash through cyberspace while the best music you've ever heard in your entire life is constantly building in the backround. A synesthetic chamber of sights and sounds that jacks itself into your brain and never lets go.

The gameplay is incredibly simple, but the execution of it works perfectly in conjunction with the game's presentation in order to elevate the experience to being trancelike. Shooting down the machinations of Rez caters to this indescribable primal feeling that just feels so natural and compulsive.

While one could view it as being shallow, I ultimately see Rez as a prime example of a game being much more than the sum of its parts. It's a borderline spiritual experience. Not in spite of its simplicity, but because of it.

FEAR IS THE MIND KILLER

What an amazing experience. Everything about the presentation and feel is just so cool. Gameplay is mechanically simple but very satisfying, and the variety of encounters is great and paced out perfectly. Everything about it is so elegant that it feels hard to talk about much other than just saying you should play it yourself if you haven't. The main reason I even wanted to write anything is to talk about my experience with trying it previously. I played the first level in the remake a couple of years back (also tried it in VR, which looked cool but did not play very well), and I thought it was neat but it didn't compel me to keep playing. Trying the original Dreamcast version it instantly clicked, it really feels like the way the game is meant to look and feel. Maybe not everyone's experience but I don't see anything about this that needs updating anyways. Anyways, absolute banger of a game, easiest 5 stars in a while.

Rez es una de las mejores experiencias audiovisuales que he jugado nunca. Es fascinante como une canciones a los sonidos que generan tus disparos junto a un aspecto visual casi sinestésico que nos propone un viaje trascendental por el universo digital y la propia evolución de la vida. Es una de las joyas experimentales que nos dejó Dreamcast que merecen tanto la pena jugar y experimentar, es un viaje relativamente corto, no es complicado y te tendrá bailoteando sin darte cuenta de que estás siendo partícipe de esa música. Tetsuya Mizuguchi debería ser un nombre más destacado en la industria y este no es más que otro claro ejemplo de ello. Rez es casi perfecto sino perfecto, dura lo que ha de durar y por muchos años que pasen sigue siendo una delicia audiovisual. Jugad Rez, en cualquiera de sus versiones, no te arrepentirás.

A surreal rail shooter that eschews complex gameplay for a killer soundtrack and stunning visuals by Tetsuya Mizuguchi (Tetris Effect, Child of Eden).

This game boasts a psychedelic light show depicting a virus in the future trying to hack its way through a mainframe to release an artificial intelligence - at least that's the vague justification behind the abstract wireframe world you float through in each stage. The visuals are inspired by the 80's cyberpunk vision of digital cyberscapes akin to Tron and the early CGI from films like The Lawnmower Man. Its crude by todays standards but for a stunning visual upgrade there's always Rez Infinite on steam.

The gameplay has you shooting waves of enemies and their projectiles but each attack is accompanied by sound effects that turn your actions into an extension of the soundtrack blurring the line between shooter and rhythm game. The surreal environments take you on a wild journey that grows in speed and intensity, the beat and tempo escalating until you reach the bosses which take the form of intense thrumming fever dreams with unforgettable visuals.

If you're familiar with Tetsuya's other works you'll recognize the trademark style over substance approach. It may not have deep gameplay but Rez is more of a sensory experience, the 'trance vibrator' is a testament to that. I rate this highly as it remains one of the earlier examples of designers challenging the conventions of gaming, pushing the boundaries between art, game, and what a gaming experience can be akin to the likes of LSD Dream Emulator.

Twenty-first GOTW finished for 2023. It's hard to pin down my feelings on this game. On one hand, it's one of the most visually gorgeous games I've played in any medium, and the soundtrack (while not necessarily my jam) compliments the gameplay and style perfectly. On the other, it feels much longer than it's actual game time, is quite vague, and pointedly existential. I'm so glad to have gotten this one off the backlog, and it'll likely stick with me for a while for various reasons, but I don't have a desire to revisit it any time soon.

Rez reminds me a lot of Crazy Taxi. Both are arcade-esque experiences where the game is fun to play in short bursts, but are pretty repetitive and don't actually offer much content. Also both were on the Dreamcast. Rez is a 3D on-rails shooter where you fly through a wireframe soundscape shooting down any enemy that files within view. The visuals and music are definitely the highlights of the game, and probably the only reason anyone remembers it. If this game had a pretty static backdrop, it would've fallen to the wayside of history. It's a game that I think I would rather watch someone play than play myself, a trait it shares with a later game by its creator, Tetris Effect. I just didn't like the actual gameplay. You move a cursor on screen and hold down a single button. There isn't much to it, and I found the levels more tedious than I did exhilarating. The VR version of the game might be more enjoyable, because you can both immerse yourself in the game as well as gain more precise controls. As for the original version, it's a mediocre game in great packaging.