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Great creative effort hurt by corporate meddling.

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 17 / 19
Date: December 20, 2000
Author: Amazon User

Brilliant, funny, creative, stylish--as the other reviewers say, Giants is a terrific game. But it could have been better, if Interplay hadn't panicked.

Interplay Groupthink Screwup #1: publishing this game in December.

Why this is a screwup: The game isn't finished! Along with the play-balancing issues mentioned by other reviewers, Giants sports numerous bugs. These range from minor graphics glitches to fatal system crashes. Of course, of course, a patch will be out, and those of us smart enough to use (and buy from) the Internet will be able to fix the game. But what about the poor schmucks who don't have Inet access? They're screwed, and are stuck with a buggy, unfinished game, all thanks to Interplay's rush to get this thing out by Christmas.

Interplay Groupthink Screwup #2: Changing the blood from red to green.

Why this is a screwup: Insults gamers. This is cowardice, pure and simple. The marketing geniuses thought that red blood was too much for us to handle. Us. Gen X. C'mon, we were buying Robocop action figures when we were 8 years old! Red blood in a computer GAME is not going to traumatize us. Note that this wouldn't be an insult (or a screwup) if the blood had been green from the start. Heck, Kabuto and his pals are aliens; we wouldn't have batted an eye at green blood. But the fact that they changed the color to comply with some lame "decency standard" makes the change an insult.

By the way, the patch to change the blood from green to red is widely available on the 'Net.

Interplay Groupthink Screwup #3: Putting clothes on the Sea Reaper, Delphi.

Why this is a screwup: Again, this insults gamers. The marketing geniuses thought that we'd be shocked by a topless Delphi, EVEN THOUGH THEY'D BEEN FEEDING US SCREENSHOTS OF HER FOR OVER A YEAR. So, they clothed her. Look, everyone knows the vast majority of computer gamers are over 18. We've seen topless women before. Heck, you can see much worse on prime time network television, or a PG-13 movie. It's a *game*, not a big deal. What is a big deal: doing a switcheroo, promoting one thing and delivering another, messing with the developer's vision. Again, this wouldn't be an insult if the character was clothed from the get-go. The developer decided to take the next step (the previous step was taken by Lara Croft), the publisher okayed it, the fans smiled and laughed, and then -BAM- the company caves in and corrupts the original artistic vision. LAME.

By the way, to go back to the original version, just go to the Giants\Bin directory and remove the file "arpfix.gzp".

But even these major screwups don't cripple Giants. The game is visually impressive, genuinelly funny, original, smart, witty, and FUN. Kind of like No One Lives Forever and Sacrifice. Hopefully these games are but an introduction to a new era of games: sophisticated, smart games designed for adults. Not "adult" as in "adult film", but "adult" as in mature, witty, and fun.

3 modes of play on beautiful islands, but no in-game save?

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 12 / 12
Date: January 27, 2001
Author: Amazon User

The Good:

Interplay's really made a beautiful game here. Giants is based on a completely new engine and takes advantage of newer graphics cards' T&L engines to great effect. The course of the single-player game is played on a seried of islands, some tropical, some ice, etc. In the single player game you play first as Meccs, human-like characters with machine weapons, then as Delphi, a magic/sword/bow & arrow using nymph, and finally as Kabuto, a brutish monster.

Each character you play has a completely different method of gameplay for you to use. It's fantastic because it makes the game highly variable. Once I'd just about gotten the mecc's weapons & strategies down, the storyline progressed to Delphi and I had to learn to use spells and such. Not only that, but there are resource-collecting strategy elements involved. One has to collect little guys named Smarties and food/souls to feed them with so they can build a base for you to provide you with more powerful spells or weapons.

Your enemies' AI, while simple, isn't so easy as to make it boring. They'll sometimes hide behind trees and structures to fire at you. All in all, a great game.

The Not as Good:

There needs to be an in-game save instead of a per-scenario save. Some of the missions are just too long to have to repeat. In base-building missions it will restart you with the buildings you've already built, but even so it's a chore to repeat things over & over again. Having an in-game save should be rule #1 in the game developer's handbook.

In addition, the AI can be pretty dumb at times, either standing there while I shoot at it or running straight away as I slug it's back with rounds.

Lastly, the game as released in the box needs to be patched badly. The patch is available online from Interplay, but the game should have at least worked out of the box.

More like Giants: Citizen Kreative!

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 21 / 28
Date: October 13, 2000
Author: Amazon User

Giants: Citizen Kabuto is an amazing game. The gameplay has elements of other stategy war games but is otherwise entirely unique and creative. For all the times we wished the video game industry used their fricken brain, here lies a wish come true!

