• Add Review
  • Subscribe
  • Nominate
  • Submit Media
  • RSS

Spike Lee Was My Hero

  • Addit
  • 05/21/2013 10:23 AM
  • 2261 views


A Game Made By: Strangeluv
Created Using: RPG Maker 2003
It's A: ACTION Game
That Roughly Takes Around: 45 Minutes To Complete
And It's A... COMPLETED GAME!!!


So it’s been awhile since I’ve played any of Mr. Strangeluv’s games - and for good reason; the man is a freakin’ maniac, A MANIAC, I TELL YOU!!! But even if he is a total maniac – or a mad genius - and he lives someplace far away that I’ve never visited in my lifetime (probably), we still love him here for him being weird. And that being said, Strangeluv sure has made a lot of pretty epic, if not slightly off, stuff. Lemme set things up, shall we. Before creating such masterpieces such as A Home Far Away and Leo & Leah, the man was that of a different legend. Back during the Gaming World days of yore, Strangeluv was just the lovable goofball who hung around his various internet buddies on the forums and just liked to create strange things – like strange poems and short stories - and make people laugh, even if things went sour for him. Around the forums, there used to be a man simply known as Psyburn. And let me tell you this, Psyburn and I…didn’t really see eye-to-eye on a lot on a lot of things - but he still was a good person to me (yes, I said it). So, “What does this have to do with the review?” Let’s just say…that, one day out of the blue – and for probably no reason other than sheer stupidity – Strangeluv got out of his chair, rushed downstairs and watched an afternoon movie that was directed by the legendary Spike Lee. Then after watching that said movie, he soon afterwards played some Sonic: The Hedgehog 3 on his old Genesis. Then after getting a Game Over screen on Hydrocity Zone, he soon slipped in some Resident Evil while watching a bunch of stray dogs digging through his yard while thinking of Psyburn. Then, suddenly – something amazing went through his brain, like a train about to smash open a brick wall, “What if I, yes I, decided to make a little short parody game about Spike Lee capturing a bunch of furries with Psyburn being the lead role and put it up for jokes and giggles? TROLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL!!! THAT WILL WIN ME MISAOS!!!” And thus my friends was how this game came into production…I think. Now, this might make you guys quiver with fear or utter stupidity, whichever comes first, but out of ALL his released titles in the many years, THIS is my favorite of the bunch. Yep. No trolling on that. I have no idea why; I just like this game, that’s all. But that being said, it’s been awhile since I’ve played it, not since around two years ago, the last time. And at the time, I never really properly gave it a review since…you know, being lazy and all. So that’s what we’re going to do right now.

The Story


Hell, I would still play it.


After viewing a great reproduction of the classic opening to the original Twilight Zone (great touch, BTW), the game soon switches over to our main cast of oddballs and furry things playing a game of special rules baseball. Meet Psyburn, a teenage Asian boy with the IQ of a bumper-sticker and the attitude of a prissier Jet Li. Along with him, he is also with an incredibly bodacious, if not dangerous, babe with a shotgun and the itchy trigger fingers of Chuck Connors, Shotgun Girl (who I swear should get her own game; she’s so f’in COOL). Spitz The Wolf, a teenage wolf…thing, also is among of Psyburn's geek squad. And let’s not forget the fastest thing that this program can NEVER possibly process: SONIC THE – FREAKIN’ – HEDGEHOG!!! How these four met will forever remain a mystery (especially Sonic). But something quite troubling is in the air! After hitting a potential long ball with the swing of a nearby stick that he found, it looks like Psyburn’s ball has just connected to one of the windows to Spike Lee’s house. Instead of just running away in fear of not getting caught (which is what I would have done), Psyburn decides to man up and apologize to the famous film director for breaking one of his windows – like a good sport. After approaching the spooky-looking manor, Shotgun Girl and the rest of Psyburn’s friends feel a bit uneasy about all this, just at the moment that Spike Lee appears from nowhere to greet them. After apologizing for his mistake, and instead of just phoning the police or paying for the damages, Spike Lee seems to be rather humble at the fact that the four have managed to appear in front of his doorstep – very humble, indeed! He soon invites them all inside for tea, cookies and milk, which Psyburn instantly accepts. Little do they soon realize that there is more to Mr. Lee than meets the eye. Little do they realize…

The Gameplay


GOD DAMN, SQUIRRELS!!!


The gameplay in Spike Lee’s: A Twilight Zone is broken up into various mini-games for each character to complete. Some of the mini-games range from shooting things to getting the hell outta there. Let’s go over some them all, shall we?

PSYBURN’S PATH:
BELOVED RAPTORS (lol, I see what you did there):
In this stage, Psyburn must guide an annoying dinosaur (that constantly gets in your way – constantly) named Chocopuffs to find his lost long love while avoiding raptors and feeding him along the way (so he doesn’t turn Psyburn into an afternoon brunch). This mini-game is pretty well constructive, as there are plenty of feeds and health power-up’s to keep you alive. The only thing that peeved me off is how Chocopuffs always seems to scatter away all over the place when you try to feed him. Luckily, it’s not too much of a bother.

