Gex - The COMPLETE History (1993-2015)

the uk chip is a vital component in a new machine designed by the californian company 3do with panasonic to be launched later this year it represents a new age in home video technology in 1993 electronics company panasonic threw their hat into the console war race and released the 3do as you all know the early 90s was a period characterized by mascot platformers modeled after the success of sonic the hedgehog to bolster their newly released console panasonic looked to game company crystal dynamics to create the 3do its own mascot platformer crystal dynamics landed on a gecko called gex the team would follow what i like to call the pucci formula injecting gex with some distinct personality with sunglasses a permanent smirk plastered on his face and a repertoire of witty one-liners performed by dana gould that had put bubsy to shame gex was ready to shake up the gaming industry when his first game titled simply gexx hit the shelves in 1995. and shake it up he did gex ended up being the best selling game on the 3do system which is kind of like coming first in a race where all the other competitors are tortoises but would be ported over to the sega saturn playstation and windows the game was relatively well received for a number of reasons it was a no-nonsense 2d platformer game that actually utilized gexx's abilities as a gecko always refreshing to see in the oversaturated mascot platformer marketplace gex had the ability to scale walls attack using his tail and use his long tongue to swallow power-ups the game was built around gex's gecko-ness something a lot of other games tended to ignore seemingly picking an animal out of a hat at random the graphics or more specifically the character sprites had a digitized look to them putting the game in line with the likes of donkey kong country which helped it to stand out visually and the game took place in the media dimension with each level taking place in a different parody version of a movie or tv genre or trope like a cartoon land a kung fu world and a spooky graveyard area each level was peppered with goofy references for instance check out this kung fu dude with the hat and the lightning hands does he remind you of anyone the story revolves around gex a lazy bum coasting in life after inheriting a fortune from a deceased uncle he's something of a tv addict and ends up being sucked into the media dimension by the villainous res who wants gex to be the tv network's new mascot a kind of ironic storyline considering gex's mascot status gex ends the game defeating res escaping the media dimension and choosing just to stay at home and watch more tv in all honesty i think that gex's characterization as something of a lazy tv addict is kind of fun it clashes a bit with the marketing and with his image but it kind of sets him apart from some of the other more try-hard video game characters of the 90s maybe gex was so successful because he's kind of relatable certainly a man after my own heart ultimately gex strikes me as a game that is greater than the sum of its parts it's a game that's a black belt in nothing but a brown belt and everything it looked nice and played nice the really interesting thing about gex is that a more ambitious initial story staged gex as a hollywood stuntman in a meta game where each level was a kind of television set but this storyline along with a whole host of content and levels was eventually dropped from the project due to time constraints gex has sort of gone down in legend as a game that had a toxic development cycle that sat to the energy out of the team who were a little frustrated with the sheer amount of cook content and ideas one developer on the project after finding out several of his levels were being axed even went so far as to hide a little easter egg in the game a message containing the contact information of the project development manager urging players to give her quote unquote a piece of your mind suffice to say when this easter egg was uncovered the developer got fired but it's a sad illustration of the strife surrounding the game's development ultimately though the game was both a financial and critical success and spawned a whole series a series that would continue to be controversial though in slightly different ways in the future what's different about gacks now well dex obviously compared to the first one is like night and day because it's a full 3d environment much like mario but uh we've been able to accomplish getting fully textured environments with no sacrifice to real-time gameplay we're trying to create the goal of providing naughty dog crash bandicoot-like environments but in complete free-roaming experience there is no other game that i think will compare to gexx we i think there are pieces of gex that are related to mario i don't think uh games like blasto have a chance against it after the likes of bubsy and earthworm jim fell by the wayside when the 3d era dawned in 1998 gex made a very successful leap into the third dimension with the sequel gex enter the gecko before i dive in and start showing too much footage let's talk about one elephant in the room straight away curiously the us and uk versions of the game feature two different voice actors in the role of gex i never knew this until years later in the us version dana gould provided the voice for gex in all three installments gould is an american stand-up comedian who at the time was something of a comedic journeyman popping up in minor