ReBoot - Just Bad Games

reboot is a third-person platformer shooter developed by electronic arts and released to the playstation in 1998. ah yes 90s ea a time before the onslaught of questionable releases coded in the rotting stench of studios long past electronic arts had notable unique releases back then and in this case they made a licensed tie-in to a beloved canadian animated series reboot now you might not be familiar with the show or are more familiar with its newer incarnation after 20 years of waiting it's finally happened mainframe is back online this cat looks totally scrumptious wait do i actually want to eat a cat no i definitely do not i would like to cuddle it but the original reboot was groundbreaking it was the first fully cg animated television show in the world it was a family-friendly series that took place inside a computer characters were included as humanoid versions of common computer elements and storylines cleverly combined tech references with enjoyable narratives in a way for all audiences to enjoy early seasons of reboot followed bob who was a guardian he served as a kind of computer world sheriff many stories had him face off with viruses bent on infecting the system they were in called mainframe but that's not all bob was also tasked with protecting mainframe from various games that would be deployed by the system's user for fun these would be represented by gigantic purple columns of energy that dropped from the sky any of mainframe citizens trapped within these columns were forced to play against the user this was an interesting concept as it basically made the ambiguous gaming user someone like us the antagonist interrupting life in bob's world if the user was fended off mainframe and all citizens trapped in game were saved bob and i are sharing a camaraderie after the game if not game over user wins [Music] the whole sector's nullified offline ouch anyway today we're looking at a video game based on a show where characters jump into various video games this series was basically made to be a video game what could go wrong oh boy let's hop on a zip board to adventure and reboot the game begins with a pre-rendered cutscene in the style of the original series in it villains megabyte and hexadecimal collude to try and take control of mainframe what a delight it will catch everyone by surprise in a move very fitting of his character megabyte backstabs hexadecimal by performing their planned weapons test directly on her lair making it explode and seemingly taking her out with hexadecimal out of his way megabyte now uses unstable system energy or tears in the system's code to destabilize mainframe and make it easier for him to take control cut to a much less impressive cinematic utilizing in-game graphics look it's budget bob he's talking to series regular enzo explaining that he's searching the area for disturbances i'm scanning for disturbances suddenly disturbances the system announces an evacuation as the aforementioned tears are popping up enzo heads off and we can finally get into the action here we're treated to a surprisingly detailed environment oh hey there's dot's diner that's a staple character meetup place from the show but uh what are we actually supposed to do here we haven't really been given any goals and fans of reboot might have noticed this already but why does bob have a gun yeah notice this on the cover of the game as well there's bob brandishing a bulky sidearm and some laser scope inspired eyepiece laser scope in the original series bob lived by one main directive to mend and defend to mend and defend offense wasn't part of his gig his character focused on clever strategy and his multi-tool device glitch to get him out of sticky situations our boy bob ain't no killer basically outside of the video games that bob and other citizens of mainframe took part in he never ever used a firearm to solve problems i don't think so [Music] so where did this gun come from well it's from a random game that they went into in episode five of season one same gun same my patch too more importantly though the gun in that episode wasn't really a gun gun yup it shot harmless bubbles to entrap foes it's a kids show people wonder how it works in the game you must not shoot civilians to mend and defend more like to end and attend a funeral anyway bob's not the only one with firepower in this game you'll face turrets and enemy combatants that'll fire on you constantly whittling down your health oh here's another in-game cutscene the camera pans down the street to show a familiar glowing ball of energy looks like we've got a tear here people and the freshly sprung energy ball isn't the only new addition now we have a timer we don't like timers as you may have guessed if the clocker counts down to zero it's not good so we have a situation where we need to complete an objective super quickly now what could possibly get in the way of that [Music] this it sort of feels like a skateboarding game unfortunately though games like tony hawk's pro skater weren't around at this point to provide inspiration for the dev team here you get no break no stop button every little push carries momentum that keeps you trucking long after