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Open Your Senses.....

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 38 / 40
Date: December 13, 2001
Author: Amazon User

Once in a while a game comes along that serves a purpose beyond just entertainment. It stands as an example of human creativity, merging with technology to produce a synthetic world that's nothing less than astounding. Rez is an amazing creation that stands apart from other games due to its perfectly created virtual world.

I have the Japanese PS2 import, and it's developed by United Game Artists, a division of Sega. Rez is at its core a simple on-the-rails shooter, in the vein of Panzer Dragoon, Space Harrier, and Omega Boost. You move your character up/down/right/left as the terrain unfolds in front of you. You've got a lock-on firing weapon and an ''overdrive'' (i.e. a smart bomb), and that's it. Simple enough....

...but the setup is where the ordinary stops. Your character is invading a computer to try and stop....something. You dive through wire-framed landscapes, as enemies appear above, below, behind, and in front of you. The environments are beautifully done - they remind me of the classic film Tron, or what William Gibson must have envisioned when writing Neuromancer. They succeed in making you believe you're inside a giant computer. The enemies come in all shapes, sizes, and colors, including giant unfolding flowers and a lightbeam-riding vehicle that resembles the Tron Lightcycle. As you lock-on and destroy them, different power-ups emerge: red nets you an overdrive (you can hold up to four at once) and blue evolves your character into some pretty incredible-looking forms. Travel through the layers successfully and you'll reach a boss - the battles are often long and multi-formed, reminding me of Radiant Silvergun. Beat the boss and you open new areas. The game is a magnificent visual creation, effectively enfolding you in an alien world.

You can't talk about Rez without mentioning the audio. Much has been made of how you contribute to the soundtrack via your actions on-screen, and this feature has been implemented perfectly. The soundtrack to each layer consists of techno/house/ambient beats, and each lock-on, firing, and enemy explosion adds its own note or sound to the musical track. It never sounds muddled or messy, but is a wonderful addition to the gameplay. You can try to create your own song as the landscapes whiz by, or can simply play the game - the extra audio can be as much or as little a feature as you want. I must also mention that some of the tracks are wonderful just by themselves. There is also a Travelling Mode that is cool to just sit back and watch.

Hard-core shooter fans will be disappointed at the game's relative ease, but Rez is much more than just a simple shooter, despite its rails-shooter roots. It delivers an experience that few games deliver - complete immersion in an alternate reality. Rez's synthetic universe will stay with you long after you put down the controller, and you will look forward to your next visit. The visuals are augmented by the audio perfectly, and vice-versa. There are also many secrets to unlock, providing high replay value - and some of the secrets are very rewarding. Rez is only for a single player, but sometimes the best games concentrate on only one. It's the kind of game that can't be defined by a single genre, but ends up being a unique title that every gamer should experience.

Rez is a unique experience

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 1 / 4
Date: January 11, 2002
Author: Amazon User

This game is totally cool. You should buy it or rent it, as long as you play it once. Rez cannot be described; it is seen differntly by everyone who plays it. Get this game.

Do *NOT* believe this industry hype.

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 8 / 23
Date: January 15, 2002
Author: Amazon User

I cannot articulate how horrible this game is. See, the key word here is "game." "Game" is missing from this. Sure the graphics and the sound are 3d, sure they are cool the first time you see them... but the "relative ease" that is referred to by many many reviewers who seem to be in cahoots with Sega is that it takes a total of 45 minutes to beat all the boards. There are ***5*** missions, and they make up for this lack by adding ridiculous features like "score attack" which *gasp* lets you get points. WHO CARES? What, I'm going to beat my old points? Very lame to get this as a bonus.

The music is alright trance music, but the 40th time you try to play a board to do it a little bit better it is just annoying to hear a BOOM BOOM BOOM BOOM drum beat.

When you are playing it, it is very immersive. But then a whole 40 mins are past and you've completed the game and what, you're supposed to want to play it again in a different "mode"? Ridiculous.

The first warning is the booklet. "Press X to shoot" is about all it says. Oh, wait, it also describes the whopping 2 power ups (one makes you stronger, one makes you ... uh... shoot a lot).

If you notice the glowing reviews they say "its more than a shooter, its an 'experience!'" along with "its really cool to look at, it's not explainable as a game!"

Translation: the gameplay is nonexistant, and you can show off your PS2 (sorta, i thought the graphics were LAME at times) to grandma for 4 minutes, and the shots and explosions are timed so they all coincide with the music.