roles in shows such as mad tv seinfeld and other things the real estate wizardry of tom vu at work gould lent his voice to the role of gex in the original game here in the uk too but hearing his much larger repertoire of quips and gags in the sequel is a little jarring for a brit like myself hey i feel like i'm trapped in boy george's pants why well to me gex's most iconic voice actor will always remain leslie phillips phillips was in the uk an incredibly beloved comedy actor who was part of a large cast of characters who contributed to the carry on series of comedy movies they were admittedly a little before my time and maybe yours too so you might well know leslie better for his last major role as the sorting cat in harry potter gryffindor phillips was an older gentleman when he voiced gex and he brought to the role a kind of suave sophistication even porting over his catchphrase from the carry on series ding dong i always found the juxtaposition of gex's old voice with his action-packed kung fu persona a charming rather than jarring detail of gex's character helping to steer him away from his roots as a poochie clone no offense meant to dana gould but i don't feel gex has the same charm or depth of character with the more atypical somewhat obnoxious delivery that gould opted for since retiring from the public's eye i have resigned myself to a life of solitude for two years i started my day watching kung fu theater days then weeks blurred into one long greasy telethon the next thing i know some government goons show up at my place it seems they've caught a whiff of old mr sunshine himself rez since retiring from the public eye i have resigned myself to a life for two years i started my day watching sweep days then weeks blurred into one long sorry afternoon chat show the next thing i know some government goons show up at my house seems they've caught a whiff of old mr sunshine himself he's back in the media dimension some of phillips's lines though are a bit shall we say mature considering the audience for this animal mascot game probably included a lot of kids i know a lot of the jokes went right over my head ah the heavens gate poster boy ah to see the world as keith richards does gex's character arc continues to paint him as a bit of a loser which is kind of refreshing in a weird way geck starts off the game again as an out of shape television and takeaway addict only accepting the mission to fight off rex again in exchange for a suitcase of cash the game ends with gekk sharing a hotel room with a red-headed lady who is incidentally nikki from the pandemonium series of games and presumably engages in some tale time with her sonico 6 eat your heart out gexx was a game that really knew its core audience it's funny to watch the series evolve as gex changes from being a layabout to an austin powers style ladies man slash sex pest by the series third installment to say that gex took inspiration from super mario 64 would be a gigantic understatement the structure of the game is almost identical there's an overworld and you enter levels not through giant paintings but televisions each level is rife with collectibles but also contains several different missions to be completed in return for a remote control similar to the stars in mario 64. ultimately though it's a formula that works and one that gex manages to pull off quite gracefully gex from a control perspective is a little stiffer than mario and has a smaller moveset he can crawl on certain surfaces bounce on his tail use his tongue to collect flies and could perform a leaping karate kick but the main enemy and the main issue in this game is yeah it's the camera it's awful it betrays the player it makes some of the platforming very difficult and it makes a really annoying cuckoo sound when you try and move the camera in a way that the game doesn't like gex's stiff movement and the volatile camera make the game frustrating at times but in many ways it was the atmosphere of the game that was the core focus of gex the thing that distinguished gex from the competition the most was how heavily drenched in pop cultural references gex really was this gex commercial playing in the background a parody of the opening scene of scream released around the same time is kind of a giveaway there are essentially six main levels each of them absolutely rife with references and parodies of movies and tropes it's kind of like a turbocharged version of the first game the first level most players enter is toon tv a super colorful vibrant world akin to toontown in roger rabbit complete with hunters who look exactly like elmer fudd there's also a scream tv a horror theme level stocked with frankenstein monsters and murderous dummies it genuinely scared me as a child kung fu theatre is a obvious parody of old martial arts flicks with a really cool chinatown aesthetic and there's also a computer a prehistoric and an outer space theme level too even the overworld with its music and tuxedo-wearing gex is a play on the pierce brosnan james bond revival of the late 90s the game went whole hog with its pop cultural pandering and i feel like it kind of worked and helped make gex stand out in a sea of similar cartoony platformers there is a massive downside to the derivative nature at the heart of gexx though it doesn't age particularly well as many of the references lose their context and their charm and the copycat nature of a lot of the assets results in an ip that lacks a solid core while the enemies the