Released on September 9, 1995, the Playstation was Sony’s first attempt at releasing a home console. Sony had originally partnered with Nintendo to create a CD-based add-on for the Super Nintendo, but when that deal fell through, Sony continued development and released the project as a stand-alone console. Marketed as a more “grown-up” alternative to the Nintendo 64, the Playstation completely dominated the 32-bit generation, sending the Sega Saturn to an early grave. Notable franchises launched on the Playstation include Gran Turismo, Metal Gear Solid, Resident Evil, and Ace Combat. Sony also pulled off a major coup by luring Squaresoft, publisher of the Final Fantasy series, away from Nintendo. The system’s only real competition at the peak of its popularity was the Nintendo 64, which was marketed mostly to younger gamers and still used cartridge-based games instead of optical media. The Sony Playstation went on to enjoy a 10 year life span and sell over 100 million consoles and almost 1 billion software units worldwide.
The best-laid plans of mice and men… Kaze no NOTAM is a 1997 hot air ballooning game released for the Sony PlayStation by Artdink, the developer responsible for the A-Train series, Aquanaut’s Holiday, Carnage Heart, Tail of the Sun, and No One Can Stop Mr. Domino. July 30, 2023 – I know more than one … Read more
Episode 26 – This week on the show, it’s the second installment in the “Launch Spectacular” series, the launch of the original Sony Playstation! On September 9, 1995, one of the greatest video game consoles, the PS1 got it’s start on North American shores. We take a look at the history of the PSX, and … Read more
Episode 4 – In this episode, I review Doom for the Sony Playstation. John Carmack and John Romero’s masterpiece of a game from Id software made a terrific transition over to the PSX. This game contains content from both Doom and Doom II, and was at the time of its release in 1995 an awesome … Read more
Someone over at Sony had their thinking cap on when they thought up Jet Moto, a cross between motorcycle racing, jet skiing, and snowmobile riding. This early Playstation racer offers up a unique, though far from perfect, game play experience by combining elements from games like Hang-On and Hydro Thunder. You start the game off … Read more
Tetris Plus was one of only two Tetris games released for the Playstation (the other being “The Next Tetris”), and is identical to the Sega Saturn release of the same name. Along with the requisite “Classic” and “Vs.” modes, Tetris Plus features a “puzzle” mode (isn’t the whole game a puzzle?) that is really the … Read more
PGA Tour 96 was three years and four games ago, but EA is still using pre-rendered environments and digitized player animations. The game runs at a poor frame rate, mostly due to the new fluid camera that follows the path of your ball, which was well intentioned but ultimately makes the game look worse. EA … Read more
Amazingly, for the third year in a row, this game still features the same 14 PGA tour pros, but EA has somehow managed to fit 5 courses onto the disc instead of the two courses included with the previous installments. PGA Tour 98 features the world famous Pebble Beach, TPC at Sawgrass (again), the Colonial … Read more
As the sequel to PGA Tour 96, the 1997 edition had big shoes to fill. EA’s first attempt at a golf sim on the Playstation was nearly flawless, and they could have basically phoned this one in by releasing the same game with two new courses and maybe a couple of new PGA pros. The … Read more
Released shortly after the launch of the Playstation, PGA Tour 96 was the first golf game to appear on the system. For a game that’s 14 years old (as of this writing) the game holds up surprisingly well. The game uses the standard 3-click system common with older golf games. Because the screens are all … Read more
Air Combat is noteworthy not only as a launch title (it was actually released 4 days after the system officially launched), but also as the first installment of the acclaimed “Ace Combat” series. The basic premise of the game is that you are part of a group of mercenary pilots who are hired by a … Read more
This disc was included as a bonus pack-in game with Ridge Racer Type 4, and features the complete Ridge Racer game, plus a scaled down version of the game running at a smooth 60 frames per second, known as “Turbo Mode”. You might not think the difference would be noticeable, considering that the original game … Read more
A year after the release of Ridge Racer, Namco released the follow-up game, Ridge Racer Revolution. The sequel cleans up the graphics a little bit and adds a much-needed rear view mirror. Everything that made Ridge Racer a great game is still present in the sequel, as Namco did little to mess with a winning … Read more
Grid Runner is a capture-the-flag style game in which two players face off against each other on a maze-like grid. To win each round you must capture a pre-determined number of flags, which are placed around the grid, before your opponent does. Throughout the game, one player is “it”, and while “it” the player can … Read more
Ridge racer was a North American launch title, and is a port of the arcade game of the same name. The game features three variations of the same track, a short, easy track and two successively longer and more challenging track variations. While it would have been nice to have three completely different tracks (like … Read more
While NHL 97 looks very bad compared to subsequent EA hockey games, for its time the game was a real leap forward from the 16-bit generation. The players are all large and fully polygonal, but the low polygon count takes away a lot of the detail. The glass over the boards looks more like a … Read more