This makes an experience? yawn. Essentially the timed music thing is BOGUS anyway, which is why the enemies are so spread apart. If you press fire very rapidly you can hear the shots coming out in a pattern. Sometimes when you press the button you hear no shot. Oooh! Marvelous technology!

Seriously, don't believe the hype - I'm sure its all about Sega's deep pockets (which is why you hear about panzer dragoon and SC5 in the same breath, even though this game mangles what was good with both of those).

This was such a dissapointment. It's on a CD, not a DVD... couldn't they have made like 3 times more boards, enemies, items and stuffed it on a DVD?

Unless you like to play the same 4 boards over and over again so you can "master" the techniques, as said on the box, the play is mindnumbing. How about make 20 levels rather than 20 bonuses?

Bottomline - rent it, it's cool for a night. But warning, you'll feel ripped off if you rent it too.

Just the facts, ma'am.

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 34 / 34
Date: January 16, 2002
Author: Amazon User

Someone else has already done an extensive review, so I just thought I'd share some interesting trivia and minutiae about Rez...

This game was originally unveiled in May 2001 under the code name "K Project." No explanation of this title was given. Now, upon finishing the game and watching all of the credits roll, finally we learn what the K stands for: "K Project- Dedicated to the creative spirit of Kandinsky." (Something to that effect, anyway.) Wassily Kandinsky (1866-1944) was a painter who is generally regarded as the father of "abstract/modern art." Kandinsky claimed that he heard sound when he saw colors. When senses overlap in this manner, it is called "synaesthesia." Much of Kandinsky's work revolved around this. He often descirbed and titled his own work in musical terms. This is very much the basis of Rez. Sight and sound comingle to form a whole. Rez's tag line is, in fact, "Go to Synaethesia."

Many will note the similarity between the play mechanics of Rez and the first two Panzer Dragoon games; using a cursor to lock on to multiple targets, and then firing at them all simultaneously. Well, there's a very good reason for this similarity: supposedly there are no less than seven former members of Team Andromeda on Rez's staff. Team Andromeda was the developer behind the Panzer Dragoon series.

The entire game is clearly influenced by the 1982 movie Tron. Aside from the obvious visual similarities, (get a load of the 3rd level boss... it's worth millions of our man-years!) both the movie and the game are about someone being sucked into a computer system and fighting their way through it. I'm quite sure that the title "Rez" itself is a direct reference to Tron. If you look up "de-rezz" in a dictionary, you'll find that this word was originally coined by the writer/s of Tron. It's short for "deresolve". When a program was "killed," it was de-rezzed. It was an allusion to an image on a computer monitor losing it's resolution and disappearing. When you play Rez, you'll see exactly why the opposite of "de-rezz" is a perfect title for it.

Sega Wastes No Time Establishing Its PS2 Talents

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: January 16, 2002
Author: Amazon User

Always one to try something unusual, Sega unveils its next-generation shooting/music game, "Rez," and proves once again that it's the software, not the hardware, that makes a game great.

Developed by United Game Artists (previously responsible for another unusual title, "Space Channel 5"), "Rez" is probably best described as "Panzer Dragoon" meets "Tron" meets your local dance club's DJ.

The "Panzer" component comes from the game's linear 3D shooting format. You can only control where your character looks and generally not where it goes. Instead of dodging bullets/missiles and the like, you need to search around and shoot them before they get to you. As can be expected, take too many hits and it's Game Over. Like "Panzer," your weapon has lock-on capabilities, allowing you to target up to eight different enemies at a single time. Like "Panzer Dragoon Zwei," you also have access to a destroy-everything power-up dubbed an "overdrive." Once unleased, enemies are targeted and destroyed automatically for a period of time (about 10-15 seconds).

The "Tron" component of the game it its story. You control a sentient computer program assigned to invade and destroy an enemy-infested system. This enemy will throw everything it can at you, from small grunts that need only one hit to large behemoths that need several locked-on missiles to destroy. The larger bosses are no cream-puffs, and require fast reflexes to defend yourself and counter-attack.

As you destroy enemies, you can pick up power-ups that let you use overdrives or enhance your character's performance. Pick up enough performance power-ups and your character will evolve. Take too many hits and your character will "devolve" into a lower form.

