Jet Force Gemini

Jet Force Gemini

North American box art
Developer(s) Rare
Publisher(s)
Director(s) Peter Beanland
Producer(s) Chris Stamper
Designer(s) Martin Wakeley
Composer(s) Robin Beanland
Graeme Norgate
Alistair Lindsay
Platform(s) Nintendo 64
Release date(s)
  • NA: October 11, 1999
  • EU: November 2, 1999
  • JP: December 1, 1999
Genre(s) Third-person shooter, action-adventure, platforming
Mode(s) Single-player, multiplayer

Jet Force Gemini is a third-person shooter video game developed and published by Rare for the Nintendo 64 video game console. It was first released in North America on October 11, 1999 and in Europe on November 2, 1999. The story of the game follows three members of the Jet Force Gemini team as they try to stop the advances of the dark insect tyrant Mizar and his army. The game features a single-player campaign where the player must explore a galaxy and save the Tribals, a race of survivors who have been enslaved and imprisoned by Mizar. The game also includes a multiplayer deathmatch for two to four players and a no split-screen co-operative mode. The gameplay shares elements with platform, action-adventure, and run and gun games.

Jet Force Gemini was developed by Rare's Blast Corps team, who originally considered the possibility to use the Nintendo 64 Expansion Pak. The game received generally positive reviews from critics, with an aggregate review score of 80 out of 100 at the review aggregate website Metacritic. Praise was given to its graphics, sound and original gameplay, while criticism was levelled at the game's difficult controls and insistence on having to save every Tribal to fully complete the game. In 2015, Jet Force Gemini was included as part of the Rare Replay video game compilation for Xbox One.

Plot

Jet Force Gemini revolves around the Jet Force Gemini team attempting to defeat the evil leader Mizar and his horde of Drones. Jet Force Gemini is composed of three main characters: Juno, a taciturn human male whose parents were killed by space pirates that invaded his home station; Vela, Juno's feisty twin sister; and Lupus, Jet Force Gemini's wardog mascot. The game begins with the three characters in orbit around the planet Goldwood after barely escaping the destruction of the entire Jet Force fleet at the hands of Mizar. Their ship has been damaged, leaving them defenseless and unable to warp out of the system. It is not long before the team witnesses Mizar's attack on Goldwood. Soon afterwards, their cruiser is attacked by a large craft of Mizar's. Boarded by drones and out of time, the three decide to abandon the ship and go off on their own separate paths to stop the invasion.[1]

As the game progresses, the heroes eventually find themselves reunited at Mizar's Palace and face to face with Mizar himself. However, Mizar, enraged and vowing revenge on the human race, escapes to a nearby asteroid where he sets course to impact with Earth. King Jeff, the beloved leader of the Tribals, quickly arranges a plan to help the heroes: by providing an ancient starship that can quickly catch up to Mizar's asteroid. Nevertheless, the team needs to locate several vital parts scattered throughout the galaxy, as well as rescue all the Tribals enslaved by Mizar. Also, King Jeff upgrades the heroes with new armor and jet packs that allow them to fly. From this point on, the team stays united and, together, works to search every world for anything they can find.[1]

Once all the Tribals are rescued and the parts found, the team, along with King Jeff, reassembles the old Tribal craft and quickly depart to save Earth. After a rough landing, Juno fights through Mizar's guards and eventually confronts the tyrant. To the surprise of all though, Mizar is revealed to be a robot controlled by King Jeff's jealous brother, Barry. Realising that destroying Barry's robot ruined their best chance of destroying the asteroid, the team is out of options. In an honorable notion, Floyd, the quiet little robot that defected from Mizar and followed the team, offers to sacrifice himself to destroy the asteroid. Hesitantly, the team agrees and attaches a timed warhead to Floyd before sending him into the core. With no time to spare, the team returns to the Tribal craft and departs only seconds before Floyd reaches the core. In a brilliant flash of light, the asteroid is destroyed mere miles away from entering the atmosphere of Earth. Afterwards on Earth, Jet Force Gemini is given the highest honors for their many accomplishments.[1]

Gameplay

In combat mode, the playable character is translucent and a crosshair appears on screen.

