There's five worlds that differ in amounts of levels to play. All five worlds has one boss you must defeat as you continue on. This is a rather unique 2D platformer in a few ways. A lot of rememberable voice overs to keep you interested maybe even laugh a little. You can climb on walls in nearly every possible way.
The controls I felt since I used a controller on two versions are slightly better on PS1 version. Each world has several factors to notably make up their strong impacts as you play the game. You collect fly icons until you reach an 100 flies to earn an extra life. You also can find a particular round icon that automatically gives you an extra life too.
Despite how frustrating some sections are to get through. You can replay levels to either find other stuff for an 100% completion or stack up on lifes. Especially for the later levels you'll need as many chances as possible. Then again if Gex Trilogy follows suit with a save state as well as rewind, you're good.
Personally, I was more surprised the actual levels had notable depth to them. For anyone wanting to know if this actually an metroidvania style platformer game. Yes it is, some levels you really gotta search for the remotes. Which are required to access other levels. Very few levels doesn't offer anything at all but they're fun to play.
The graphics with the artwork absolutely amazing stuff. There's also portals that will appear out of no where. Some portals will teleport you to other sections in the levels. Some will teleport you between day or night in a handful of levels for the cartoon world. There's also portals that takes you to bonus mini games.
For an 100% completion, you need to complete all of the bonus mini games with a perfect score. Talk about being very strict, obviously the sequels changed that for the bonus mini game levels. The bosses are vastly different from each other. My favorite boss was the super hero joke character, The Flatulator. Who kinda reminds me of Boogerman because he farts as an attack.
Boogerman predates the Flatulator by a couple months I checked. My second favorite boss was Morphina the first boss in the game. She summons skulls that spins around her. Closer to being defeated, her appearance becomes undead vastly altering her entire appearance. She also has a few attacks excluding the skulls.
My least favorite boss was Sun Snake. Whose the third boss in the game, this is the only boss fight of it's type in the trilogy. Instead of directly fighting the boss, you have to reach the top. Then grab the remote to end the boss fight. However you gotta make some tricky to pull off jumps.
Not only that, you gotta pay attention for when the boss reappears. Thankfully this is Sun Snake's only attack. I will say I did enjoy the ending to it where a lot of boulders with the boss falls to the ground. Toxic Turtle likely a direct parody of Gamera. Considering Jazz Jackrabit fights an turtle army, a slight chance that could've been referenced too.
Toxic Turtle has a few attacks mostly flying around as well as a dual wind attack. You simply tail whip em a couple times to win. The boss fight will get trickier near the end. I will say I for one loved they went for that joke. Especially knowing for another boss in Enter the Gecko parodying Godzilla lol.
Jazz Jackrabbit predates Gex a couple months. Of course, the final boss is his arch enemy Rez. Not to be confused with the video game of the same name. Rez has several attacks with half being tricky to avoid. Both of them are a series of blasts with little room of error. He also does this tornado move kinda like Looney Tunes' Taz.
I know what some people are thinking Gex predates Crash Bandicoot a couple months too. In order to hit Rez, he needs to summon TVs placed above. You got a few seconds each to across them all from one side of the screen to the other. As soon as you get the chance destroy this metal orb.
Then you can eat a bug that gives you an attack power up with one usage. I should mention, there's a few power ups you get in the game. Such as super speed, fire breath, ice breath, a wind barrier and this multi electric blasts. Most of those you can use repeatedly until it runs out or you get hit.
This particular power up sorta has a short time limit even not being used. After you hit Rez enough times, sit back to watch the ending. Despite everything Gex continues to watch TV like nothing happened. If it were any other game that would've been considered a bad ending. But somehow it actually makes sense to end that fight.
I also wanna mention my big issues with the game itself. Which led to me resuming my process if you wanna call it that through the PS1 version. Unlike the sequels on PS1, Gex for the most part lacks a save feature. The only version to have that prior to Gex Trilogy is the 3DO version. Thankfully there is a password system.
I wrote my last password done in a text on my computer. By this point I wanted to finished what I started. I know some might not like how I done it. Sometimes you gotta think about others. I didn't wanna rage quit the game. By this point you can tell I'm even more sold on getting Gex Trilogy now.
It's a little frustrating getting the passwords. Either defeat a boss or find an VHS tape. Yes an VHS tape that's already no longer being made in real life used to be quite common in the 90s. Sometimes trying to stop running or climbing too fast gets you harm by enemies or fall to your death.
Most hazards I felt were fine with hit detection. The big rockets you gotta use in a particular levels are strict to not touch the tips. Not only that, the blue rockets can be altered in directions. Simply by moving yourself towards the end of the rocket I'm not kidding. Sometimes trying to jump a platform especially moving ones, you simply miss em.
Almost like you fell through kinda annoying very late in the game. As previously stated these stages are surprisingly bigger scale in scope you're expecting. Some of them can be quite frustrating to navigate through. Either trying to figure out where to go or what to do. There's also little room of error in later levels.
You also can get more health. Not just repelling em, you can increase the amount of hits you'll take. I do wanna point out this is only temporary. Either replaying the same levels or a different one resets it back to your default amount of health. You better this game will test how well you adapt as you play it.
By the end of it, you could be ready to play other great platformers or the start of getting better at em. Regardless, Gex is still a fun 2D platformer I do recommend. I do prefer the sequels despite how little I was around Gex 3 growing up. I had Gex 64 for a couple of years. Those enhancements would be perfect for all three of them.
Some mechanics doesn't always work like when they're suppose to. Like you're climbing the wall, you gotta jump either across from you or above. You might jump like normal to fall down. Then I realized you gotta hold the direction you're heading before you jump. If done correctly you can make those jumps especially with hazards around.
There's a great variety of regular enemies. I absolutely love the animations as awhole. There's only two cutscenes in the game, they still held up amazingly well. The voice acting mostly Gex is very decent. Yes sometimes you get a lot of the same lines repeatedly. Gex does earn the right to turn, the world needs him back.
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