#113: Cyber Spin

That font is the best thing about this game...

Cyber Spin is another game that's new to me, and that I was way off base when I guessed what it would be from the name. Cyber Spin sounds like some kind of cyberpunkesque skating game or probably a platformer that looks like Tron. Instead it turned out to be a high speed racing game. The name probably comes from how easy it was to make the car spin out and crash into a wall? And by crash I mean bounce, because apparently this car can crash into a wall at ~400 km/h and take no damage like it was a bumper car.

Screwy turn ahead!

The one good thing this game has going for it is the way it flashed up the direction of an upcoming turn to let you setup for it. No track map was annoying but at least the little diamond signs gave me a chance of steering at high speeds.

Game over? I guess?

I raced a bit and got this cryptic game over screen. I'm guessing I had to actually race in under 45 seconds? I tried again, made use of the turbo button to put up what I thought was a pretty good time, and still was over 45 seconds. That's about enough of this game.

Speaking of a turbo button... They made a pretty bad use of the buttons on the controller! Y, a pretty standard button, did nothing. B was for breaking, something that was never needed in the first level at least. A was for going fast and you had to hold it down. X was turbo. I'm pretty good at holding down a button while pressing another one, but the Y into X combo is a weird one. I feel like that means it rarely got used in games while I was developing my controller skills. I was able to do it, but it was weird. L and R caused big skids in one direction or the other. Again, not needed on the first track. Maybe those are more relevant later on? I'll never know.

I don't much care for racing games, especially ones like this that look like they should be realistic but aren't. I get the appeal of games that emulate real racing even if I don't like them much. I get the appeal of games that go way crazy and are obviously using fake physics like Mario Kart. I don't get why someone would make a game like this one, or why someone would want to play it. Well done, past me, for avoiding this one.

Rating: D-

#97: King of the Monsters

Godzilla?

I recognized the name King of the Monsters from when I was a kid but I couldn't remember much about it. I thought it was going to be a Rampage style game where you were beating up a city with an enemy monster. In a sense that's exactly what you do; the game is a wrestling game between two giant monsters that takes place in the 'ring' of a city in Japan. It turns out delivering a piledriver to Godzilla does a far amount of collateral damage to the city at large!

YES!!!!!!!

King of the Monsters is immediately amazing for this mode selection screen. The window at the top cycles through a list explaining what all of the buttons do! Absolutely nothing beats this as an introduction to a game. Tell me what the buttons do so I know what my options are! I guarantee I never would have known how to use the beam special attack if they didn't tell me right away. (The beam attack seemed abysmally bad so my fights would have gone better without trying to use it but the point still stands.)

German Suplex? On it!

As far as wrestling games go this actually seemed pretty good. The controls made sense, and were smooth. The concept was a little corny, but pro wrestling is a little corny too, so it fit. Only having 4 characters seemed a little weak but maybe you could unlock more as you played the game? I didn't really play for very long as I was getting ready to go out of town for the weekend but what little I played (2 matches) was enough to have some fun. I imagine multiplayer would be pretty good too, and I like that it was an option.

Rating: B+