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Street fighter alpha 3, CROC 2, Bottom of the 9th 2000 By Chip and Jonathan Carter Tribune Media Services STREET FIGHTER ALPHA 3, FOR PLAYSTATION -- Here's the latest in the seeming endless and ageless Street Fighter series, which has been around in one form or another for the better part of this decade. Just like all the other entrants, Alpha 3's a 2-D slugfest, high on animation, low on blood and gore -- just lots of smacking and whacking. The huge cast of 31 includes plenty of favorites from past SF titles. There's Ryu, Ken, E. Honda, Sagat, Vega, Cammy, Chun Li, Charlie, Rose, Adon, Dan, Akuma, M. Bison, Gen, Sakura, Dhalsim, Zangief, Blanka, T.Hawk, Dee'Jay, Fei-Long, and, from the Final Fight series, Rolento, Birdie, Sodom, Guy and Cody. There are also four new characters -- Karin, Sakura's archrival; R. Mika, a wrestler who idolizes Zangief; and Juli and Juni, henchmen of Bison and Balrog. You can play the standard arcade mode -- a picture-perfect port of the game you've been paying quarters to play for months -- alone or with a friend. Or you can challenge the New World Tour, which lets you take on computer opponents throughout the world and unlock new skills, as you progress. JONATHAN SAYS : I love this game. It doesn't have the presence of Tekken or the smack of MK, but it was the first, and it's still one of the best. And you've got to love this cast of characters. What a lineup! All the best from the best. A. CHIP SAYS : Is anybody besides me tired of 2-D fighters? I've always loved the SF series -- all 9 million versions of it -- but today, as I watched M. Bison whack E. Honda from left-to-right for the umpteenth time, I was thinking to myself, "Self, there's got to be more to life." And there is. It's called 3-D. Somebody might want to drop these guys a line about it. B. OVERALL RATING -- B+ -- RENT IT FOR AGES 10 AND UP CROC 2, PLAYSTATION -- This Crash Bandicoot wannabe is back for an unexpected second adventure. Unfortunately, Croc's no more fun this time around than he was the first. The little Australian backpack-wearing reptile scoots and bounces his way through five different levels in search of his missing parents. He swats bad guys and cracks open goodie-filled boxes with his tail. The graphics are cute, but sparse. The game play is repetitive and dull. Worse, the control is maddeningly imprecise -- it'll prove especially frustrating for the younger audience that might otherwise have appreciated this game. JONATHAN SAYS -- They got the "crock" part right. I can't believe they made a sequel to this one. It's too hard for little kids and way, way, way too dumb for older kids. D. CHIP SAYS -- The character's cute, the animations are fine ... but there's a lot lacking here. The backgrounds and worlds seem empty, like rough drafts that an artist never got around to finishing. Here's an example of a game that must have looked like a good idea to somebody somewhere in some corporate boardroom and some point in time. But it's certainly nothing an actual gamer could have been involved in -- or is going to be interested in. D. OVERALL RATING: D -- SKIP IT. BOTTOM OF THE 9TH 2000 -- The original game in this series, which came out for the PlayStation a couple of years back, was one of the most innovative and enjoyable baseball games ever. It was groundbreaking at the time -- in fact, it introduced the now got-to-have-it "lock-on" batting style. Which makes it all the more difficult to understand how the N64 debut of this series could possibly be so bad. For starters, you get real players, but not real teams or leagues. Those unnamed teams supposedly feature last year's rosters with a few Band-Aid patches to reflect off-season trades and free agent signings ... but even that doesn't explain the must-be-from-outer-space actual rosters here. You play the 1998 Major League baseball schedule. It's like being stuck in a time warp. But wait, it gets worse. Graphically, the N64 Bottom of the 9th is a giant two-step backward. This game would look fine on the Super NES, but not on a Next Gen system. The players are chunky polymorphs who appear to have escaped from a Nintendo character game -- maybe Kirby Jr. Baseball? Worst of all is the lack of spatial reality. The field's so compact and disproportionate to real life that it's hard to play the game. Imagine playing hockey in a bathtub and you've got the idea. The one saving grace is a scenario mode that puts you in the middle of 20 situations of varying difficulty and grades you on your ability to get out of trouble. JONATHAN SAYS : I can usually find something nice to say about any baseball game. I guess this is the exception that proves the rule. D. CHIP SAYS : Yuck. I can't believe anyone would have the guts to bring this thing out in a market that includes games like Triple Play 2000 and All-Star Baseball 2000. It is, in a word, a mess. I'd love to see the scenario mode in another game, though. D. OVERALL RATING: D -- SKIP IT. TIPS AND TRICKS SPACE STATION SILICON VALLEY, FOR N64 -- These codes will let you unlock all the levels in the corresponding world: Euro Eden -- up, down, L, Z, down, up, Z, down; Arctic Kingdom -- up, down, Z, L, down, right, C, Z, down; Jungle Safari -- up, down, L, Z, down, left, C, Z, down; Desert Adventure -- up, down, L, Z, down, left, Z, down; Celebration Parade -- up, down, L, Z, down, right, Z, down. Chip & Jonathan Carter are a father/son gaming team who've been twiddling their thumbs professionally since 1990. For more tips, tricks, reviews and news, check us out on-line at http://vgames.webpoint.com/vid/ecol/mainpage . Or e-mail us at [email protected] . Got a question? An inside tip you'd like to share? Write to Chip and Jonathan Carter in care of this newspaper. While they cannot respond individually, they will answer questions of general interest in their column. (C) 1999 TRIBUNE MEDIA SERVICES, INC. Techno file index Mail Tribune Copyright � The Mail Tribune 1999, Medford, Oregon USA