Left in North America 3 - Game Sack -

hello and welcome to game sack today we're going to take a look at some more games that never left north america granted most of you are probably from north america but even you may have missed some of these games might be a good thing with a couple of them but hey these games need to be called out for what they are anyway let's take a look at an xbox game followed by a really cool game boy advance game

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this is zionide for the original xbox and it was released in 2006 from play logic and evolved games this is a twin stick shooter that's kind of weird what's weird about it you ask well the story is super weird for one there's a witch who's being transferred on a ship to be executed but she encounters zionide which makes your thoughts a reality so she creates her own universe but you need to stop her so she can be executed or something like that not that the story really matters much in these games as you fly around you control the movement of your ship with the left analog stick and fire by pressing the right analog stick in whichever direction you want to shoot in you're on rail so you can't control where you go except for a few points where you can choose your path but from my experience with this game it doesn't really matter much the camera goes all over the place and it can definitely mess you up since it's really easy to get confused you can cycle between two weapons with the r trigger one of them is a pink spreadshot and the other is a narrow beam which is a bit more powerful normally your weapons fire on the same plane as you however since the game takes place in a 3d space your shots will automatically start firing into the screen if you shoot towards something that appears to be lock-on targets but trust me they are not lock-on targets you'll have to aim precisely at them sometimes you can collect crystals which will power up your weapons a bit the stages are quite long and end with what i would guess counts as a boss fight the good news is that there's a life bar you can watch go down so it doesn't feel like you're shooting at it forever not making any progress the graphics are a mixed bag there's not a lot of variety in the stages and everything kind of looks the same what's more is that the game is letterboxed with no option to play it in any other mode so you have to zoom it in to fit your screen which means you lose some vertical resolution compared to if it were anamorphically squeezed like most widescreen games of the time were otherwise it's fairly crisp and runs at 60 frames per second but it also only runs in 480i that is unless you hack the xbe file which i did for this video to get it to run in 480p this game really just wasn't trying at all this was the final system exclusive game released for the xbox and i'm honestly disappointed that it's not more impressive usually at the end of a console's life games really push those limits but not this one as far as sounded music go it's okay at best so is it fun honestly it's not bad after you get used to it but it's not something i'll be playing years and years into the future i don't think there was a sequel believe it or not released on the ps2 pc and psp but those were all released outside of north america so this one is blender brothers for the game boy advance which was released in 2001 by hudson i seriously cannot believe that this game was only released in north america because really it's quite good you control a space rabbit or maybe it's a space dog it's really hard to tell but since you collect bones in the game i'm assuming it's a space dog anyway you have several planets that you need to platform your way through in order for space to be safe again or something like that you have your normal jumping and attacking abilities you can high jump by crouching and then pressing jump you'll do a little jump and then land on your ears and jump higher in fact you seem to do everything with your ears in this game from attacking enemies to climbing poles and ropes actually you do use your arms to pick up little things that you can toss you can toss some things that'll explode to open up the path ahead of you or sometimes you can even toss things into the background to hit an enemy or switch you can also choose a mini bro to accompany you in each stage you start out with only one and you need to find the rest in the game each mini bro has a different power like restoring your life defending you from one hit or maybe lining up a dark area you press the r button to use these abilities though some are automatic each mini bro has a gauge that slowly refills automatically after you use his ability and you can't use them again until it does refill there's a decent amount of variety in the stages usually you'll just need to make it to the end of the stage but sometimes you may need to race in order to grab keys with slightly janky mode 7 graphics yep these are pretty janky sometimes during a stage you can travel into the background which reminds me of virtualboy wario land anyone remember that virtual boy episode i did anyway there are also some items that you can grab that will let you move at super speed smashing through enemies or fly to the air for a limited amount of time by continuously pressing the jump button each stage has multiple checkpoints as well to respond you when you die and since you can only take three hits dying in this game is not something that will seem unfamiliar and of course there are the usual boss fights you can save your game between any of the stages and you can also replay the stages you've completed at any time if you want to find all of the mini bros the control is mostly fine but it did feel slightly laggy sometimes usually it's only an issue when you're fighting a boss and you think that you need some quick reflexes in reality you just need to learn their patterns and plan way ahead there are also times when enemies are lurking below you directly off screen and you need to learn and plan for them as well seriously though the game is highly enjoyable and it's easy to find yourself putting a lot of time into it for a platformer be careful though because you might beat it the first time you play it if you don't put it down the graphics are nice but not outstanding they're pleasant enough though and certainly not worth complaining about except for maybe the janky mode 7 i don't know the music is excellent and it really helps keep you glued to the game