Where "Rez" truly shines is in the music/graphics department. Part video game and part light/sound show, "Rez" puts you in direct control of the game's sound and look. Almost everything from pressing a button to locking-on creates a sound. The sounds even change depending on the form of your on-screen character. These sounds combine with the background beat to create an innovative soundtrack that has house and techno written all over it. Taken with the wire-framed graphics and psychedelic color patterns, "Rez" gives you a most unusual PS2 experience.

One minor warning: the game does support DualShock controllers (as most PS2 games do nowadays), but the vibration effect is on almost constantly, and grows in intensity as the game advances. While the rumble-to-the-music vibration is unique, it can cause strain on your hands/wrists during extended play. I suggest you hold the controller lightly during play and take frequent breaks to let your hands rest if you leave the vibration effect on (you can turn it off, too).

Don't pass it up

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 1 / 1
Date: January 16, 2002
Author: Amazon User

If you've come this far ... you must buy the game and tell your friends to play it too! There's nothing wrong with this game! It's a great shooter, controls easily and looks and sounds spectacular. Unless you HATE techno music ... there's no reason why you shouldn't add this great SEGA title to your collection.

Another under-appreciated Sega title

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 3 / 5
Date: January 23, 2002
Author: Amazon User

Being a fan of music games, especially the now-infamous Dance Dance Revolution, I jump at the chance of a completely unique game featuring techno-style music. I also have loved Sega's entries into the video game hall of fame, even though most of the titles are harshly under-appreciated. This title combines the two pseudo-genres - an under-appreciated sega unique music title.

First off, I think this game is the best argument that game creation is a form of digital art. This game flows and gleams with an artistic style most games lack. From the Tron-like visuals to the extremely catchy beats, the game keeps you riveted and open-jawed through the entire play-through.

The graphics, technically, are a bit dated, but that is mainly because it is a port of a Dreamcast version that was never brought overseas to the American version. It is a bit bland singled out, but when combined with the music ad the fluid controls and thumping of te controller to the beat, it all seems to fit perfectly.

This game is hard to explain in the gameplay area. By technicality, it is a shooter, but that in no way gives it justice. The controls are very close to Panzer Dragoon's style of moving a cursor around the screen and as you slide over targets, they are selected and then fired upon. But, the cool thing is that the blasts and explosions all become part of the music, making it sound different every time you play. This really makes the game more of an experience then a pure game.

And that leads to the negative. The game is very short. In about 3 hours, you can master the game, so all the play modes you open start becoming extremely easy, although there are many to extend replayability. The main draw of this game is that it is very addictive, and will still be very fun to pull out months from now and experience again.

Overall, this is one of my favorites from the past few months, and has been the perfect game for breaks from Final Fantasy X. Pick this game up if you enjoy unique games and good techno.

WOW

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 4 / 4
Date: February 03, 2002
Author: Amazon User

That's all you can say really. This is an experience in video games like I've never had. To put REZ into words would be like trying to describe a Pink Floyd concert to Helen Keller (to quote EGM), it just can't accurately be done. Most amazing game. I am really dumbfounded at this game. I'm at a loss of words at how great it is. If you really want a full on REZ experience, I suggest going with the import Dreamcast verson. Same game, but the images are much sharper adding to the visual experience. I reall wish I could say more, but there is not much to say, besides GET IT.

P.S. Keep the Visine nearby...

Rez is revolutionary

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: February 04, 2002
Author: Amazon User

I have no clue why Rez's production was stopped. This is the coolest game ever! Fast paced action that has awesome music to go with it! The music's pace and style goes along with the gameplay. I have to congradulate Sega and UGA on such a great contribution to the PS2 game library. There are many more levels than 4 unlike many people's beliefs. It has great replay value, it's never the same the second time, or the twentieth. It never loses its fun value, a must buy. Go out and purchase one if you have the means. =D

Rent before you buy!

1 Rating: 1, Useful: 3 / 12
Date: February 04, 2002
Author: Amazon User

This game is so over rated or at least rated by those who only are addicted to the game and techno music. The only reason to buy the game is if you want to listen to the same techno music all the time. The sound effects are NOT all people crack them up to be. The gameplay is so simple my 8 year old nephew went through this game with ease. There is no challenge in the game and if you do like the music in this game you will be happy to know that there is a sound track coming out so you can pick that up for 10 bucks rather than wasteing your money on this less than satisfying game which is 50 bucks.

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