you've pressed anything just look at this [Music] this is the only form of transportation in the game and it feels like you're moving on ice every level is an ice level yay we eventually managed to use our zip board bob's weird floating travel pan device to sadly wobble hover to our first tear we need to close it and fun thing about tears they do not want to be closed they have a natural gravity that pulls bob in only to zap and launch him away if he touches them what this means is that you'll need to get close but not too close then spam the controls to limit bob's movement in an attempt to stay relatively stationary because again you don't have a break or stop button to hold bob in position bob will stumble to use his multi-tool glitch to kinda auto lock on and mend the tear and that lock-on good luck you'll be right next to a tear desperately trying to keep up still and glitch will not lock this leads to plenty of lost time and in a game with a timer i think even bob himself would agree this is bad this is very bad in the first two levels you feel like you're given ample time to mend the tears but almost all of it is wasted as poor bob drunkenly surfs nowhere near where you need him to go and this is with readily accessible out in the open tears it's not always that simple sometimes they're positioned in such a way that this happens [Music] it's nigh impossible to get the camera to face where you need it get used to facing the wrong direction can you see why this might be frustrating it's so hard to lock on the tears and they're not the only things that need to be locked on and dispatched bob also relies on a form of auto aiming for his gun to target baddies again he needs to be a particular distance away and facing his foes to actually lock on here there's a flying enemy tank shooting up friendly cars in the area killing civilians in our town i don't think so did you see that we took out our first actual enemy and it only took 58 direct hits but you shouldn't always rely on spamming the fire button with the auto aim bomb you must not shoot civilians why would you make an auto aim that aims at things you're not supposed to aim at it's automatic the user has zero control as to where bob ames but the game isn't just about untearing tears and accidentally incinerating the innocent in reboot we're also introduced to a whole load of platforming remember that whole ice level movement thing well this game gives you all those slippery sways and then demands perfect platforming to acquire various items needed to progress unfortunately jumping isn't just a simple button push no you need to hold the button for bob to squat down building up flames beneath his zip board when you let go bob will get a small rocket propelled hop in the direction he's moving bad momentum plus terrible controls multiplied by awful platforming equals a slippery poopy old time with loads of silly deaths did we mention all this is done with a d-pad because all of this is done with a d-pad oh wait wait wait here the game case says it's analog controller compatible compatible yeah turning on analog mode just maps the four button inputs of the d-pad to the left controller stick what sonic did the exact same thing it's fake analog what's worse the right stick it does nothing zip anyway after dealing with the annoyance that was the first few tears in this game we're no longer at the whim of a countdown timer the mini map shows the locations of various key cards we've yet to pick up that are needed to exit the level the roof that our first key card sits on is conveniently next to a mini skatepark with ramps we figure this is how we're supposed to nab it do you think that this would be easy but it's not bob not only slips around everywhere but his jump ability is totally sloppy it is crazy frustrating but at least we've got all the time in the world now as we're no longer on the clock after you clear the tears you're free to roam the level snag weapon upgrades extra lives or just head to the exit level complete that's the gameplay loop load level mend three tears remove the time limit then leisurely free roam the map scooping up exit keys simple objectives until we hit the third level prior to this platforming was inaccurate and a pain to do correctly but there was no real punishment for failure here though the level takes place in a kind of industrial plant and half the level contains platforms that hover over an open sewer you see where this is going don't you yeah right in the poop pit you will fail and find yourself down in the muck needing to find your way back out better be quick because of the timer no because of this a giant monster sewer snake you can try to fight it if you want but you're better off avoiding it it dives under the sludge so you can't target it and then pops back up to attack wherever it wants its bite annihilates your health bar and did we mention that this crap snake is guarding a tear great so while we fruitlessly wrestle the controls to lock on long enough to mend the tear we also have to juggle worrying about and though that maggoty sewer freak feels like some kind of boss encounter it's not we didn't get to the game's first official boss battle until