I-War: I destroyed the Override.

[Cobra Kai]

I played this game on and off all weekend and just a few minutes ago I finally defeated the entire game. Another lame-oh ending, dammit this is 2 games in a row that I've spent hours working to defeat only to be greeted with a totally shitty ending sequence (Power Drive Rally). I wouldn't advise anyone to play this through just to see the ending. The last stage itself is nothing like the rest of the game, its some target shooting thing.

 

I posted a thread back in 2003 on this game raving about how much fun I thought it was, and you know I still think the game is fun. Why? It has so much to complain about, but overall, I think it's the strongest of it's genre on the Jag, I like it more than Hoverstrike and Battlemorph...I guess it's just my taste, I know alot of people will disagree with me. Although, I do need to play more Hoverstrike, I haven't spent very much time with that one, I'm open minded, I could very well discover that game is better if I play it some more.

 

I'm going to bullet point some good and bad features of I-War:

 

Good:

-Good framerate in 1st person view

-Powerups aplenty

-Techno soundtrack

-Big levels

-Decent enemy AI, especially the flying enemy.

-Nice explosions

 

Bad:

-Bland graphics

-No strafing

-Slowdown on later levels

-The HUD map is useless

-Horrible storyline/plot

 

Ok, the lack of strafing really is a bummer, because you really can't play the game with the lighter small Sled, since you pretty much have to get right in front of the enemy and duke it out face to face, you take a lot of damage. This relegates you to having to use the medium or large Sled.

 

This problem is fixed later in the game when and if you find the Auto Tracking Chip, then you can hide your Sled by a wall and your blasters will move autonomously. This makes it so you can actually shield yourself from enemy fire a little bit, while still being able to deal damage yourself. Problem is, I don't think you could last long enough to get this powerup with the small Sled, as it's right in the middle of the game, like level 11 or something. It's pretty hectic by then.

 

The Sled you choose also regulates how advanced you can powerup your ship. I played through with the Medium Sled, and by about stage 16 or so I was disappointed when I realized I wasn't able to use those level 3 Lasers, level 3 Shields, level 3 Plasma cannons, or those Mark 3 Missile launchers. I guess you have to have the Big slow Sled for those. The medium ship is slow enough, I'm not sure I'd have the patience to play this in an even slower craft.

[kevincal]

I had this game, but ended up selling it. I did think the atmosphere was pretty cool. It reminded me a lot of Assault Rigs on the PS. The high res intro screen in I-War is pretty cool. I remember really liking the music too. I don't think I got very far in the game though...I do remember a really weird glitch happening to me though. Somehow my ship got throw off the playing platformer and was just falling into the black forever! It was like I fell into the abyss...lol It was pretty cool actually because I could still rotate the craft and everything...just falling infinitely into the black it seemed.

[CrazyChris]

I liked the game, but the slowdown,

made it frustrating to play.

 

I was never able to finish it.

 

Chris

[Gorf]

I too loved the game but thought the ending blew big time. I was really looking forward to

Overried being a battle similar to TRON's MCP, as I-War had a slight TRONish feel at times

like when you do battle with the tank like vehicles. We'll try to correct that in KylrByte.

[ZylonBane]

I-War had a slight TRONish feel at times

"Slight"? TRON practically dictated the entire visual design of the game.

[+LS650]

I enjoy IWar, but it needs more variety between levels. And yeah, that "shoot the three moving targets" ending is really crap.

[Gunstar]

I always loved this game, regardless of what people say about the frame-rate, it never bothered me, especially in first-person view, which is fastest, but it never bothered me much in other views either. One point is that the slowdown in frame-rate in some places doesn't really effect game play, in the sense that the enemies are ALSO slowed down, so it's not like they get the drop on you or anything. I LOVE the bonus levels going through the tunnel, and if you switch to first-person view there, it's an INCREDIBLY FAST&SMOOTH frame rate! I too, was disappointed by the ending a bit, but the over-all game made up for it IMHO, and I still play this game ALL the time, it's definately one of my top 10 favorites, It's got real replay value, with all the levels and especially the 3 tanks to choose from, which I have finished the game with all three, and I personally like the light tank the best becuase it's so fast and I like the added challenge using it. The music ROCKS, the graphics are totally cool IMHO, but then I always prefered garuad shading and lightsourcing over just plain texture mapping (without the other two above FX), it gives the graphics much more DEPTH, IMHO. It will remain one of my top ten favorites (along with Hoverstrike: UL CD) regardless of what others feel about them and especially about the frame-rates, which are acceptable to me. Sure, I'd love better frame-rates, but they get the job done IMHO. The only thing that DID disappoint me about this game was the two-player mode, only becuase of the ONE arena, and lack of A.I. enemies as well as your buddy.

