PlayStation

Well, after waiting (and waiting and waiting) for the sequel to the astoundingly popular Lunar: Silver Story Complete, Working Designs has finally unleashed it's epic RPG Lunar 2: Eternal Blue. Was it worth the long delay? Well, if you enjoy the old school flavor of 2D graphics, and if you miss the days of games like Final Fantasy IV and VI, then Lunar 2 is well worth your hard earned cash.

Back in the sixteen bit days, there was the SNES and the Genesis leading the way in gaming excellence. While the Super Nintendo Entertainment System had most of the best RPGs, Sega had a few gems up its sleeves with the Genesis and the Sega CD. While Nintendo fans stayed busy playing the latest Square Soft masterpieces, Sega fans were content to play titles from Working Designs. One such title was Lunar: Silver Star Story. While the Sega CD was limited in terms of animation quality, the title did make use of state-of-the-art animation, for its time, in a CD based game. The game enjoyed success, but never the same as Square did with its Final Fantasy series... Now, after many years, Working Designs has translated Lunar once more. This time, the game is played on the Sony Playstation, in the US, instead of the Saturn. (Game Arts also has a Saturn version available in Japan) Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete is the long delayed and much hyped title from Working Designs. After waiting years for it to be released, all I can say is that it was well worth the wait.

When you first sit down and play this one, you might think that you were playing the '99 version, but after a while you will realize that 989 sat down and beefed up the features and the authenticity. When I say beefed up authenticity, I'm talking about the game's plays, which were designed by UCLA head coach Bob Toledo. These plays are different than the other plays that you would find in another football game like Gameday 2k (yuck). The plays are unique, in that you won't be using the same play over and over again for a different team; you have to use a different play.

Benched
The Gameday series has tried to improve itself nearly every year, and this year is no exception. This year they added tons of new features, animations and game modes in hopes of making this the best Gameday ever. All of the options from the last title are back, like all of the NFL teams, season mode, create-a-player mode, and everything else. Although they added all of these new bells and whistles, Gameday fails to impress in the gameplay department, as you will soon find out.

Developers are starting to see a market in games that illustrate the importance of relationships. Final Fantasy VIII's heartfelt love theme is a sterling model of this idea, and Thousand Arms in another example that drives this point home. Red Company has brought us a turgid cache of loopy games like Bonk's Adventure and Sakura Taisen, but this latest hybrid RPG looks to be their best showing yet.

"Suikoden spells war"' is the terse slogan Konami is toting to promote their new game, Suikoden II. But this sequel to the original melee masterpiece also spells love, intrigue, betrayal, and a great game.

Star Ocean: The Second Story is Enix's long-awaited sequel to the their elusive Super Famicom title, Star Ocean. Although I know little about this game's predecessor, the follow-up has easily made a name for itself as one of the most unique RPG's on the Playstation.

Police dog. When you hear that phrase you usually think of overdeveloped Dobermans whose soul purpose is to disarm goon with their bite and sniff out drugs. In Tail Concerto you play a police dog with a different agenda; you control an expedient mech to aid you in capturing feline felons and transporting them to the penitentiary֯r would that be pound? The territorial war is on between these two species, and you can expect a lot more from Bandai's quirky adventure in a dog eat cat world.

"Hutchi-son, Hutchi-son, does whatever a spider can..."

Okay maybe not, but thanks to those wonderful folks at Activision, I really can spin a web any size, catching thieves just like flies, providing, of course, I'm playing their stunning latest release, Spider-Man, on the Playstation.

What has happened to 989? It seems like their games get worse every year. If you ask me, I think that they should just give it all up and stick with games like Syphon Filter. Faceoff 2k is just a minor upgrade to the lethargic Faceoff 99. For the diehard fans, the minor upgrades might be enough for you to shell out your hard-earned money, but for the rest of us--this is just a rental.