level six and whoo it's a curveball i guess we can call this some kind of boss chase sequence we have to travel down a linear path facing off against a large entity in possession of a tear that sounds simple enough just pew pew the boss and men the tear easy right simple yes easy no a tear is involved this means the level's timed and if you're using your default pistol it's going to be a long time before you make even a dent in the boss's health gauge basically if you didn't search around previous levels picking up weapon upgrades you're in for a pretty miserable time you'll probably want to restart the whole game just to find them and you probably want to find lives too while you're at it because with these bosses you'll need them what i love about this first boss as crappy as the encounter is is that he just kind of gives up when there are 10 seconds left on the clock huh i've never seen a boss just lose interest and fly away but this is the reboot video game and i honestly can't blame him take us with you if you're quick and very lucky you can swoop in and mend the terror that the boss shrugged and plopped down huzzah boss fight there boss not fight complete unfortunately the game continues megabyte unleashes more tears than the doom guy enjoying string cheese rip and tear griffin's hair and it's up to bob to pop and mend men men but wait as a fan of the original series i'm noticing a distinct lack of purple game cubes no not those adorable nintendo lunch boxes these the energy column thingies from earlier a huge part of the appeal of the original series was seeing what interesting video game scenario the characters would be tossed into there were fantasy games racers sci-fi space shooters we could add level after level in a fun new setting all the while fending off the user making sure they don't beat the game and cause a section of mainframe to be wiped out the whole sector's nullified but no what we get here is the equivalent of a digital janitor cleaning up garbage code before it explodes great oh i wish things got more interesting the basic enemies you face throughout the game are all introduced by the seventh level you got your turret and you got your two kinds of binomes this round boy with a shock stick and this squarish fella that keeps moving out of range and blocking on you to blast you from afar while the types of foes don't increase the difficulty sure does the game spices up the overall experience with additional challenges and it's done well nope it's a total fail you know how locking onto enemies is a pain well they have zero problem targeting bob sometimes through solid objects and proceed to fire direct hits before we're ever aware they exist throughout the game enemies are placed in the most infuriating locations making platforming unfairly difficult sometimes you only need to glance at enemy placement your health and then you will immediately do the mental math that there's no way you won't be vaporized because you will take damage and then there's this guy this stony arm flailing nightmare can be described as a mini boss he can also be described as one of the most rage inducing obstacles in the puddle of awful that is this game he doesn't really attack not directly nor can he be targeted and killed cool he holds a tear and loves to cuddle up close you know what that means game over come on bob you can do it no enzo i really don't think so we have the gravity field of the tear pulling us in this cycloptic stone creep endlessly trying to get close and the game still wants us to stay a reasonable distance away to mend the tear what kind of sick creature gets enjoyment out of playing this sort of game eventually we sealed the tear but just barely and the game keeps hammering home it's inflated difficulty through enemy positioning look at how these turrets are set up you're basically forced to enter the pool here but it's so small you can barely dodge enemy fire and then you have to contend with a freaking tear pulling and blasting you away oh you'll die and when you game over and restart guess who you'll have to deal with again no checkpoint delete this game yes the game does try to offset crazy difficulty spikes with weapon upgrades like the blaster or the rockets to make enemies die faster but it doesn't stop there you also get upgrades to bob's multi-tool glitch these upgrades include a mortar flamethrower and a freeze weapon known as the fox gun so why don't these weapons make the game easier because the upgrades to your pistol and glitch run on special energy pickups every level has health and energy pickups to find but there's not much you're mostly going to rely on drops from the bad guys to charge your attacks once you take out an enemy drops will sort of explode out from them pooted from their husk you gotta scoot over and scoop them up quick because they can disappear or worse they can just fly off the map completely and if you're using glitch for both attacking and mending then you have to remember to toggle between abilities if you're not paying attention you might accidentally attack a tear instead of mend it and waste your precious energy reserves so with energy pickups rare than stringy cheese in hell most