Neon Genesis Evangelion 64

[Anonymous No.10689848]

This is a very interesting game. It's not a very fun game, the actual gameplay never exceeds tedious and boring, but it's interesting how the developers of the first NGE adaptation decided to adapt it chronologically rather than try to boil the essence of evangelion into Vidya form, or just do something lazy like a fighting game or a racing game (it is an N64 game after all). It's an appealing game too; thanks to the aesthetic strength of Evangelion of course but the MIDIfied soundtrack and the great Evangelion models, all of which look amazing especially for the N64, the games cutscenes and visuals are cool and charming even today, maybe moreso, its not hard to imagine how shitty a game like this would look coming out today. The high fidelity models are probably the reason the gameplay is an assortment of clunky mini games; system limitations and a belief that the evangelions shouldn't be blocky and abstract even if it comes at the cost of good gameplay. Id recommend Evangelion fans play it and no one else.
Any anons play the sequel? Is it any good, even for someone who 'liked' the first one? Is there an English patch?

[Anonymous No.10689852]

Oh I forgot to mention how a Neon Genesis Evangelion game would've made a lot more sense on the PlayStation, obviously you have the storage and FMV capabilities but you also have a larger Japanese install base and Evangelion: The Video Game already came out on that console and it jt was called Xenogears, it's no wonder the sequel ended up on the PlayStation 2 and not the GameCube

[Anonymous No.10689896]

>>10689848
>or just do something lazy like a fighting game or a racing game (it is an N64 game after all)
Now I want an Evangelion racing game.

[Anonymous No.10690084]

>>10689848
I agree it's not a very fun game, and it's definitely more focused on its presentation rather than the gameplay, but once you actually understand how the gameplay works (building up sync ratio, performing special attacks) it becomes a decent kaiju fighter simulator, it's basically a spiritual sequel to the SNES Ultraman game, also by Bandai. Same mechanics of building up a power meter to perform powerful attacks. And since Evangelion is heavily influenced by Ultraman, it all works out.
The non-fighting missions can vary but some of them are fun too, I like the Magma Diver one.
But yeah the presentation is definitely the strongest point, I remember back in 1999, watching really bad quality Real Media videos that came in CD-ROMs from anime magazines, and being amazed at how it looked. Then I finally saw the real thing in front of me in a local store managed by a japanese guy who had imported the game. He sold it for a very high price so I couldn't even think of buying it. I remember thinking it was the best looking console game I had seen up to that point.
As far as I know, the game doesn't use any special trickery, doesn't use the Expansion Pak, so it's not one of the most impressive games on the system, however the well-crafted 3D models and the art direction make it stand out a lot, I still think it can look like an early 6th gen game sometimes.
And somehow, later Eva games didn't have this faithful look to them. Like, PS2 has obviously more graphical capabilities than N64, and NGE2 does look pretty good, but somehow the models aren't as good looking as the N64 game, it seems like the modelers were lazier, even with more polycount and better textures. Same with the Evangelion: Jo game.
As for NGE2, while it might seem like it's a sequel for the "2", it's more like a reskin of some other unrelated tactical RPG series in the gameplay department, it's not another Ultraman kaiju-simulator action game.

[Anonymous No.10690096]

And yeah I also thought it was weird that the PS1 didn't get any exclusive Eva game.
Saturn got a number of them developed by Sega, because Sega was the first sponsor Evangelion got. Sadly, they're not particularly good games but they're interesting and funny sometimes. The digital card library one is pretty interesting for fans of the show and the trading card collecting aspect makes me nostalgic for being into anime in the 90s, collecting cards into binders was a staple.
Then there was Girlfriend of Steel, which was originally for Windows, but then Saturn and PS1 got ports, sadly censored (the PS1 version more so).
Then Bandai finally started working with the Eva IP and along with the model kits came the video games, but it was for N64 instead of PS1. My guess is that they wanted to take advantage of the 3D technology, they wouldn't have made the same models on the Saturn or the PS1, and although they could have made it for the Dreamcast, I guess for some reason they went with N64. Well, contrary to popular belief and parroting, N64 wasn't a total failure in Japan anyway, in fact the numbers are quite close to Sega Saturn units, and it also sold more software.
But still weird that the PS1, which was a license game juggernait, didn't get an exclusive Eva game... only a censored Girlfriend of Streel and one or two ports of the PC mahjong Shinji and Friends games (also on Saturn), but nothing exclusive.