music the characters and power-ups in mario canon have been recycled time and again in gex they kind of can't resulting in a weaker ip overall though a hefty mix of blue humor and pop culture pandering made the second gex game a b-tier player in the platformer genre in the late 90s which was a good position to be in before we move on i'll very quickly mention that when gex made his way to japan he was rebranded slightly for the japanese marketplace gexx was dubbed spintail and the awesome cover shows him smoking a cigar you couldn't do that nowadays the final installment of the gex series was gekk's deep cover gecko from 1999 released for the ps1 and n64 gex is the story of a franchise knowing what works and leaning into it hard deep cover gecko upped the ante on both the sex and pop culture let's start with the sex because sex sells after all take a look at the frankly quite shocking magazine adverts from around the time for some reason crystal dynamics brought on board malice andrada to act in the game as gex's secret agent love interest who is marlies former actress in baywatch and former playboy playmate of the month well that's one thing gex has that mario sonic and rayman certainly don't a playboy playmate of the month love interest and to go with it a hugh hefner-style smoking jacket too for american audiences dana gould reprised his role again as gex but bafflingly for uk audiences a third voice actor was brought in to voice the gecko british actor danny john jules most famous for appearing in red dwarf voiced gex this time around bringing a more youthful and cool personality to gex hey baby what's shaking always wondered what it was like behind the scenes at alton towers i feel a disturbance in the force or is it my underpants the missions just keep getting weirder i feel a little overdressed john jules was less suave but more energetic than leslie phillips in the role and i feel never strayed into the territory of overdoing it in essence gex is the james bond of gaming i like to interpret it like this gex is actually a secret agent code name just like james bond that's adopted by a new gecko when the old gex retires hence the different voices what do you think in all seriousness gex 3 is probably my favorite gex game due to a number of factors the overworld the move set the way gex controls and feels the submissions in each world not a huge amount has changed since the last installment it's still a game that apes mario 64. and apes the dozens of other collectathon games of the late 90s gex 3 however feels bigger better and more ambitious level themes are no longer recycled meaning there's a much greater breadth of different levels on offer the levels feel a lot more bespoke than in the previous game packed with little gags funny little set pieces and even mini games to keep things fresh the murder mystery level had a stuffed bear wandering around the grounds which again scared the stuffing out of me as a kid to add further to the variety gex 3 is packed with race against the clock collect-a-thon bonus stages along with a host of other bonus playable characters you can play through some bonus stages as a random dinosaur called rex gexx's slob of a cousin cuz or gexx's butler absolutely named alfred who pops up throughout the game as a kind of walking talking tutorial welcome sir please come on in entering the training area should allow you to brush up on your skills he kind of reminds me of the butler in tomb raider the game feels artistically like a much richer experience the media dimension has been revamped it's no longer a dull place it's now the equivalent to a level in its own right brimming with detail and fun to explore each level grants gex with his own set of catchphrases a unique costume and unique abilities in the anime world gex gets to wear a mecca style suit complete with a jet pack that lets him glide around and save japanese school girls in the christmas level he dons a woolly sweater a woolly hat and can snowboard around there's also as you would expect plenty of pop culture references again gex is kind of like a time capsule you can put it in your playstation and relive the 90s just by looking at the cover you can tell oh right this game came out when austin powers was popular and then when you go and face the first boss in the game you look at him and think oh right this game came out when wwf was at its height because this is obviously stone cold steve austin and would you look at that in the credits you can see one of the devs had a stone cold steve austin blow up punch bag next to their desk again for me who's filled with nostalgia this is all kind of awesome but for new time players it's probably not one of the coolest things about gex 3 is the cut content and strange easter eggs that are continually found as far as i know at least three cut levels have been found by people online one of them is a jaws themed bonus level then there's an alternate wild west and an alternate fairy tale themed level these levels actually look like a lot of fun it's a shame they were cut out gex 3 also features two really odd easter eggs that speedrunners have happened upon two strange rotating cubes one depicting a baby and one showing a guy in a speed racer outfit these mystery cubes remained undiscovered for 20 years and are presumably just strange easter eggs and nothing more it really makes you wonder if there's more to be found within gex 3 i think this is the ultimate gex experience sure it's derivative of bigger more