likely you'll be using bob's totally canonical basic pistol to fend off baddies sure it's nice to have a default weapon that can always be used but we all know just how useful this pistol is believe it or not the pistol becomes even more useless as you proceed through the game because while the enemy roster doesn't really change beyond what we've already mentioned their ability to absorb damage does huh must have built up an immunity to being shot in the face could have sworn this took like two bullets a couple levels ago and if you collect enough energy to power your special weapons you'll find they're actually not much better for example the glitch flamethrower requires you to be so close to enemies you may as well be offering them a breath mint when you have no distance between you and the enemies you're basically guaranteed to take damage as for your freeze attack it's short and it sucks can bob target frozen enemies no no he can't bob can't lock on to something that is perfectly still and defenseless because that would be useful and finally there's the mortar an explosive weapon with limited ammo capacity what can we say about it when it works it works when it doesn't ricochet okay so if you've mastered your weapons skills and let's face it tumbled through with blind luck you'll hit the other two boss chase missions first up is a web creature a super rare and extremely dangerous being from the reboot series now if you get too close to this critter it lunges this move is an instant ko we learn this and then relearn this and then relearn this several times right obviously that's not working what if we fly over the web creature and try to heal the tear behind it right right wait hold on missiles seem to work why weren't they working a minute ago oh turns out all webby here has moments of invulnerability you need to identify those and hold on to your energy he also has a move where he turtles up and you can't shoot him then either conserving energy is a necessity you do not want to try to take this thing out with your pistol we're looking at some serious down time here after a whole lot of trial and error we take the dang thing down but it's not over yet on to the lingering tear which keeps passing over speed bumps in the level as you might imagine glitch doesn't like locking on to a dippy ball of energy real hard to position yourself properly not hard to take a beating from the tear the next chase style boss is the giant binome a linear encounter that includes a mini platforming section unlike previous boss levels this one has additional enemies to contend with at the same time once you drop its health bar he ejects his lower body and draws a new bar you need to keep the heat on him while dodging attacks turret shots and navigating the terrain that swoops on by of course like the web creature before it's not enough to just blast this boss into submission there's also the issue with the tear and maybe you managed to kill the binome early by some miracle you may think hey i still have almost a whole minute to mend this thing easy peasy right think again remember how tares are easiest to mend when they're stationary and not much is happening around you well this is the atmosphere we need to mend this thing in not only do you need to handle platforming and dodging but additional enemies are still firing on you it's one thing for a game to add mechanics and later levels to bolster a satisfying challenge to overcome but this is ludicrous later on the platforming becomes more obnoxious level 13 is known as floating point park can you guess why they call it that now is a better time than any to talk about another of glitch's features glitch grapple a grappling hook to help swing bob to safety there's a catch though isn't there glitch grapple the damn thing runs off energy glitch grapple no energy no grapple in some instances when glitch does happen to save you it'll spawn you super close to a tear and thanks glitch if you don't get good at platforming real fast you'll be wasting all your weapon energy on grappling and then be left with your peashooter of a pistol to fight off enemies this is a waking digital nightmare why do they think fans would want to play this well if they couldn't entice viewers with the promise of having their own adventures in the world of reboot they may still have gotten a few fans to bite with this good gosh an exclusive episode of reboot one you won't find anywhere else but that exclusive episode isn't presented in a traditional manner as in there's no option on the main menu to watch the full episode that's been shipped on the disc mainly because there isn't one there are traditional reboot style cut scenes that progress the story sure but they're blended in with pre-rendered in-game scenes and let's face it this over my deleted bitmap is not on the same level as this bomb i've mended the tear and secured the area this mainframe was fine before bob arrived is not on the same level as this his name is bob you know sometimes they take in-game visuals and animate over top of them when bob gets a call through glitch you've done well guardian mainframe appreciates your efforts that there is a rough look jumping back and forth