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i couldn't tell you why this one didn't see a release outside of north america especially since it was developed by hudsonsoft granted this isn't the first time that this has happened with a hudson game before be sure to check this one out

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do

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this next game is for the genesis and i remember seeing it in game magazines here and there i always wanted to rent it but i could never find it for rent back in the day but honestly i kind of like it i mean not fifty dollars like no no no but hey it's it's not bad after that another game for the xbox and i know you guys like the xbox at least a lot of you do i have at least one that leave comics remember caliber 50 on the genesis from metrics and sata of course you don't this is an interesting overhead run and gun

so in 1972 you're out flying your f-14 tomcat even though they weren't deployed until 1974 but that just goes to show how special you are maybe you're a test pilot i don't know anyway you crash and you're captured by some nefarious fellows after 20 years you decide you've had enough of their hospitality and you make a break for freedom you blast your way through the game with some rather unique controls the arcade had those joysticks that rotate like akari warriors or midnight resistance i've got to be honest i've used those joysticks in the arcade and i don't like them one bit regardless of if i like them or not however the game was designed around those controls so that means they had to change things up in the home version you have two choices on the control the first is like how forgotten worlds is handled on the genesis the b button fires and button a rotates you counterclockwise or maybe even anti-clockwise and button c rotates you clockwise when you let go of the b button you toss a grenade the other method may appeal more to most players button b still fires and tosses a grenade when you let go of it but now you shoot in the direction that you're pressing on the d-pad if you hold either a or c you lock into that direction so that you can stray this feels much more natural but there is one small caveat when you change your direction your guy rotates to the new position it's not instantaneous like it is on most overhead run and gun shooters it doesn't take long but it is slightly weird however this also lets you lock and strafe in more than eight firing directions honestly i don't know which method i personally prefer i was able to adapt quickly to both methods if i had to choose i guess i'd pick the first type since it feels like i can be slightly more precise with it there are lots of enemies all over the place and even more tiny little bullets that you have to avoid fortunately you have a life bar you can also power up your weapons and even get a flame thrower i don't care much for the flamethrower because it doesn't have quite the same reach as the other weapons you can even get into a vehicle here like this plane which flies around and you shoot from the little turret on the top that's pretty cool the stages are pretty typical for a game like this wandering through jungles and enemy compounds and the like at one point you go into a hole and start wandering around some underground caves even inside these caves you have to worry about helicopters trying to shoot you down how did they get in here the graphics are fairly weak but they're not offensive it's just that there really isn't anything special here same goes with the sound effects the music is pretty good in places but could use better instruments

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overall i find this one fairly enjoyable to play it's certainly no shock troopers or bloody wolf or anything like that but it's definitely not a waste of time