Jet Force Gemini is a third-person shooter with elements of platform, action-adventure, and run and gun games. Players control the playable character from a third-person perspective in a free three dimensional environment. The game features extensive levels to explore, items to collect, power-ups that enhance characters health and weaponry, towering bosses to defeat, and devastation on a massive scale.[2] Unlike other Rare shooters such as GoldenEye 007 or Perfect Dark, the weapons in Jet Force Gemini feature no magazines and cannot be reloaded after a certain number of shots. Players fight on foot and have the ability to jump. Much of the game is spent in battle, but some parts feature jump mechanics, as the player can hang from most ledges, swim and fly using jet packs when needed. In combat, the player is free to set on a manual aiming system with the targeting camera fixed behind the character’s head. When using this technique, a reticle appears on screen and the playable character becomes translucent so that players can aim and shoot with finesse.[3] By contrast, when walking around, the game plays much like a typical 3D platformer.[3]

Exploration is one of the most important aspect of the gameplay.[2] The campaign features a galaxy that is composed of 15 nonlinear worlds, with areas connected by different types of doors. Most of the doors open automatically, but some need a special action to be unlocked. For example, some doors require the player to kill all the enemies in the area to be unlocked, while others may require a specific key.[1] The players can take control of any and all three characters as they progress though the game, using their individual and unshared strengths where required;[2] Juno can walk through magma safely, Vela can swim underwater indefinitely, and Lupus can hover for a short period of time.[4] These abilities allow the characters to uncover new areas which the other characters cannot reach. Therefore, choosing the right character for the right stage is critical in order to complete the game.[2] Initially, the game does not allow the player to tackle the different worlds with a desired character, and forces the player to use the three characters individually until they reach a meeting point.[4] Once they get to the meeting point, all of the worlds can be tackled with any character in any order. The overall objective of the game is to explore all the areas in order to save all the Tribals and collect several spaceship pieces that allow the player to get to the final stage.[4]

The game also features a multiplayer mode, where two to four players can battle it out in both traditional deathmatch and survival matches. Like GoldenEye 007, options such as weapon schemes, time limit, number of kills or number of lives can be altered to match player preference. Additionally, some multiplayer aspects, such as levels and characters, can be unlocked by finding the corresponding secret in the game's campaign.[1] Players can also unlock some racing mini-games, where players race from an overhead perspective, as well as a firing range mode, which is similar to a rail shooter like Virtua Cop.[5] In this mode, players are limited to moving a crosshair around the screen while the game automatically follows a specific route. Jet Force Gemini also features a no split-screen co-operative mode, where the second player takes control of Floyd, a floating robot that automatically follows the main playable character, and can assist him by shooting.[2]

Development

Development of Jet Force Gemini began in 1997 by Rare's Blast Corps team,[6] with lead programmer Paul Mountain, who had previously worked on Diddy Kong Racing.[3] The developers took inspiration from many popular games and movies of the time. The free-roaming nature of Nintendo's Super Mario 64 influenced the scale and the openness of some of the backgrounds and settings, and the collecting and upgrading of weapons were inspired by Super Metroid.[3] Additionally, Mountain revealed that "the behaviour of the bad guys was a mixture of arcade space shooter formations and Quake-style 'attack and cover' mechanics".[3] According to him, "I suppose... we were inspired by all the good stuff we'd played and enjoyed playing".[3] The game also borrowed from other non-related video games sources. Lead artist Lee Musgrave admitted: "There are elements of Star Wars in there, Aliens, Dune, Battle of the Planets, even Stargate – it was a real mix of everything and anything 'space' related."[3]

At one time, the game's protagonists Juno and Vela were designed as younger and more cartoon-like with large heads, but were later changed to their more mature versions at Nintendo's request.[3] The game's controls were one of the main concerns during development. The idea was to retain a character-based game, where players could see the character they were playing, while keeping the tightness and accuracy of first-person shooters.[3] Rare initially attempted to automate the change of view and targeting mode based on the context of the action, but this idea was eventually replaced with a manual system. According to Mountain, "The solution we ended with is a beautiful thing... It feels very old-school to me; difficult, unforgiving, but ultimately precise".[3] As several members of the team enjoyed racing games and had also worked on Diddy Kong Racing, the team decided to include the futuristic Ant racing featured in the campaign and the top-down arcade racing games in the multiplayer.[5]

Developers initially considered the possibility to use the 4MB Nintendo 64 Expansion Pak,[7][8] but the idea was eventually dropped. According to Mountain, "we wanted to deliver the same experience to all players and were confident that we could do this using the standard 4MB of RAM on the console."[5] This led to some confusion as the box cover for the original release stated that it did support such a feature. Nintendo provided a quick-fix to the mislabeled covers by providing stickers declaring its rumble pak compatibility and fixed later printings of the boxes.[9] The game was originally planned for release on August 31, 1999, but was pushed back to September 27 in order to give the programmers time to polish up the game.[10] It was then pushed back even further to October 11 due to manufacturing delays.[11] Jet Force Gemini was localized as Star Twins (スターツインズ) in Japan due to Nintendo's opinion that the Japanese pronunciation of the original name, "Jetto Fōsu Jeminai" was too difficult to pronounce.[12] 4Kids Entertainment obtained the rights to merchandising both Jet Force Gemini and Perfect Dark toys, movies, and other recreational products, but the company did not produce any merchandise for the franchise.[13]

