Philips CD-i Reviews E-L

Jack Sprite versus the Crimson Ghost is a well-intentioned but ill-advised attempt to combine old black-and-white film clips with conventional 2D fighting action. For you youngsters out there under the age of 60, the Crimson Ghost was a 1950's detective serial featuring a frightening villain donning a ghastly skull mask. Despite the cool villain, most of the action in the series consisted of lame fistfight sequences between guys in suits. In stark contrast, the star of this game, Jack Sprite, is a wacky, computer-animated geek who speaks in an annoying high-pitched voice. With Jack manning the "control desk" on the bottom of the screen, you view video clips by selecting from seven locations including a hotel, office, and warehouse. Jack narrates as you watch the grainy video, and prompts you to "inject him into the scene" at critical moments. When this happens, the game suddenly switches to a colorful screen with 2D graphics and sparse scenery. Here Jack must punch and kick his way through a parade of goons that all look the same. These fights are extremely lame thanks to unresponsive controls and a limited number of moves. The quirky background music that plays during these fights is almost unbearable. Some action sequences end with an encounter with the Crimson Ghost himself, who serves as a boss. The main problem with this game is obvious: the pieces don't fit together very well. Juxtaposed with the grainy video clips, the clean-looking 2D sequences look sorely out of place. And unlike campy games like Night Trap, you won't want to sit through these dull video clips twice. What nearly saves the game are some funny, Mystery Science Theater-inspired voice dubs that play when you select an irrelevant location. Nevertheless, the unlikable lead character and general poor design makes Jack Spite and the Crimson Ghost impossible to recommend. © Copyright 2004 The Video Game Critic.

Rest assured that Kether is not just another cheesy FMV (full motion video) title. No, this is a fully interactive space expedition into the dark corners of the galaxy, or at least that's what the box says. Piloting a starship, your objective is to travel to five temples located on various planets. Your first challenge is to navigate one of the many harrowing obstacle courses. These stages involve negotiating an asteroid belt or weaving through the buildings of a city skyline. Viewing your ship from behind, you must dodge obstacles while whisking through the scenery. The smooth graphics are basically pre-rendered movies, and they are very easy on the eyes. The Asteroid fields remind me of Silpheed (Sega CD, 1993), but the best stages let you navigate through virtual cities - they can be quite exhilarating at times. Alas, since your path is predetermined and the camera tends to swing wildly, it's difficult to judge the position of obstacles (nothing a little memorization won't help). Once you reach the temple, you must solve a puzzle to gain entrance. This "puzzle" is little more than the classic game of Memory, except played with mysterious hieroglyphics. Once inside the temple, you find yourself in a dark labyrinth with a first person point of view. With the help of an overhead map, you must locate the six special rooms while blasting wandering monsters. Overly-sensitive controls and rough animation make these stages a bit frustrating, but they're still intense. The graphics and audio effectively convey an aura of isolation and fear. Kether's first-rate voice acting, crisp sound effects, and futuristic synthesized music all add to the eerie atmosphere. Some of the screens look like works of art! I wasn't expecting much from Kether, but I found it to be an intriguing journey. © Copyright 2004 The Video Game Critic.

This ultra-rare CD-i title boasts some of the most vertigo-inducing visuals I've ever witnessed in a video game. As you careen down rolling, winding tracks in a pod-shaped car, you shoot obstacles to clear your path and trigger junction switches to change your course. With its smooth animation and first-person perspective, Lost Ride conveys the feeling of being on a roller coaster like few other games. The sensation of speed is so convincing that I practically became ill during my first play session! But leave it to Philips to take a promising concept and totally ruin it. Lost Ride's main issue is its unreasonable difficulty. The first stage of any game should be relatively easy, letting the player become comfortable with the controls with learning the basic strategy. But Lost Ride's initial level is both sprawling and agonizingly difficult. It's set in a mineshaft, and zooming through tunnels and over suspended tracks is great fun - for the first half hour or so. But once you get tired of going in circles, you're ready to advance to a new stage. Good luck with that! Navigating the tracks requires constant checking of the map - which is only available at certain intervals. An onscreen map would have been helpful. In addition, switching tracks is needlessly tricky. While it should be a simple matter of shooting an arrow, more often than not your shots don't even register. That's a serious problem, because once you start heading in the wrong direction, it could be a long time before you work your way back. Since you're limited to the track layout, you're often forced to travel lengthy sections before reaching the next junction. The shooting action in Lost Ride is equally lame. Although you can blast flying bats and boulders, these appear at random and it seems their only purpose is to break up the monotony. I should also mention that the game contains programming glitches that cause your "ride" to temporarily go off-track, although the program usually recovers. Lost Ride should have been called "Lost Opportunity". Had it been designed with shorter, more reasonable stages, it could have been a hit. © Copyright 2005 The Video Game Critic.