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For a quarter century, Vanna White has been making a fortune turning letters on a wall, even after technology had long made her obsolete. The popularity of Wheel of Fortune has endured for decades, and many a gaming platform has had its own version in some form or another. The Sega CD was no exception, but whatever charm and magic made the show such a hit was completely lost in this horrible version.
Full-motion video games are love ’em or leave ’em, and most left a long time ago. There are some out there who actually enjoy them all, and those who have an open mind are sure to find a few that they might *gasp* like! Psygnosis’ Microcosm is one title that tends to split people right down the middle, so read our full review and see where you stand.
The Sega CD seemed to peak in the beat-’em-up genre with the early release of Final Fight, since few games that followed, if any, equaled that level of quality. Sony Imagesoft, known for its dreadful line of licensed games (Mickey Mania was a fortunate hiccup), tried to fill the void with Ultraverse Prime, a game based on the Malibu Comics superhero. To say the game is underwhelming is a major understatement, and it comes off as a digital checklist of how to make a generic brawler. It did have an interesting theme song though…
Robert De Niro as Frankenstein’s monster… just sit and think about that for a minute. De Niro is an incredible actor, but there’s something about him portraying Mary Shelly’s piecemeal gollom that just doesn’t click. I guess more than a few people felt the same way about Kenneth Branagh’s trainwreck adaptation of the classic Gothic novel, but of course, Sony Imagesoft had to check this one off on its list of licensed horrors. I think the game might actually be worse than the film, and in this case, that’s saying something.
When the Sega CD went under, it took with it a lot of games in development, and little by little those games are coming back in some form or another. Penn & Teller’s Smoke & Mirrors was recently leaked onto the Internet, and a few others have even been finished up and sold. Among those available for purchase is a long-forgotten FMV game by those champions of mediocrity, Sony Imagesoft. Bug Blasters: The Exterminators goes beyond camp, and the game is so laughably bad that it gives anti-FMV stalwarts all the ammunition they need to say “’nuff said” any time the topic comes up.