SAVING PRIVATE RHYHORN:
Similar to the previous stage (but at least you don’t have to carry a baby dinosaur on your back – STARFOX ADVENTUES), avoid mines, targets, and various Pokemon (what?) as you make your way up to base camp. This game can get a little tough at times, but it’s all-good if you just keep your eyes peeled on the ground the best you can. The screen shakes a bit too much for my tastes, but it’s fine.

TO KILL OR BE KILLED:
(Okay, that’s not the real name of this level – but it might as well should!) You must pick off all the guards with a nearby sniper rifle to progress on through. Out of all the stages on Psyburn’s route – this one was the most CHALLENGING to get through. You’re supposed to snipe the guards from the opposite direction as they are walking in order to hit them, but I always seem to screw up or not make a direct hit, which resulted in many, many annoying deaths. I think this mini-game could have been done a bit easier, or done entirely differently instead of just going down this route. Perhaps you could have done something straight out of Metal Gear, where Psyburn could sneak up on the guards rather than the previous confusing mechanic; it might make this mini-game more fun and less confusing for the player rather than what he originally did.


SPITZ’S PATH:
THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE FURRY PT. 1:
(I HATE SPITZ’S MINI-GAMES WITH A PASSION! THEY SUCK!!!) This is the one path I always dread while playing this game, even though it’s not entirely terrible. Let’s start with the first mini-game. Spitz must play a quick draw event with a member of an enemy Squirrel gang in order to take him down. It may sound rather simple, but the way this game works out is really, really confusing and not really much fun. You see, once it’s time to draw, you’d think all you have to do is move the cursor directly on the enemy and hit him, right? Well, that’s what I did the first time and died right after that. What you NEED to do is move the cursor to Spitz, reload his weapon, first - THEN hit the enemy in order to land a hit (derp). Ugh…

THE GOOD, THE BAD, AND THE FURRY PT. 2:
Wait – wait just a second, here! I recognize that train! Yes, I remember now. This mini-game was directly ripped straight out of Western Story (an old Rm2k3 game that was never completed, sadly), not just the game but the code too! That’s horrible. But, to its credit, Strangeluv did ask for permission to use it and the original author said that it was okay. I find it kind of ironic. The original game that this was based off of was never was completed, and a direct copy is rather hard to find. So, in some ways, at least a part of Western Story lives on in this mini-game. As for the mini-game itself, all you have to do is hit the enemies on the train while hitting a bunch of treasure chests to reload your gun. This mini-game is a bit buggy (just like the original) and the hit detection is a bit off in some cases, but it’s enjoyable…a bit.


SHOTGUN GIRL’S PATH:
THURSDAY THE 12th:
Aw, yeah – my favorite mini-game of the bunch, Thursday: The 12th! (I swear, Shotgun Girl needs her own game -- now!!!) In this horror based mini-game, you must press your way through a mansion full of reoccurring zombies while using your beloved shotgun to live to die another day. I love this mini-game! All you have to do is shoot stuff (and what person doesn’t love that?). If I had to knit-pick, there are two problems with this game: Number one, sometimes when you shoot something and try to go up a flight of stairs or through a hallway to move on to the next map, the game will lock up and freeze, forcing you to restart. And as for the second problem, sometimes I get hit twice after a zombie is supposed to bite you once. Whatever.

LOCKED IN A CORNER:
(Again, not real name) This one is a bit of a toughie. Using a cross-hair while Shotgun Girl stands in the middle of a room, you must clear out the overcoming zombies as they try to rush you to EAT YOUR BRAINS!!! This game CAN be tough because the hit detection is off a lot, forcing you to reset quite often. The only good saving grace about this game is that a lot of the enemies take an extra second to actually hit you when they get close, so that gives you plenty of time to turn around and shoot, so that’s nice, I guess, giving us a bit of a handicap.


SONIC THE HEDGEHOG’s PATH:
KINKY KONG:
A pretty well-done mini-game, despite the limitations of the maker. I remember first playing this many years ago and was just like, “Wow. He actually made a working Sonic The Hedgehog level in RPG Maker!?!?!?” At the time, it was pretty amazing stuff. Nowadays, it’s a bit clunky and the increased speed factor can kill you at times. Still…not too shabby, as this is my second personal favorite mini-game. As Sonic, you must race your way to the end of the stage – just like his own games, but this time, to the left side of the screen (muahahaha)! What makes this mini-game suffer a little is the control scheme and the incredibly slow pace that Sonic isn’t known for (which is perfectly fine because the engine isn’t capable of making such fast paced platforming games like this). Shift, for example, is used to kill enemies while 1 is used to speed-up for clearing the ramps. Now…why couldn’t he just use shift for speeding-up (or not use it at all and just have Sonic naturally boost) and enter for attacking? That would have been so much easier. Anyways, this mini-game is pretty well done and is definitely a keeper in my books.