successful titles but gex approaches the genre with a kind of ambivalence that conker's bad fur day would later get a lot of credit for gexx was the first rated r cuddly superstar of gaming and i need the world to know it and in typical gex fashion the game once again ends with gex getting laid and that was the last time we'd see geck's headline a major console release there are a couple more games starring gex to mention quickly both enter the gecko and deep cover gekko or should i say deep pocket gecko had game boy colour ports both games were 2d and both games were perfectly serviceable but they lacked a lot of the personality of their 3d counterparts vanilla 2d side-scrolling platformer experiences pale imitations of their console counterparts deep pocket gecko has a little bit more of that gex personality of the two with more colourful and gimmicky levels i'd say it's probably the better game because it's got a lot more charm and it feels a little less lazily designed both can be passed up pretty safely though even for the most ardent gex fan for the sake of completeness i need to mention that gex has cameoed in two games since deep cover gecko first gexx was an unlockable character in everybody's golf 2 for the ps1 in 1999 alongside sir dan from medieval and sweet tooth from twisted metal it's a decent golfing game but beyond the cute caddy outfit there's not a huge amount more to say about this one gex's final on-screen sighting was as a playable racer in the 2001 crystal dynamics game mad dash racing released as a launch game for the original xbox this game gave us our fourth and final gex voice actor none other than the legendary billy west who you might know was the voice of stimpy philip j fry or the red eminem gex didn't have much dialogue however more just a collection of sound effects and mini sound bites this would unfortunately be the last time we'd see geck's star in any game the really sad thing is gex died quite suddenly despite plenty of future plans gexx hasn't made a gaming comeback in 1999 gex nearly joined the ranks of other popular gaming franchises like sonic with a planned action figure range launch from time makers resource the range was going to include a bunch of different costumed gex's along with a host of villainous characters unfortunately the company went under in late 1999 before the figures were launched denying gets the chance for plastic immortality apparently ign hosted a contest in 99 to win some gex action figures whoever won that competition i hope you've still got hold of them because they're damn rare bizarrely enough two gex books did squeak out into the market in 2000 a how to draw gex art book in case you really want to draw gekks and it gets novelization which is a truly bizarre sounding concept to me considering gex's threadbare plot they don't quite make up for the loss of the action figure line another project that didn't see the light of day was a planned gex trilogy collector's edition set that was advertised in 2002 but never materialized for some reason the most tragic thing about gex is that at some point in time some concept art for a potential gex 4 leaked online a game that was being planned for the ps2 and nintendo gamecube the giant buddha style gecko looks particularly awesome but these two pieces of art are all we know about gex 4. it seems it never left the drawing board a final twist in the gex saga brings us to 2015. after gaming giant square enix acquired crystal dynamics they released a press release stating that they are excited to see what talented teams might do with any of the gex fear effects or anachronics ips there could be hope yet for a return or a hd remaster for the livable gecko under the square nx banner though no noise has been made about gex since that tiny 2015 reference and that my friends is the story of the myth the legend the is or was gex gecko gone but not forgotten a lost icon from a bygone era his games serving as a time capsule to the 1990s will he ever make a comeback we can only hope and email square enix every day until it happens i guess and there we go i would love it if you let me know in the comments who your favorite gex voice actor is and if we do see a gex hd remaster what would it be called gex recharged gex rebroadcast i don't know the best suggestion will receive a hearty thumbs up and that's it if you enjoyed please kindly give this video a like and consider subscribing here's a few other pop culture history lessons to sink your teeth into just remember every day it's tail time [Music] you

Channel: Johnny Vector

Views: 12,731

Rating: 4.9281044 out of 5

Keywords: gex, gex deep cover gecko, gex enter the gecko, gex gbc, gex game boy, gex 2, gex 3, gex golf, mad dash racing, history of gex, gex retrospective, gex review, gex gecko, 3DO, hbomberguy, hbomberguy response, hbomberguy gex, gex deep pocket gecko, gex history, gex pal, gex dana gould, gex billy west, gex leslie phillips, gex danny john-jules, dana gould, leslie phillips, danny john-jules, gex: enter the gecko

Id: qdtN4HQYzcQ

Length: 24min 33sec (1473 seconds)

Published: Mon Sep 21 2020

Reddit Comments

[u/SkiphIsVeryDumb]

It’s tail time

[u/Kromblite]

This video is like an orgy at dennis prager's house

[u/RobertG1179]

Gex is worse than debate night at Ben Shepino's house.

[u/BabyBabaBofski]

This is like a taco party at Lindsey Ellis' house

[u/flyonthwall]

tong

[u/ZJL1986]

I got a PS1 back in the day. GEX and Ape Escape were my introduction to 3D gaming