Source: Electronic Gaming Monthly – Issue number 90 – January 1997
Electronic Gaming Monthly was probably the best video games magazine of the late 1990s. It covered all the available systems in the U.S. and was also covered imports and rumors about upcoming systems and games. Some of the systems covered in 1997 include the Nintendo 64, PlayStation, Sega Saturn, Super NES, Genesis, Game Boy, Game Gear, Neo Geo, and 3DO.
The January 1997 issue includes:
Departments
- Insert Coin – A look back 20 years to the introduction of Pong and Star Wars to today when a new wave of Star Wars games is coming along, including Shadows of the Empire for the N64.
- Press Start – News this month includes the introduction of the Dual-Analog pad for the PlayStation, more M2 cancellations and doubts about its future, a new PlayStation model, possible future networked N64 games, Sega expands its online presence, Super Mario Kart R will become first four player N64 game, Arcade Shark N64 joystick introduced, and much more.
- Gaming Gossip – News and rumors including: Midway making Quake for the Nintendo 64 and PlayStation and Joust 3D for the N64; Mortal Kombat 4 coming soon; San Francisco Rush coming to the Nintendo 64; Lode Runner coming for the Nintendo 64; Sega develops arcade games with M2 board including Jurassic Park: The Lost World; and much more.
- Next Wave Protos – A sneak peek at games in early development, including Spider (PlayStation), Command & Conquer (PlayStation), Oddworld (PlayStation), Carmageddon (PlayStation), HED (Nintendo 64), Sentient (PlayStation), Dynasty Warriors (PlayStation), Mission Impossible (Nintendo 64), Rocket Jockey (PlayStation), ID4 (PlayStation), WCW (PlayStation), XS (PlayStation), SWIV (PlayStation), Brahma Force: Assault on Beltlogger 9 (PlayStation), Rush Hour (PlayStation), Ark of Time (PlayStation), and more.
- Review Crew
- Dragon Force (Saturn) – A fantasy based military sim.
- Sonic 3D Blast (Saturn) – A port of the Genesis version with improved graphics.
- Bug Too! (Saturn) – A pseudo-3D side-scrolling platform game; Virtual On (Saturn), Sega’s fighting mech game ported from the arcade to the Saturn
- Toshinden Ura (Saturn) – One of the worst versions of Toshinden.
- Virtua Cop 2 (Saturn) – A good port of the arcade light gun shooter.
- Batman Forever (Saturn) – A mediocre game based on a mediocre Batman movie.
- Adventures of Lomax (PlayStation) – A 2D side-scroller featuring Lemmings.
- Robotron X (PlayStation) – Basically, the classic Robotron unnecessarily “upgraded” to 3D.
- Suikoden (PlayStation) – A large and pretty solid fantasy RPG.
- Tunnel B1 (PlayStation) – An action game in which you must race against the clock. Looks and game play are somewhat reminiscent of Wipeout.
- King’s Field 2 (PlayStation) – First person RPG.
- Project X2 (PlayStation) – A difficult 2D horizontal shooter.
- Tempest X (PlayStation) – A nice update of Tempest and it includes the original.
- Tobal No. 1 (PlayStation) – A somewhat underrated (for the time) 3D fighter.
- Twisted Metal 2 (PlayStation) – A pretty good sequel to the original and the game to have at the time if you like vehicular combat games.
- Dragonheart (PlayStation) – A 3D hack and slash game based on the movie that garners comparisons to Skeleton Warrior. Average at best.
- Samurai Showdown 4 (Neo Geo) – Another 2D fighting game classic on the Neo Geo.
- Street Fighter Alpha 2 (Super NES) – The newst street fighter game on the SNES seems to have the worst game play and control.
- Maui Mallard (Super NES) – A pretty good 2D side-scroller for the SNES.