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aquaman battle for atlantis is a game from 2003 that was released by tdk and developed by lucky chicken studios it was released only in north america for the gamecube and xbox and i'm playing it here on the mighty xbox this is basically a 3d beat em up in the truest sense of the term you can swim in any direction back and forth left and right and up and down when you get close to an enemy you go into combat mode here you can punch with either your right or left fist kick or block you can also use your grapple to bring enemies closer to you as you fight you can press the l trigger to call for help from sea life when you do this a fish friend will come in and bash the enemy that you're fighting usually killing him completely dead forever his friends and family will never see him again and his hopes and dreams will never be realized he won't even be able to make it home to see and feed his pets i hope they'll be okay and yes i know these aren't technically fish but come on what are you gonna do about it the swimming controls are actually quite good and intuitive unless of course you like pressing up to go up then you'll hate them each mission has you doing different things the first has you rescuing eight civilians that are being held another has you swimming around to destroy bombs that have been planted this mission is timed which is pretty awesome what's even better is if you get too close to an enemy you have to fight them and you can't escape until their life has ended this takes precious time and you can easily fail the mission however if you're careful you can avoid most of the fights and complete the stage sometimes you even get to pilot a vehicle and shoot down enemies this is a fairly nice diversion unfortunately none of these concepts are designed very well and it gets boring kind of fast the game feels like it was being made by people who don't really care much about it it feels so empty most of the time and of course extremely repetitive the graphics are fairly sparse but at least you get 480p and 60 frames per second the enemies don't look particularly good as for you yeah you're definitely no jason mamoa the music even seems empty and uninspired being based on a dc character that didn't have a lot of mainstream appeal back then and not even really today is probably why this was only ever released in north america the rest of the world really didn't miss out very much

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i always figured that the series that this next game is from was pretty popular but that's just a guess judging by how many titles are in the franchise i want to like this game i really really do but you know what no just no

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cool borders is a snowboarding series that started on the original playstation but pool borders 2001 was only released in north america both  on the playstation and playstation 2 from sony themselves i generally don't care for snowboarding games at least none of the ones that i've ever played so far in my life this version for the original playstation here is no exception you can create your own character but the options are rather limited there are different types of events that you can do but i had a hard time findin enjoyment in any of them yeah i know i'm kind of complaining about it but you know what am i supposed to do compliment the game i don't like i gotta tell you what i really think you can at least punch the other snowboarders so that's pretty cool this game really wants you to do lots and lots of tricks that's one thing i really don't like doing in games like this i'd rather just race and unfortunately even that's not very well done in this game that said it's no tony hawk even though the control layout is basically the same the designers of this game should have taken a few notes from the tony hawk series as the tricks in that game are easy and fun to do even for someone like me the thing that brings this game down the most are its controls it feels like they didn't spend much time refining them at all for example trying to grind on a rail with a triangle button doesn't seem to work at least it doesn't for me then there's the playstation 2 version oh my god this one is so much better i definitely had some fun with this one but it still has some issues the gameplay is similar to the ps1 version but it feels so much smoother and far more refined that goes for both the controls and the graphics you can choose a pre-made character in this one but you cannot create your own the same events are here and the button layout on the controller is also the same doing the tricks feels much easier and even more fun however i still suck at them and landing them successfully is a huge chore most of the events seem to want you to score enough points by doing tricks and this is easier said than done what i really like though are the racing events these are super fun they even get crazy with nonsensical obstacles i love that i wish the entire game were like this and if it were it'd be about a million times better than it currently is doing tricks is fine i guess but i don't like needing to do them one of the actual events is the tutorial which of course goes through and shows you how to do all the different moves and whatnot this is actually pretty fun except if you mess up three times you need to restart the entire tutorial from the very beginning which has got to be one of the most stupid things i've ever seen in a video game okay one more time from the top i mean they want you to do like a million tricks and if you mess up once on one thing then again on another and then a third time on something else you've got to restart come on you're not even trying and god i hate this instructor's stupid voice you're definitely gonna have to start over it's really too bad because this game has so much potential