I’ll leave the last few out for yourselves to discover and play, but that’s pretty much all the mini-games this game has to offer. Looking at the list, Strangeluv definitely did a masterful job at handling and crafting a lot of these mini-games (even if one of them was stolen :P). Most of them are incredibly fun and challenging enough not to be too difficult but just on the right level of insanity. Some of the controls can be a bit wonky in most of the games (or unresponsive), but most of them work just fine in my opinion. It’s amazing because with most joke games, like this, the author wouldn’t usually bother to spend a lot of time crafting good level design and replay value into something like this, but this game seems to have done that very well. Even though the mini-games don’t offer much in terms of extras, I still find myself coming back to these mini-games to experience them once awhile (except the first Spitz stage – because it SUCKS), and that says something. The collection of mini-games, here, are fun, challenging, and offer a lot for such a tiny package.


The Soundtrack


A girl with a shotgun, killing zombies!? SOLD.


The soundtrack for this game is average at best. A lot of the tunes are recognizable and have been done to death countless times by many other games on the site. From what I recognize off the top of my brain, I heard a lot of music from Super Metroid, Banjo Kazooie, Chrono Trigger, and Super Mario: RPG just to name some. Now, since this is a JOKE game the music choices work all right and seem to do the job just fine. But the score could have had some more originality in its approach and used more classical movie themes from some of Spike Lee’s films; that would have been genius! And it’s not like Strangeluv is incapable of doing that, seeing how he has placed more non-gaming themes for his other projects. Instead, we get the unoriginal tunes we’ve all heard countless times before. I do have the praise one thing in the sound department, though: the opening. Using that classic setup from the original Twilight Zone was a pretty good nod to the source material, as it really set up the game in a nice way (and not mention gave me a laugh). The organ theme was also a nice comedic touch. I would have loved to have had more tunes from some of Spike Lee’s classical works in his movies, but I guess the overall result didn’t strain too much from the experience.

The Aesthetics


I’ll say!


For its time, the graphical presentation in Spike Lee’s: A Twilight Zone looked rather nice and pleasant for a joke game, something that was a nice change to the norm that we saw back in the day. Today, they look a bit outdated (not to mention there are some image problems with some of the facesets). Mapping seems to be fine, but not the best that I’ve ever seen Strangeluv do, which is okay for a game such as this. There also seems to be a few panoramas thrown in for effect. As for the sprites, they look fine, but they also clash with a lot of elements on the screen. Obviously, for starters, there is Sonic’s sprite. Since he has no upward or downward pose, it looks a bit off compared to the other regular character models. There are also a lot more detailed models thrown in with regular 2k3 sprites that clash as well. Also, some of the facesets look a bit too pixelated (like Eddie’s). I guess the presentation is manageable, but I can’t help thinking it could have looked a bit more polished in a couple of spots. Oh well, no biggie.

The End Result


WASTE THE MUTHERF**KERS!!!


It’s been quite sometime since I lasted played this game. And at the time of its original release, I thought it was one my personal favorites, not to mention one of the best joke games I’ve ever played on the site. But…father time does strange things on some of our old favorite classics. Playing this game today – fidgeting with the frustrating control scheme – some of the magic that once was, was lost to me. That being said, I still enjoyed playing this game for the umpteenth time (I’m that dedicated). I don’t know what it is about this game that keeps me coming back, but I think it’s the clever writing, excellent mini-games, and the fact that Psyburn is actually cool for once in something. But also I admire it for its replay value, as it keeps drawing me back in to play every now and then. It’s incredibly difficult for a lot of people to make something that can stand the test of time and keep people playing their game over-and-over again. With this, I feel that Strangeluv struck a chord with me and created a simple, but creative joke game that will stand the test of time with me for more years to come. Sure, it has aged a bit; the control schemes for some of the games are clunky; and nobody likes Eddie Murphy – or Sonic for that matter – anymore in today’s world, but there was once a time that everybody did. And it was glorious, just like this game. Glorious.

Spike Lee…you’re still my hero, even if your final form was too epic for the game to run properly and crashed because of it.



(BTW, this should have been the ending credits theme.)


OVERALL GRADE:
4 / 5 - B ~ Pretty Darn Good!!!

Posts

Pages: 1
Thanks, bud. I just hope that, somewhere out there...Strangeluv is reading this whole thing right now... Then he finally gets off his lazy butt and makes me a spin-off sequel starring "Shotgun Girl" -- HOT DAMN IT!!!
Wow, I just saw this. I'm... I'm impressed. A fitting tribute to a.. ghost in a shell. I followed Spike Lee's advice. He said, "Do the right thing." So I made this game.
Did Spike Lee ever tell you to do a "spin-off involving 'Shotgun Girl?'" I hope so, friend... I really hope so...
Pages: 1