Very different to what I expected - I went in thinking it would function effectively the same as DMC but it's the polar opposite. Attacking is a commitment and there's no reason or reward for doing endless combos (which aren't really possible regardless) - the mechanics demand that you finish every fight as quickly and efficiently as possible. In that sense it's a pretty good ninja game, and it also goes a long way to making it feel like an actual successor to the originals.
It has the problems that games of this era and this kind tend to have - there's some jank, and the camera is as much an enemy as anything else on screen - but when it works it really works and it's so stylish. You also just cannot go wrong with the modern-day ninja game, it's an inherently hilarious and cool genre. Boys cutting demons in half as they run up a skyscraper in the rain to keep their boss fight appointment with an evil wizard on top of a flying pagoda above the Empire State Building and other such nonsense. It's always good!

genuinely horrifying, do NOT look up the inspiration for this game

edit: just wanted to give some more actual thoughts on this game

Everything about this game other than the gameplay is phenomenal. Insanely high quality aesthetic for a genesis game: The dark atmosphere, the giant highly detailed monstrous creatures, the subtly unsettling ambience of the music, the fucking cries of pain Ecco emits when he takes damage, all of this helps present the ocean as what it really is: A dark, confusing, and terrifying place where god knows what can happen. Also, as mentioned above, the inspiration for this game is fucking insane.

Conversely, the gameplay is raw sewage. No other way to put it. Just plays like ass. Borderline unplayable.

Despite the low rating, I really do love this game. Incredibly unique piece of art. Just a shame it plays like balls.

"Ecco, if we breathe air, why do we live beneath the waves?"

Before you read on, I'd like you to listen to the music I linked to in that quote. There's a chance it might not hook you, but that track in particular used to mesmerize me when I was little. It kind of perplexes me how beautiful it is, especially coming off something like the GEMS driver, which is often derided for sounding like well....flatulence. Nevertheless, to this day I still think it's one of nicest pieces of music I've heard out of the 16-bit generation. The entire opening sequence still captivates me, from watching Ecco and his pod swim through their home to the close up of Ecco himself at the title screen, it always entices me to watch the entire thing and stay there for a while before I begin the game proper.

Like many I too also enjoyed the start of the game where I just swam around with my pod and got to talk to my fellow dolphins. Not many people like the controls, but I think they're okay. Maybe I'm just in denial and have grown accustomed to them throughout the years, but Ecco's ability to torpedo through the water never ceases to put a smile on my face. It definitely kept me entertained as a kid for the longest time despite never actually progressing from that starting area for a while. I was just enjoying my time as a dolphin, doing tricks and chatting with my pod! Hanging out with my friend Ecco, what more could I ask for? Of course, at some point though...I jumped too high.

WHAM!!

The biggest jumpscare that absolutely shattered me when I was little. Make no mistake, that entire sequence shellshocked me for a very very long time. Not just the sudden disturbance and loud noises, but also the fact that I was now all alone in the unforgiving ocean. No friends here, not even the passerby fish for me to munch on. It was just me...alone...

What awaited me beyond these waters? Regardless, this is when I talk about something else that always astonished me about Ecco's game, which was...just how mean it was. As a young one, I stood absolutely no chance against this beast. Ecco's game...did not want me to beat it. The puzzle solutions made no sense, and checkpoints did not exist. Oh, you died? I guess that's too bad, you'll need to start the sequence over again. Super R-Type back on the SNES trained me on the ways of never messing up, but that game was a walk in the park compared to Ecco, it was straight-forward at the very least. By the way, do you by chance like auto-scrollers?

Welcome to the machine, welcome to hell. Stay a while, I hope you're comfortable...

Suffice to say, even as an adult Ecco's game is nothing but a stone wall of tedium and frustration. In a way it perfectly represents the ocean itself. It's beautiful in every way you can imagine, the ocean's serenity is captured perfectly and the screen even darkens as you descend lower to the depths of the bay, where it then displays the sheer terror and danger of the abyss itself with it's outrageous difficulty, of which I'm sure it would be just as hard to survive there as it is to survive in this game. I marvel at this game every single time I boot it up, as it is a true work of art, a hard to play work of art, but a work of art nonetheless.

Why do I bother playing this game then if it so terrible? To see my friend Ecco, that is why. I still enjoy spending time with him and his pod in the starting screen, jumping for joy in the bay until the game decides to jumpscare me and begin the adventure. An adventure of hardship and dread. Will I ever beat it legitimately? Who's to say? Maybe one day I'll finally get through it, but for now...

Goodbye Ecco, see you my friend....until next time......

Konami beat-em-ups SUCK - they're impactless quarter-munchers that coast on their copious amounts of IP fanservice. Turtles 1 in arcade, Simpsons, Vendetta, X-Men, - can't stomach even a little bit of them without losing my mind, and their place in retro culture permanently contimated beatemups' reputation as a mindless button-masher genre.