Giants opens the gaming genre to CREATIVITY! Most games are dark. Dark in color (because it's easier to hide everything in shadow instead of rendering everything with the lights on) and Dark in content (most game developers make dark games to try to be "cool" ) but this game left the lights on. The skies are the strangest, most unique thing in gaming. Odd, bright, rich colors that not only make it an alien planet, but a game that stands out among the dark crap. THese guys are artists and as with MDK they aren't afraid to play some scenes for laughs.

I wish all game developers were this brave and inventive instead of hiding behind their cowardly "Messiah" and "Duke Nuke'em" garbage.

Don't get me wrong, there's lots of well-placed action and violence, but they didn't lay it down as a foundation the way other games do.

For you hard-core gamers, the gameplay isn't perfect but it does hold up well. There seems to be some imbalances but I'd rather have the variety of races (they are so ridiculously different that they were probably hard to tune) to play around with than another Quake clone. When I play the 3 races I feel like I'm learning a whole new game. Kind of cool though, 3 games in one.

I haven't played the Network game yet but I'm looking forward to that in the final rev.

Giants is why I buy interactive entertainment. This will tide me over until Black and White comes out.

Breathtaking

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 8 / 8
Date: January 07, 2002
Author: Amazon User

I can't contain the experience alone. Every one must know, they MUST you see?
I'm typically the type: the more gore, head kracking, and the darker and more evil a game the better. Well, here's Giants, possibly the funnest gaming experience I've ever had and it's Light hearted, but it's the funniest game ever. It's so masterly put together with all the perfect elements of twisted humor, Beautiful graphics and environments, different styles of gameplay within the game, staring at delphi's nude body...just delete or move the arpfix file in the bin folder to experience the sea reapers as they were meant to be. Quite possibly my favourite game ever. A winner in the Industry.

MyStats

.Beutiful Graphics, Amazing modeling work, Sharp textures.

.The Story. Oh god, I love it! The Plot is so perfect. Funny and I mean REALLY Funny, heroic, great combination of elements. Very original Scie Fi. I was completely emersed in these worlds.

.Environments are one of the most striking features here. Wow, 30 islands, each beautifully rendered and detailed. Fully emmersive and atmospheric.

.Sound. The music is outstanding, by Mark Snow, (X files, La Femme Nikita) and I mean it...It's THAT good. The sound effects and ambience is riveting.

.Gameplay. Fun. Very Fun. Pure energetic Fun.

One of the few titles I give 100 on a 1-5 scale

Incredible

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 7 / 7
Date: April 02, 2001
Author: Amazon User

This game is amazing... even the title screen is cool. The scenery is beautiful, and the sun effects are awesome, but we know that graphics aren't everything. This game is so fun to play. The action is high-paced and non-stop. It's also hilarious. I have never laughed so hard while watching a cutscene in my life! Also, it feels so great when you are a Kabuto, and pick up a little sea reaper, and impale it on your horns and then eat. There are only two minor downsides. One, being the system requierments (sp?). They reccomend a P3 500 Mhz, and full install is 1.3 gig. The other downside is the 3d card difficulties, at least I had some. I had a Nvidia TNT2, but I got an error message starting up. All I had to do was upgrade to Nvidia TNT2 Ultra and now it works fine! These small downsides do not match up to the greatness of this game. If you haven't already, pick this one up now!

Beautiful, Unique and Very Odd Game

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 6 / 6
Date: June 25, 2002
Author: Amazon User

If you combined Salvador Dali's mind with that of General Powell's, you'd probably come up with something like "Giants: Citizen Kabuto." Odd, strange and wierd all describe it. But likewise, so does fun, entertaining and laugh-out-loud funny at times.

There are 3 different factions to play as: The Mercs, The Sea Reapers and the Giant Kabuto himself. With the Mercs, there are 5 guys, though you basically play as one of them with the other four tagging along and mimicking you -- there strength is in weapons and technology. The Sea Reaper is Delphi, a sort of mermaid like women with very strong magical powers. And Kabuto, who is raw strength and size.

If you've ever played Warcraft, Starcraft, or Command & Conquer, (RTS's) and Doom or Half-Life (first person shooters) you'll get a feeling for this game as it combines base building with first person shooter. But the big difference is that with each of the 3 factions in this game, the strategies and tactics required are TOTALLY unique. None are like the other two, and yet they are very well balanced and a blast to play.