Reception

Reception
Aggregate scores
AggregatorScore
GameRankings79% (25 reviews)[14]
Metacritic80% (14 reviews)[15]
Review scores
PublicationScore
AllGame[16]
Edge9/10[17]
GameFan77%[18]
Game Informer7.75/10[19]
Game RevolutionB[20]
GameSpot8.8/10[21]
IGN8.1/10[22]
Nintendo Life[23]
Nintendo Power9/10[24]
The Cincinnati Enquirer[25]
GameCritics.com7.0/10[26]

Jet Force Gemini received generally positive reviews from critics.[15] Scott McCall of AllGame felt that the game "pays homage to 8- and 16-bit games with its emphasis on high-intensity action and level design that requires skill with the controller."[16] Wiriting for GameSpot, Nelson Taruc said that Jet Force Gemini "easily joins Rareware's already impressive stable of hits" like GoldenEye 007 or Banjo-Kazooie, stating that the game is so varied that "it could be broken up into four separate games - and still get strong reviews."[21] IGN reviewer Matt Casamassina praised the game's originality and concluded that Jet Force Gemini "has much more good going for it than it does bad".[22]

The audio and sound effects were lauded.[20][26] IGN pointed out that the music was "some of the very best ever put into a Nintendo 64 game" and described the sound effects as "dead-on and crystal clear".[22] Johnny Liu of Game Revolution said that the game "goes for a more operatic feel than the generic video game techno".[20] Nintendo Power credited the game's "visually stunning" settings and "state-of-the-art" animations and special lighting,[24] while Game Informer noted that the game's "enormous" explosions help intensify the action.[19] Despite the praise, critics remarked that the frame rate can drop significantly when the action increases.[22][26]

While the gameplay was highlighted for its depth and length,[19] some critics reacted negatively to the insistence on having to save every Tribal to fully complete the game.[20][22][26] According to GameCritics, "Going through each level three times becomes majorly tedious [...] and finding them also lead a lot of pointless legwork".[26] IGN felt that this task was "far too tedious to truly be enjoyed",[22] even though Game Revolution admitted that it "is countered by the pure fun of running around tearing through giant bugs with lasers".[20] The game's challenging artificial intelligence and variety of weapons were also highlighted positively.[21][24] According to IGN, "It's old-school gameplay brought into 3D and it's all extremely satisfying."[22]

Although the minigames and co-operative mode were considered interesting, the deathmatch mode was criticised for being "slow and clunky".[22][20][16] AllGame's McCall felt that it simply did not work due to the game's unusual manual targeting.[16] Publications also claimed that the controls were complex and confusing.[19][21][22] In a negative review, James Bottorff of The Cincinnati Enquirer explained that the control scheme is frustrating because players are required to change from using the analog stick to the C buttons of the Nintendo 64 controller when switching to combat mode.[25] GameSpot said that the controls remain responsive at all times, but acknowledged that the alternation between the two control styles "might prove distasteful to some".[21] In a retrospective review, Andy Green of Nintendo Life stated that Jet Force Gemini is "a really enjoyable game" with "its fair share of flaws that tend to hinder the experience a little too much. That being said, it's certainly an incredibly fun title, at its best, that will definitely raise a few smiles".[23]

Legacy

A Game Boy Color version of Jet Force Gemini was in development in 2000, but was ultimately cancelled.[27] The owner of the prototype cartridge has attested that the game appears to be nearly complete, though it was never officially announced by either Rare or Nintendo.[27] In an October 2012 interview, former Rare designer and producer Martin Wakeley commented: "Jet Force Gemini on the Gameboy was the only occasion I can remember Rare outsourcing anything. It was being done by Bits Studios and was nearly done last time I saw it, I’m not sure what happened to it."[28]

In 2000, Jet Force Gemini was ranked by IGN at number 20 in their list of The Top 25 N64 Games of All Time.[29] In 2009, Official Nintendo Magazine ranked it the 93rd best game available on Nintendo platforms. The staff called it Rare's "big hope" due to the highly anticipated but delayed Nintendo 64 game Perfect Dark.[30] Subsequent games developed by Rare have featured cameo appearances of Jet Force Gemini, including Kameo: Elements of Power, Viva Piñata: Trouble in Paradise, and Banjo-Tooie.[31] Players may also dress their character up as Juno, Vela, and Lupus in Minecraft: Xbox 360 Edition through the use of a downloadable content pack.[32] The game is included as part of the Rare Replay video game compilation for Xbox One, with support for dual-analog controls being added post-release.[33]