between visual styles not alphanumeric oh in a big chunk of this exclusive episode is made up of fail-state animations you get after you've completely run out of lives bob's failure and multiple character deaths don't seem like they should be part of a canon exclusive episode hey kids wanna see an exclusive episode of reboot here's bob and dot stuffed corpses humiliatingly encased in glass if you can't love them stuff them they're dead even if you stacked all the cutscenes together the story is blander than tap water for a game with 19 levels you'd think there would be something interesting going on paying attention to it as a fan however will confuse you as best as we can tell the whole game takes place before the very first episode of the series remember dot's diner from the first level it said grand opening over the entrance in the very first episode of reboot the diner was open already frisket a full-grown dog by the time we got to see him in the series is shown here as a puppy cool that's fine what isn't is that characters show up in this prequel that bob hasn't met yet in the series by this point like mike the tv or heck even the web creature that appeared later in the series shouldn't be here yet good job making a game for fans it's not like they would totally notice all this is wrong like we did near the end of the game we get the final level type the boss arena here you have one main boss potentially with some enemies guarding them in a circular room you fight to the death no tears few power-ups a massive test of your skills and luck and the first of the two final battles is against megabyte getting close to him is a bad idea because of a gatling gun he has attached to his chair when you upgrade the system you throw out the trash he's dead by this point you'll hopefully have access to things like max level missiles so as long as you keep the energy pickups in mind this fight isn't all that hard the actual final boss of the game though hexadecimal is far less of a cakewalk her portraits spin around the central platform and when they stop spinning they attack you with electric blasts no matter where you are think you can hide behind the wall go try that there's nowhere to take cover and heck shoots energy blast straight at you you're expected to get close enough to attack her without dying but we did it we made it through all 19 of reboots levels mended tears conquered bosses and eventually eventually took down the queen of chaos herself hexadecimal oh it's finally over you have saved mainframe but i regret there is some terrible news we have suffered many casualties where's my brother i'm afraid he did not survive my child wait what how was this an ending for the game it feels like we lost we did we what turns out we were not playing the game right see every once in a while when you get a game over you're treated to this [Music] remember the future is not written in wrong the game player with the fastest clock speed will journey first to the ultimate ending you get the cryptic message in order to clear the game properly in order to see the good ending you not only need to beat the game you need to beat it fast fast how fast remember all those times we finished mending tears and thought oh we could just leisurely prance around the level picking up useful upgrades we were wrong sure when you handle the level's tears the timer goes away but does the clock really stop ticking no a non-displayed secret timer is still going strong make it through on time you get a good cutscene be slow get a bad one if you're playing through without the knowledge of this hidden countdown clock you'd never know that some cutscenes are bad and some are good we just thought bob was having an awful day take too long you fail so no don't try to bolster your life count or equipment don't prepare for enemies don't try to squeeze out a modicum of enjoyment from this overwhelmingly underwhelming experience rush reboot for the playstation is a poorly conceived tie-in that despite containing some original content that fans may enjoy is such a fumble of ideas and execution that it seems to forget the very show it was supposed to represent the original reboot television series showcased a variety of interesting scenarios and mock video games while unfolding a compelling narrative it was cleverly referential and created an absolutely engaging inner computer world boiling all that down to a single character haphazardly bouncing around terrible spaces closing balls of light and clumsily shooting things is a total waste pure and simple in the end it really should have been so much more oh speaking to the end what happens if you do rush through the game and get the good ending not much enzo congratulates you and dot gives bob a big old smackeroo huh that's a lot of hassle for not so much payoff yep hey but at least we beat the game we won yeah yeah game over a user wins [Applause] it's just bad [Music]

Channel: Rerez

Views: 836,420

Keywords: Rerez, Video, Games, Gaming, Gamers, Video Games, Video Game, ReBoot, REBOOT, Reboot, EA, Electronic Arts, PlayStation, PS1, Just Bad Games, Bad Games, JBG

Id: eZup4oHNpz8

Length: 29min 53sec (1793 seconds)

Published: Thu Sep 23 2021