Review by: Eric Holmes

Since I've been overwhelmed by the number of posts and reviews of this game I won't bother to mention the obvious features of this game but I'll mention the more salient features that a number of reviews seem to ignore and just enthuse for the game.

Overview

First of all, I own Fighting Vipers and VF2 have had a lot of gameplay time on VF2 with a few friends; I much prefer the VF engine to FV but was originally introduced to the series through Vipers because of the simplicity of the characters and engine but became charmed by Virtua's complexity and depth when I got a hold of the Saturn version and didn't have to keep plugging cash into the arcade machine :-)

This game isn't as pretty as Saturn VF2 for me; whilst many people comment on the shading and light sourcing and what-not I think that the resolution difference is a huge trade-up for the game. The characters don't seem to have much in the way of facial features any more, limbs are blockier and a lot of the visible personality on the characters is gone. This worked fine for the more anime-like, blockier Fighting Vipers characters in their own game; you don't see so much detail on their faces or bodies since they're covered in chunkier armor but it's a distinct loss on certain characters; Jacky, Akira, Pai, Lion all suffer horribly with the end result looking more like action figures duking it out rather than real people.

The biggest difference for VF players will be the _speed_. The game is far, far slower than VF2 - about half the speed, just like Fighting Vipers was. You won't notice it unless you play the games back to back though - but try playing FMM and then playing VF2 after a few rounds...you'll notice that your timing is shot to hell :)

The data on the CD is only around 50mb whilst there are a huge number of CD audio tracks. What would have been nice IMO would have been a hi-res graphics option to use the VF2 graphic engine with higher-res textures, no walls, etc. I realize it would have been more work but whoever did the US and European releases for this had nearly six months to do it and changed very little.

Another annoying features for VF players is the the distorted physics, even when in VF mode - characters leap to silly heights for pounces and it robs the game of some of the realism that makes VF much more enjoyable than other games. *shrug* Just a note.

The hidden characters are great fun, in particular is Janet from Virtua Cop (very similar to Aoi from VF3). Shooting Jacky is worth the money for this game all on its own :-)

A feature that this game is crying out for is the VF3 voices and perhaps one VF3 costume for each character would have been nice. The VF2 voices are just plain annoying, something which is all the more obvious if you play just a few credits of VF3 where the voices really sparkle with character and personality - and they're nowhere as muffled as the dodgy Saturn FMM/VF2 speech.

Ohyeah...the Vipers shouldn't do their wall-push throws in levels where there are no walls :-) It only causes trouble :-)

Conclusion

Despite these shortcomings this is the first game-of-a-series in the last year which I've been anxiously waiting for and have _not_ been disappointed with; compared to X-Wing vs. TIE Fighter or Red Alert. The graphics put me off at first but the huge selection of characters has really won me over. For vs. gameplay this is definitely the best game I've yet played next to VF3 itself and I'm sure this has more long-term appeal.

Simply put, this game needs buying. It's a long-term relationship for which you'll need to own a Saturn. Get some non-Saturn owning friends around and make them green so maybe they'll buy a Saturn for this exclusive too :-) Then play Bomberman and make them beg for you to put this game on :-)