Graphically, it's stunningly beautiful, as are the sounds and music. And you will laugh out loud at some of the cut-scene dialogues and you'll be wondering if the creators were part drunk when the put this all together. But it works very much in its favor. It's one of the top 10 games I've ever played, but it's definitely the most unique.

Giants - Meccaryns, Sea Reapers, Giants - Oh My!

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 5 / 5
Date: December 18, 2000
Author: Amazon User

I love this game. Or should I say... I love these games. Giants is played through three unique game perspectives: The hilarious cockney Meccaryns, the beautiful and exotic Sea Reapers, and the bone-crunching Giant, Kabuto, himself. The Meccarynss are the technologists - Grenade launchers, mines, jetpacks, etc are all part of the possible inventory items available to the Meccaryns. The Sea Reapers are much earthier. Their arsenal consists of a variety of spells, bows, and a sword. Kabuto uses his teeth and brawn. Each of these options requires that you come up to speed on completely different interfaces. In addition, one can play any of the three choices from a first or third person perspective.

The gameplay can be placed somewhere between RTS and shooter. Several of the missions require that you gather "smarties" and "Vimp meat" to feed the smarties, to help in the construction of a base. Construction follows a short building tree that culminates in a well-fortified base and several key items being made available. The more smarties you have the faster your structures can be completed - assuming that you have kept them well fed. The single player experience is entertaining and serves to gradually bring the player up to speed on the available options for the different playing perspectives.

A full install of this game requires over 1GB of disk space so prepare yourself for removing some of those old games you've been letting languish around thinking that someday you will get back to them. The graphics for this game are beautiful and immersive. Bullets kick up dust, trees sway in the wind, clouds move overhead, terrain and atmosphere are bright and colorful. All this and the beautiful textures provide a rich environment for your gameplaying enjoyment.

Although this game is great...I do have a couple of dings on it. One, there is no save option while working through the missions. If you die be prepared to start over from the mission start. The other ding, a little more frustrating, is that it has crashed to the desktop on a few occasions. Oh yea, I almost forgot, for those who have been waiting for this game in anticipation of getting a close look at the topless Sea Reaper Delphi...forget it, they put a top on her.

This game, along with Sacrifice, should keep me well entertained through the Christmas holidays and into the first part of the New Year where I'm looking forward to getting my hands on, what else? - Warcraft III.

Runs on WinXP SP2 just fine

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 5 / 5
Date: May 13, 2006
Author: Amazon User

I've always wanted to play this oldie but goodie. Picked
it up from an Amazon reseller, figuring I'd play it on my
older Win95/Dos machine as Amazon description says "Not XP
compatable". Well, I put it on my 6 month old XP machine, and
it installed and plays just perfect. No patches, no special
compatability mode. The disk says it runs Win98 or ME, and
I've never encountered a Win98 game that wouldn't run on XP.

So don't shy away from this game if you have XP!

Stunning and Demanding

5 Rating: 5, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: January 31, 2001
Author: Amazon User

This is the most visually stunning game I've ever played... period. The backgrounds are so engaging they're almost a distraction. The colors and textures are rich and beautiful. The lights and special effects are amazingly realistic. The characters are smooth and engaging.

I recently purchased one of the mnay Geoforce2 cards on the market this game plays like a dream. Upgrading from an older TNT2 made a tremendous difference. Giants seems custom made for the features of the Geoforce2 cards.

Giants has raised the bar in graphics and gameplay, which may strike some the wrong way. Those of you who with computers barely ahead of the obsolescence curve, might feel a bit left behind. Those of you who are still running on older video cards, like I was, might have some problems. Unfortunately, it's the nature of the beast.

Aside from graphics, Giants presents and engaging and hilarious story with excellent gameplay. Just when I felt I'd conquered one aspect, the game switches gears, races, or genres and suddenly becomes a new game. Giants hints at being a first person shooter, a racing game, a strategy game, and an adventure game. Unlike many games that have tried to combine different elements and failed, Giants makes each transition smoothly and succesfully.

So, the bottom line: if you have a newer computer with a decent video card, you will probably love this game. If you've been thinking of getting a new computer because your current one is lagging behind, you might want to reconsider purchasing Giants. Giants could still prove to be fun, but without the incredible graphics, you might feel that you're missing something.

Giants

4 Rating: 4, Useful: 3 / 3
Date: March 11, 2001
Author: Amazon User

Is there life after Deus_Ex? Yes, now there is. Giants is a brilliant game. On my modest Celeron 466 system , with a Geforcce2 MX video card, the game plays fluidly and the worlds are stunning. Only when engulfed by numerous badies does the framerate drop to a minimum that just allows play to continue. If you have a Geforce card, it is a must have.

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