- Tricks of the Trade – The trick of the month is for Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 and gives you access to a secret menu that provides a variety of options (including enabling playable bosses). There are also tons of other tips and tricks for Twisted Metal 2 (PlayStation), Project Overkill (PlayStation), Die Hard Trilogy (PlayStation), Namco Museum Vol 2 (PlayStation), Ultimate Mortal Kombat 3 (Super NES), Tobal No. 1 (PlayStation), Waverace 64 (Nintendo 64), NHL Powerplay ’96 (Saturn), Tomb Raider (PlayStation), Street Fighter Alpha 2 (Saturn), Motor Toon Grand Prix (PlayStation), Star Gladiator (PlayStation), Triple Play ’97 (PlayStation), Super Mario 64 (Nintendo 64), Time Commando (PlayStation), Battle Arena Toshinden Ura (Saturn), Wipeout XL (PlayStation), Pilotwings 64 (Nintendo 64), Gun Griffon (Saturn), Gunship (PlayStation), Machine Head (PlayStation), Loaded (Saturn), and more.
- Special Features
- Cover Story: Mechwarrior 2 – A detailed overview of Activision’s classic mech combat sim game. I played the PC version but never tried the console versions.
- PlayStation Expo ’96-’97 – A semi-annual event held in Chiba, Japan. The highlights of this show were the five new arcade conversions released by Namco including Soul Blade, Time Crisis, Ace Combat 2, Namco Museum Vol 5, and Rage Racer.
- Retrogaming – It’s a little disconcerting to read a retrogaming article from a magazine that is itself now retro. This article takes a look at some of the many compilations available at the time including Namco Museum Volumes 1-4, IREM Arcade Classics, Thunder Force Gold Pack, Gradius Deluxe Pack, Arcade’s Greatest Hits as well as some standalone re-releases like Outrun, Asteroids, Afterburner II, Paperboy, Donkey Kong, Space Invaders, and Pac-Man as well as some modern updates to classic games. The article also asks “Will the PlayStation become a dinosaur in the years to come?…will the Super NES one day become an archaic system?”
- MDK – A sneak peek at this third-person, 3D shooter that was attracting a lot of attention at the time.
- Team EGM – Previews and reviews of sports games. Previews: FIFA ’97, Big Bass World Championship, Open Ice, Space Jam, and Grand Slam Baseball. Reviews: Hardcore 4×4, Jet Moto, 2 Extreme, In The Zone 2, Street Racer, NBA Hang Time, NBA Jam Extreme, and Motor Toon Grand Prix. Plus an interview with Cedric Ceballos whom I think was playing for the Phoenix Suns at the time.
- Interface – The letter of the month deals with Nintendo’s botched launch of the Nintendo 64. Basically, there weren’t enough units produced to match pre-orders and on top of that they prioritized bigger outlets like Wal-Mart over smaller specialty gaming stores so that they got them earlier. Also, letters about PC vs. console gaming, the cost of “modern” consoles vs. the Atari 2600 when it was new, upcoming Saturn releases, complaints about the review format in the magazine, and more.
Features
- Shoshinkai – A look at Nintendo’s annual trade show. Some highlights include a look at upcoming games for the Nintendo 64 such as Blast Corps, Star Fox 64, Golden Eye, Mission Impossible, Yoshi’s Island 2, and Mario Kart 64 among others. There was also a look at the 64 DD disk drive for the Nintendo 64 but that was never released outside of Japan.
- Mortal Kombat Trilogy – Which version is better, the PlayStation version of the Nintendo 64 version? There are trade-offs of course. The PlayStation version has 7 more characters and CD quality sound but also more loading time. The Nintendo 64 version on the other hand offers a 3 on 3 game mode that the PlayStation version doesn’t have. Three out of four EGM staff picked the PlayStation version as the best.
- Final Fantasy VII Update – An update on the continued development of the much anticipated 7th installment of the Final Fantasy series. This was actually the only Final Fantasy I ever spent significant time playing.
Next Wave
- Saturn – Previews of recent or soon to be released Saturn games including Scud (80% complete), Virtual On (100% complete), Spot Goes to Hollywood (100% complete), and Heir of Zendor (95% Complete).
- PlayStation – Previews of recent and soon to be released PlayStation games including Batman Forever, Psychic Force (85% complete), Warhammer: Shadow of the Horned Rat (95% complete), Persona (100% complete), Final Fantasy VII (25% complete), Discworld 2 (60% complete), League of Pain (90% complete), Project X2 (95% complete), Re-Loaded (90% complete), K-1 (75% complete), and Allied General (100% complete).
- Neo Geo – Previews of recent or soon to be released Neo Geo games. The only one this month is Samurai Showdown (100% complete).
…and more!