Edited May 29, 2007 by Gunstar

[Gorf]

I-War had a slight TRONish feel at times

"Slight"? TRON practically dictated the entire visual design of the game.

 

 

I still maintain TRON-ish...minus a lot of TRONish like elements.

 

i'll post something to view later.

[rockman_x_2002]

You know it's sad but I never got around to actually finishing any Jag game except Pitfall: TMA. Always wanted to finish I-War and Iron Soldier. I-War seems more doable because I just plain suck at mech games.

 

After I get finished with my Splinter Cell Xbox outings, I think I'll dig out the Jag and revisit the I-Way.

[82-T/A]

That's kind of a bummer... but I really do enjoy playing I-War, it's still definately one of my favorite games. Truth be told, there is nothing specifically about the graphics that make it all that great, but the "design" and "look & feel" of the game are done in such a way that it gives it a very cool look to it without requiring a lot of rendering and other stuff.

 

I've still never beaten the game, but one of these days I'll sit down and have a go at it again.

 

 

HoverStrike on CD is definitely cool...

[Gunstar]

That's kind of a bummer... but I really do enjoy playing I-War, it's still definately one of my favorite games. Truth be told, there is nothing specifically about the graphics that make it all that great, but the "design" and "look & feel" of the game are done in such a way that it gives it a very cool look to it without requiring a lot of rendering and other stuff.

 

I've still never beaten the game, but one of these days I'll sit down and have a go at it again.

 

 

HoverStrike on CD is definitely cool...

I totally agree, the graphics could have been better, but as you said the look&feel are spot-on. One of my faves and I play it over again at least once every few months...same with HoverStrike CD, which I like even more.

[82-T/A]

That's kind of a bummer... but I really do enjoy playing I-War, it's still definately one of my favorite games. Truth be told, there is nothing specifically about the graphics that make it all that great, but the "design" and "look & feel" of the game are done in such a way that it gives it a very cool look to it without requiring a lot of rendering and other stuff.

 

I've still never beaten the game, but one of these days I'll sit down and have a go at it again.

 

 

HoverStrike on CD is definitely cool...

I totally agree, the graphics could have been better, but as you said the look&feel are spot-on. One of my faves and I play it over again at least once every few months...same with HoverStrike CD, which I like even more.

 

 

I actually bought a spare CD drive just so that I could play HoverStrike and not have to worry about damaging my one and only CD drive (and never being able to play it again!).

[Iron Draggon]

I love this game too... it's right up there with Iron Soldier... or it should be... a pity it never got all the credit it deserved...

[Gunstar]

That's kind of a bummer... but I really do enjoy playing I-War, it's still definately one of my favorite games. Truth be told, there is nothing specifically about the graphics that make it all that great, but the "design" and "look & feel" of the game are done in such a way that it gives it a very cool look to it without requiring a lot of rendering and other stuff.

 

I've still never beaten the game, but one of these days I'll sit down and have a go at it again.

 

 

HoverStrike on CD is definitely cool...

I totally agree, the graphics could have been better, but as you said the look&feel are spot-on. One of my faves and I play it over again at least once every few months...same with HoverStrike CD, which I like even more.

 

 

I actually bought a spare CD drive just so that I could play HoverStrike and not have to worry about damaging my one and only CD drive (and never being able to play it again!).