But Turtles in Time on SNES? It's good. The action hits hard and fast, the stage design is timelessly iconic, the bosses are solid, most of Konami's long-running issues with hitbox and enemy design feel so much cleaner here - and DAMN, the TUNES.

Why this is the one good Konami joint? Who knows. My guess is, with Final Fight and Streets of Rage making waves, the bar was getting set high and they had to clean up their act. It's not too uncommon for console versions of brawlers to reign in the arcade jank, either.

It's still too repetitive tho - even with the occasional golem and robot enemies, it's hard to stay invested in beating up faceless foot clan dudes for 9 whole stages. The I-frames suck and lead to one too many deaths caused by collateral enemy charges. They give you so many continues and lives that there's basically no way to game over, but you still have to restart a stage after losing all your lives anyway - like c'mon man, you gave me the keys to the kingdom, get rid of the potholes while you're at it.

It's still a Konami beatemup, but it like, fires enough really striking neurons for that to be okay.

Recommended by [maradona as part of this list! ]

As one of the key contributors to the brand identity of Sony’s gaming wheelhouse, Naughty Dog has centered itself as a pillar of prestige gaming, an ideologue pristinely focused on scavenging pop cultural landmarks on a relentless tear to put video games on a creative pedestal, sullying the individuality inherent to the medium in favor of some perceived notion of being considered “art”. Where we find the studio now, aping Indiana Jone’s blockbuster exploits in Uncharted and cutting surface-level highlight reels of post-apocalyptica in The Last of Us, exists primarily as a production house for wannabe-films in the name of cinematic gaming, but tracing back through the history of the developers work shows off a lost pedigree. Severed from the modern image of today, the Naughty Dog of the mid 90s was a beast cut from a different cloth, a proponent of the infamous Mascot Wars that defined the generation.

While the adage doesn't ring true today, the common knowledge of the 90s held that console exclusives and brand identity were the sword and shield brandished by the gaming industry. On the hallowed ground of internet forums, the nu-playground politics of the console war were waged equally in tech specs and pretty faces. By the time Sony entered the fray the battlefield was already established, with Sega and Nintendo locked in an eternal struggle for relevance. Competitors had risen, fallen, and been cast aside, but Sony remained as the last man standing against the twin behemoths. The dual-sided clash saw fit to tear the fate of the console market asunder, rendered desolate in the shockwave of mutually-assured destruction… Until he, the bearer of Sony’s curse, rose from primordial depths. Branded with the mark of enmity, the flag-bearer of PlayStation’s campaign cast a mocking shadow over the decade. Born into strife, with the serrated edge of the attitude era gripped tightly in his paw, Crash Bandicoot dug into his trench, grubby paws grasping for cultural leverage.

Mel Blanc-ian, a comic centerpiece made as much as a figurehead, Crash was the perfect scapegoat, an idol to cherish and ridicule in equal measure. A jester on the battleground of the modern technobandit, the mascot of yore breathed life into the indefinite scuffle that is brand identity. Becoming synonymous with genres and companies all their own, mascots, especially those in the realm of the mascot platformer, became analogous for not only the series and franchises they encompassed, but for the consoles they inhabited as well. Sega had Sonic, Nintendo had Mario, and Sony, fresh out the gate, had Crash Bandicoot, the mass-production beast forged by the wreckage of a thousand prototypes. The role, aside from poking fun at corporate rivals, was purely accessory, but as touchstones in the memories forged in the scorched earth of Gamefaqs forums, the mascot became an inescapable notion.

Years have since passed, and the Mascot Wars have drawn to the close. While some, the ever stalwart, cling to delusions of supremacy, the giants of the conflict settled into uneasy truces. With the three leaders co-mingling, interweaving, the tribalism of the past decades remains spoken in hushed whispers. Sega's great defeat in the Summer of 2001 saw the colossus fall, not by Nintendo's hand, or even by Microsoft's emerald super-soldier, but at the blade of Sony's masterwork, the PlayStation 2. With the fall of the esteemed leader, the war flickered, faded and died. However, for every victory, the heroes of the past are just as easily forgotten: with success coordinated in equal part by masters of tactical espionage and gods of war, the mascots that defined history were brushed away, hardened cynicism overtaking the endearing face of plucky spirit. Crash, Sly, Croc, even the maligned Gex, all shunned by the tides of time.

The era defined by the mascot has long since passed. Yes, false idols clammer to the throne, halls besieged by Hat Kids and Yooka-Laylees, but the original generation has faded, gussied up only to be showboated in recollections and remasterings. The soul, flickering against the growing cynicism of the game industry, now rests as post-ironic detached nostalgia.

…none of this has anything to do with the actual game of Crash Bandicoot, and that’s because there’s very little to say about Crash Bandicoot. Like any property in the 90s that uses the aesthetics of tribal villages, shockingly racist! Literally my only comment on the content of the game itself. ¯\(ツ)/¯