[Anonymous No.10690295]

>>10690084
>it's basically a spiritual sequel to the SNES Ultraman game, also by Bandai.
Emulated this to check it out since the deliberate, weighty combat between giants was conceptually interesting. It was pretty fun and its funny to call NGE64 a spiritual successor because although it definitely is it significantly more simple and plays significantly worse because of it. In my opinion the only good change from Ultraman is having a singular attack button instead of a punch and kick button, but the block button with a contextual dodge was a bad choice as was binding the special attack to A+B which can feel a lot more inconsistent than just pressing Y, while using the C buttons for nothing except mashing in the minigames that aren't even the fights. The focus on presentation also hurts these fights a lot like how the camera starts close and pans out, which isn't a big deal for most fights but makes the already tedious mission 13 much worse. It also makes moves that 'cause cutscenes' undesirable because after a while hitting 02's big kick stops being funny and satisfying and starts to be tedious when you have to walk all the way to your opponent to interact again, same with the grab attacks, they lack the simple joy of firing a laser beam and watching a monsters health immediately tick down, and the sync system lacks the depth in managing it as the meter in Ultraman does, because in Ultraman that bar is ultimately the bosses health bar too, whereas in NGE64 you just have to keep it above 80% for the best animations. The intro to every fight where Ultraman flies in and grows in size is a fun way to contextualize the fight without being too repetitive. Not a perfect game I didnt like how I couldnt roll or crouch under projectiles or how I couldn't string two attacks together but much more fun than NGE64.

[Anonymous No.10690394]

>graphically impressive for an N64 game

[Anonymous No.10690524]

>>10690394
That got a genuine chuckle out of me my first playthrough, I think the developers knew it was a little rough so they cut away from it quick. Again it's a game with a lot of charm, or maybe the word is 'character.'

[Anonymous No.10690554]

I'm currently in the process of ripping 3d assets from this game

[Anonymous No.10690572]

>>10690554
That's awesome. Keep us posted.

[Anonymous No.10690576]

>>10690554
Did you make your own 3d renderer or are you using that one tool that reads the hex and you set the offsets for Tris/verts/Tex?

[Anonymous No.10690586]

>>10690572
You can get the low-poly models and weapon models here:
https://www.vg-resource.com/thread-42435.html

[Anonymous No.10690597]

>>10690576
Ripped in Project 64 using Nemu64 plugin, converted to obj. with N64_MappingTool, fixed up in Blender

[Anonymous No.10691275]

>>10690597
Gonna download them and put into GoldSrc so hard!

[Anonymous No.10692965]

>>10690295
>The intro to every fight where Ultraman flies in
There was a reference to this in Bangai O (which also has Ultraman himself in the score result screen as well)

[Anonymous No.10693013]

>>10690597
Lilith looks more buff than I remember.

[Anonymous No.10694694]

>>10692965
>There was a reference to this in Bangai O
Bangai sOul

[Anonymous No.10694706]

>>10693013
Her limbs always had that bloated look when she was on the cross

[Anonymous No.10694815]

>>10689896
theres only one car

[Anonymous No.10694858]

>QTE fest long before Telltale Ganes made it trendy

[Anonymous No.10695154]

>>10694858
There's only one QTE mission, then there's a few instances of QTE/pummeling during action missions but it's still mostly an action game. As already said it's similar to the SNES Ultraman game.

[Anonymous No.10695613]

>>10694815
Did not stop Sonic R

[Anonymous No.10696521]

>>10689848
This licensed shovelware wouldn't be talked about nearly as much if it didn't have the Eva license attached to it.

[Anonymous No.10696534]

>>10696521
Maybe, but if it didn't have the Eva license, or some other famous IP attached, Bandai wouldn't have paid for it's development and we wouldn't have the amazing 3D models it has.
Also, there aren't many Kaiju fight simulators out there.

[Anonymous No.10696551]

>>10690554
Reconstruction of the HD model is coming along well, all that's left is to model the back armor and connect the top section to the abdomen. Once Unit 01 is finished, I can quickly move to Units 00,02 and 03 since I have the HD parts for those as well.

[Anonymous No.10696558]

I will die on the hill that banpresto/bandai had some awesome IP Schlock across multiple generations and there’s tons of stuff im keeping an eye out for translations. When you see the banpresto logo you aren’t guaranteed any sort of quality but you know it’s about to be interesting or funny at a minimum. They’re a based 7/10 factory, the type of AA developer that seems to be going the way of the dodo today, indies just don’t fill that gap.

[Anonymous No.10696581]

>>10696551
Also, I think this might be the only N64 game with a fully modeled (highpoly) mesh of a nude female

[Anonymous No.10696590]

>>10696558
Bandai is more of a mixed bag, some really good stuff, some mod stuff, some shit. But in my experience Banpresto is more consistently good. Also has all the cool /m/ core.