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BaronKrusha's Conker's Bad Fur Day Review
Normally, I don't care for the graphics of game when I first play it, game play matters to me most. But when I popped in BFD for the first time, the graphics literally grabbed and took me into Conker's world. I swear to Al God, every character must be built with over a million polygons. Each character in the game looks like a million bucks. Everybody animates according to what is happening, say, for example, Conker is hungover. He'll hold his throbbing head in ache, say a few lines to justify he's sick, and his eye's will be blood shot. Something very new to the N64 (and too late) is lip synched speech. Conker's mouth will animate according to what he's saying, giving the impression that he is actually talking. The characters that aren't used much in the game just move their flap of a mouth to lip synch, which is rather disappointing. And then there's the scenery. The textures blend perfectly, with lots of detail in 'em, too. In the Heist multiplayer, there are lockers and phones in the textures that look extremely real. If this is what Rare can accomplish on the N64, then I can't wait 'til Gamecube comes out. "Marvelous" indeed.
9.8
Ever since Donkey Kong Country 2, I've been addicted to Rare's music. Well, after that game, I was a bit disappointed with the music in their latest games. Every tune after that was too cheery for me, and I was blood thirsty for something catchy and a bit dark. Thank you Robin Beanland for investing in the Rad Game Tools, a little tool that compresses superb  music into a little 256 cart for us to hear. The music from 'It's War' is extremely cool, with drums setting the beat and trumpets, uh, trumpeting.
Then, there's the speech. About 5 hours of speech (so I've heard) and all of it is well done. No, Rare didn't hire professional actors to act perverted, Chris Seavor himself did most of the voices, including Conker. Of course, they had to alter most of it. Fortunately, every character speaks, and that really adds to everybody's personality. "And you can get on with whatever it is you're trying to do" Honestly, you'll be saying the game's witty dialogue everywhere, to the point where your boss will fire you if you "don't shut your cakehole." I wonder how Rare will do speech with Banjo-Threeie.
9.9
Be prepared to get that same feeling when you play Super Mario 64, then Banjo-Kazooie. Conker's Bad Fur Day's control is a bit difficult to learn, especially when you've been playing Banjo-Tooie for sometime. Conker runs extremely fast, and jumping is a pain to figure out when those lighting effects are just doing their job. Include the stubborn camera, and you've got some high hurdles to jump. But, like Jet Force Gemini, these control problems can be mastered.
With button mashing behind, I've to discuss Rare's ingenious Context Sensitive pads. While in a Context Sensitive zone, you can simply press 'B' to perform some kind of action. This makes for extremely simple control, the instruction manual won't be used much in this area.
8.3
On one finger, count how many games have been this simple, so funny, and sound great before Bad Fur Day came along. Oh, you can't do that, for it has not been pulled off before. Rare has used all of it's talent and created BFD, resulting in one of the most original games ever. Sound, in most N64 games, sucks. Then Rare came along and made great music along with actual voice. Gameplay in 3D platform games has been redone. No collecting here, just simple 'B' button pads to complete your adventure. And then there's the plot, worthy of Homer (not Simpson, the Greek guy). Conker wakes up hungover, and he has not the slightest what's actually going on. Only 'til the ending does everything fall into place. It's gonna be tough to make something even more original than this.
9.5
The Nintendo 64's limits have been pushed, and pushed, and pushed, but BFD has finally set the standard, just too late. Even though Conker's platforming debut is a bit late, it's a great game. The extra year or so changing Conker into a mature game was well used. My only gripe is that the game is pretty short, despite it's difficulty level. The multiplayer helps a bit, but the core of the game is the adventure. Well, Rare has registered a trademark known as "Conker's Other Bad Day" so, they must have something more for blood-thirsty 17+ gamers. Can't wait!
9.5
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