 

It was the first game I bought with my CD unit, though I also had the pack-in games. I already had the cartridge version, and though it has it's problems, I liked it. When I saw the CD version with it's smoother frame-rate, better control, improved texture resolution, new special lighting effects and of course the 10 new levels with even higher resolution textures, it was a must-buy for me. I never regereted it, though I did give the cartridge version to a friend along with a clearance Jaguar for his birthday. We loved played driver&shotgun on HS: UL CD! he owned a Playstation and agreed it was better textures than he'd ever seen on it. He was really impressed with how high-res the textures stayed on the enemies and object close-up, much better than any Playstation textures he'd seen on "enemies" that tended to get more pixelated close-up. Not only that, but the graphics are all 16-bit color depth (65,000) whereas most Polygonal Playstation games are only using 8-bit color depth (256). If you want to see how fast the Jaguar is in 8-bit instead of 16-bit color, just look at Zero5 which is the ONLY 3D Jaguar game that IS in 8-bit color instead of 16-bit color! it has one of the faster frame-rates of polygonal jag games becuase of the easier to process 8-bit graphics, leaving more speed and power for the polygon engine to run.

 

That's not to say that there aren't ANY PSX games in 16-bit color, but most were later generation titles like Soul Reaver, which I believe is using 16-bit color depth.

Edited June 16, 2007 by Gunstar

[doctorclu]

I love this game too... it's right up there with Iron Soldier... or it should be... a pity it never got all the credit it deserved...

 

I like this game too, and to be honest when it comes to games it is not the destination but the journey.

 

My biggest disappointment is that the game is over. (like when I finished Bubsy, which I filmed and put on YouTube).What

So what was the ending of Iwar like? What happens?

 

I LOVE TRON too.

[82-T/A]

That's kind of a bummer... but I really do enjoy playing I-War, it's still definately one of my favorite games. Truth be told, there is nothing specifically about the graphics that make it all that great, but the "design" and "look & feel" of the game are done in such a way that it gives it a very cool look to it without requiring a lot of rendering and other stuff.

 

I've still never beaten the game, but one of these days I'll sit down and have a go at it again.

 

 

HoverStrike on CD is definitely cool...

I totally agree, the graphics could have been better, but as you said the look&feel are spot-on. One of my faves and I play it over again at least once every few months...same with HoverStrike CD, which I like even more.

 

 

I actually bought a spare CD drive just so that I could play HoverStrike and not have to worry about damaging my one and only CD drive (and never being able to play it again!).

 

It was the first game I bought with my CD unit, though I also had the pack-in games. I already had the cartridge version, and though it has it's problems, I liked it. When I saw the CD version with it's smoother frame-rate, better control, improved texture resolution, new special lighting effects and of course the 10 new levels with even higher resolution textures, it was a must-buy for me. I never regereted it, though I did give the cartridge version to a friend along with a clearance Jaguar for his birthday. We loved played driver&shotgun on HS: UL CD! he owned a Playstation and agreed it was better textures than he'd ever seen on it. He was really impressed with how high-res the textures stayed on the enemies and object close-up, much better than any Playstation textures he'd seen on "enemies" that tended to get more pixelated close-up. Not only that, but the graphics are all 16-bit color depth (65,000) whereas most Polygonal Playstation games are only using 8-bit color depth (256). If you want to see how fast the Jaguar is in 8-bit instead of 16-bit color, just look at Zero5 which is the ONLY 3D Jaguar game that IS in 8-bit color instead of 16-bit color! it has one of the faster frame-rates of polygonal jag games becuase of the easier to process 8-bit graphics, leaving more speed and power for the polygon engine to run.

 

That's not to say that there aren't ANY PSX games in 16-bit color, but most were later generation titles like Soul Reaver, which I believe is using 16-bit color depth.

 

 

Yeah, I've noticed the same things too. Take for example, High Octane, definitely one of my more favorite PC / PS games. On the Play Station, the graphics just aren't crisp AT ALL, and while the frame rate IS good, the texture mapping just isn't that great. The one thing about the play station is that... because ALL games are on CD, they are designed mostly from the beginning with those great features on it. It seems like there are very few games for the Jaguar that really took advantage of the CD. Most of them tended to be cartridge games that they then tried to enhance. It appears to me as though they did this with Hover Strike, but they did a GREAT job...

 

It makes me wonder what the Jag would be like if it had strictly been a CD only game? That said... I do like having cartridges too.