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hey are you lost or what come on let's  go remember the jet moto series on the  playstation the first two were decent  jet ski games that were released in many places around the world not jet moto 3 however this 1999 game was north america only the first thing that you should know is that this is the only jet moto game not developed by singletrack whom you may know as being  the developers of warhawk and the first  two twisted metal games  instead it was made by pacific coast power and light which honestly sounds  like a utility company in california  when they're not billing you for your  gas and electricity they're busy making the sweetest games ever anyway they're known as locomotive games now so how's the game it's okay at best you ride a hover bike that can pretty much go across any surface except air there are purple rods here and there that you can grapple onto that will aid you in a sharp turn all you need to do is finish in the top three the big problem is that both the controls and the camera are extremely twitchy and all over the place your hoverbike is extremely sensitive even when using analog controls combine this with the extremely low frame rate in addition to the warpy and blocky graphics it's very difficult to tell what's going on more often than not it doesn't take much effort to knock you off of your hoverbike or fall into a bottomless pit still even with all of that the game is pretty easy unfortunately there don't seem to be many areas to race in as they started repeating really soon at this point i basically just turned the game off because i was bored and there wasn't anything new that it offered the graphics have got to be some of the worst on the platform they haven't aged well at all i have no nostalgia goggles when it comes to 32-bit era 3d graphics this game might be a franchise killer too i debated saving it for a franchise killers episode but i guess i'll put it in here at least the music is somewhat decent

finally here's a dinosaur's tail from high-tech expressions on the genesis this is based on the exciting cartoon movie called we're back a dinosaur story at least somewhat based on it as it seems like the story and universe here have already been established by the time you begin the game i've never seen the movie so i can't really say for sure though you can play as one of two kids louis or cecilia they both play through the same stages with some differences which i'll touch on in just a bit so be sure to stay tuned here to gamesack to find out what those differences are you don't want to be left hanging do you anyway at the beginning of the game all you can do is walk around and jump with the b button in order to kill the various animals running around you you can bounce on them then they turn into what the game calls wish bubbles for you to collect eventually you'll be able to collect icons like a shoe which will let you run faster if you hold the a button i don't recommend using this as things have a habit of appearing suddenly and hurting you so you really do need all the time you can get in order to react there's also a little boomerang that you  can grab which can be tossed with a c button to dispatch enemies this is nice except you can only throw one at a time and the trajectory is kind of weird as i said before louie and cecilia play through the same stages but the order of those stages is slightly different  pretty neat now aren't you glad you didn't click away sometimes you'll fly a pterodactyl above city park in order to collect some wish bubbles but you've got to avoid pigeons and kites i say those are some really big pigeons it's  really hard to see in this stage because you're so huge and you can't see around yourself to know what's coming there's also this stage where you're either flying or riding through the city streets okay i gotta admit the graphics here are pretty cool again you collect more wish bubbles while avoiding the balloons this is easier because you're not stuck dead center in the middle of the screen so you can more easily see what's coming overall the game is tougher than you think and it puts up a decent challenge in fact i like it a lot more than i  thought i would the graphics are decent and they work but like i said i really like the 3d stages the music uses the horrible gems sound driver but amazingly i really like most of it it's well composed and it actually sounds pretty good this is a game that i would never have  thought to try back in the day because i thought it was only for kids but honestly i think everyone should give it a try that's right including you but not you

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and there you go more games that are illegal to play outside of north america i mean that's how this works right oh well doesn't matter anyway as you may or may not know i am  beginning to run out of interesting titles to discuss that have not left north america however i would like to do another left in europe episode someday we've only had one on gamesack so far and that was back in episode 110 i think what titles would you suggest i cover for another left in europe i mean something preferably for the main consoles not you know restricted for the amstrad gx4000 or something because i don't have one of those let me know in the meantime thank you for watching game tag

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hey how's it going today i'm going to  take a look at neon genesis evangelion second impression and what i think is really cool about this one is that it has a saturn version and there it goes it wants to escape but  in case it does that you also have the  gamecube version so let's go ahead and try this foreign okay my first impression is that i have absolutely no idea what's going on okay okay i'll give it another try oh a battle scene

well my second impression of neon genesis evangelion second oppression is that it doesn't really leave much of an impression  yep that's the joke