Review by Fidika

Reviewed: 05/04/02 | Updated: 07/19/02

Surgeon Generals Warning: "may cause temporary insanity or fits of enraged violence due to high stress levels and poor game design"

That's right, this is Gundam, the live action, interactive movie! Now, I'm a pretty big Gundam fan personally, so I just had to pick up this game to add it to my collection, if nothing else. I realize that interactive movies have a VERY BAD rep amongst video game circles, because... well... they're always crap quite frankly! However, the concept of interactive movies is really a very good one, it's just always poorly executed. Wouldn't it be nice if you could rewrite the script in your favorite movie? Change the camera angles, the background lighting effects, or replace certain characters with your favorite actors? Alter the plot so that your favorite character survives or the bad-guy wins in the end? Sounds like a great idea to me! However, no one takes ''interactive movies'' seriously, so they're almost always given an absurdly small budget, meaning it'll be of grade C quality, with random bums off the street playing big parts, or has-been actors playing the star roles.

Never has that been more true than with Gundam 0079: The War for Earth. You don't have to know Japanese to recognize bad acting when you see it, and when you play this game, you'll truly know what BAD ACTING IS! The game (or ''interactive movie'') encompasses the first 10 episodes of the original MS Gundam series, from Amuro becoming pilot of the Gundam, to the death of Garma. However, the plot has been significantly altered from the original, 20-year-old TV show. Char's forces are attacking Side 7, and Amuro, the would-be-pilot of Gundam, is apparently dead, and ''you'' replace him instead (they never actually show you, ''you'' represent the personification of the player, I guess, which is probably best, I wouldn't want to see what half-wit actor they would've gotten to play the leading role anyway...). By the way, Char Aznable will be played by some fat guy with a butt-chin, who in no way resembles Char. Furthermore, his mask looks like it's made out of paper machi. Which brings me to my next subject: costumes. The costumes the characters sport are probably best described as trash bags with holes cut out of them and spray-painted various colors. They're a very poor imitation of the uniforms worn in the original Gundam TV show.

Oh, and did I mention that the movie is completely dubbed? Yes, that's right, they didn't use the actor's original voices, instead, they used voices from the original voice actors from the original Gundam TV show. I admit, that probably was a pretty good idea (to preserve the continuity with the show), although it makes the movie look even cheaper than it should when their mouths don't even match the words. Still, I think it would've been better if they animated the characters using traditional cel-animation rather than live-action actors. Fortunately however, the game is mostly computer-animated, featuring CGI versions of everyone's favorite Gundams, Zakus, and the White Base. The computer animation is actually kind of good, with some nice lighting and texturing effects. However, the animation is pretty unrealistic (even for giant 200-ton Robots), and looks very awkward most of the time.

Unfortunately, Gundam 0079's ''interactive'' part only goes so far as pressing the correct buttons at the correct time on the screen (Shenmue QTE style, mostly). If you do something wrong, you won't get an altered storyline or change the plot, you'll simply get a short sequence of your Gundam being blown up probably, and have to redo it. And when I mean REDO it, I really mean REDO IT! You have to REDO THE WHOLE SEQUENCE! Sure, it's nice to watch a sequence 1 or 2 times, but after the 10th time, it REALLY, REALLY GETS OLD! I've had it where I had to watch the same stupid 2-minute long cinema over and over again, each time trying to get the stupid button-pressing gameplay down, and believe me IT SURE WASN'T FUN! That is, unless your ''idea of fun'' is torturing yourself... slowly... painfully... mindnumbingly...

If you HAVE TO GET THIS GAME, I recommend you simply use some of the codes provided by GameFAQs to simply watch it as a movie. As a movie, it was mildly entertaining. It's always fun to pull this game out, show it to your friends, and laugh your @$$ off at the terrible, horrible, ''acting'' in this game. However, ''actually playing the game'' is a big no no, unless you feel like torturing someone, and driving them to the brink if insanity (I shudder at the thought of being forced to play this game for even an hour straight...). But then again, it might be a good interrogation method, and one you can't get in trouble with the constitution for using (I believe the FBI already owns a copy of this game...).

In fact, giving this game a 2 out of 10 is being generous (more than it deserves). I didn't give it a 1 because the 30-minute long movie almost entertained me, and, well, it was inadvertently very funny! Only pick up this game if you're a VERY hardcore Gundam fan (like myself, of course), and even in that case, only use it as a 30-minute OVA.

Rating: 2

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