References

  1. 1 2 3 4 5 Jet Force Gemini Official Nintendo Player's Guide. Nintendo of America. 1999. ASIN B000G8L1AE.
  2. 1 2 3 4 5 "Jet Force Gemini". IGN. 1999-09-22. Archived from the original on 2011-07-13. Retrieved 2011-02-22.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 Damien McFerran (2010-06-03). "Feature: The Making of Jet Force Gemini - Part One". Nintendo Life Retro. Archived from the original on 2011-07-14. Retrieved 2011-02-08.
  4. 1 2 3 Jeremy Conrad (2000-04-14). "Jet Force Gemini Game Guide". Graphics and Weapons Tips by Peer. IGN. Archived from the original on 2012-06-25. Retrieved 2013-02-07.
  5. 1 2 3 Damien McFerran (2010-06-03). "Feature: The Making of Jet Force Gemini - Part Two". Nintendo Life Retro. Archived from the original on 2011-07-14. Retrieved 2011-02-08.
  6. ↑ "N64 Games of October". IGN. 2010-10-06. Archived from the original on 2011-07-13. Retrieved 2011-03-02.
  7. ↑ "Jet Force Gemini Team Speaks". IGN. 1998-11-23. Archived from the original on 2011-07-13. Retrieved 2011-03-02.
  8. ↑ "Rare Undecided About 4MBs". IGN. 1999-04-04. Archived from the original on 2012-03-16. Retrieved 2011-02-08.
  9. ↑ "Nintendo Fixes JFG Box". IGN. 1999-10-12. Archived from the original on 2012-03-16. Retrieved 2011-02-08.
  10. ↑ "Jet Force Gemini Delayed". IGN. 1999-06-18. Archived from the original on 2012-03-16. Retrieved 2011-02-08.
  11. ↑ "October Gemini". IGN. 1999-08-09. Archived from the original on 2012-03-16. Retrieved 2011-02-08.
  12. ↑ "Star Twins: News From Japan". IGN. 1999-10-15. Archived from the original on 2012-03-16. Retrieved 2011-02-08.
  13. ↑ "Rare Toys". IGN. 2000-01-24. Archived from the original on 2012-03-16. Retrieved 2011-02-08.
  14. ↑ "Reviews of Jet Force Gemini". GameRankings. Archived from the original on 2013-05-10. Retrieved 2010-11-28.
  15. 1 2 "Reviews of Jet Force Gemini". Metacritic. Archived from the original on 2012-10-23. Retrieved 2010-11-28.
  16. 1 2 3 4 McCall, Scott. "Jet Force Gemini - Review". AllGame. Archived from the original on 2014-11-13. Retrieved 2013-11-20.
  17. ↑ Edge staff (November 1999). "Jet Force Gemini". Edge (77).
  18. ↑ "REVIEW for Jet Force Gemini". GameFan. 1999-10-08.
  19. 1 2 3 4 "Jet Force Gemini". Game Informer. 1999-10-01. Archived from the original on 2000-06-04. Retrieved 2011-03-01.
  20. 1 2 3 4 5 6 Liu, Johnny (1999-11-01). "Jet Force Gemini Review". Game Revolution. Archived from the original on 2012-07-17. Retrieved 2013-02-07.
  21. 1 2 3 4 5 Taruc, Nelson (1999-10-12). "Jet Force Gemini Review". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 2003-06-28. Retrieved 2011-03-01.
  22. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 Casamassina, Matt (1999-10-08). "Jet Force Gemini". IGN. Archived from the original on 2008-10-08. Retrieved 2011-03-01.
  23. 1 2 Green, Andy (2013-08-24). "Jet Force Gemini (Nintendo 64) Review". Archived from the original on 2013-10-31. Retrieved 2013-11-20.
  24. 1 2 3 "Jet Force Gemini". Nintendo Power. 125: 120. October 1999.
  25. 1 2 Bottorff, James (1999-11-06). "Poor controls shoot down Jet Force Gemini". The Cincinnati Enquirer. Archived from the original on 2006-01-01. Retrieved 2006-01-01.
  26. 1 2 3 4 5 Weir, Dale (1999-10-28). "Jet Force Gemini". GameCritics. Archived from the original on 2008-05-15. Retrieved 2011-03-01.
  27. 1 2 monokoma (2010-02-28). "Jet Force Gemini (GBC - Cancelled)". Unseen64. Archived from the original on 2010-05-04. Retrieved 2011-02-22.
  28. ↑ Emily Rogers (2012-10-01). "Crash Lab: Life after Rareware and Free Radical". notenoughshaders.com. Archived from the original on 2012-10-25. Retrieved 2010-10-02.
  29. ↑ "The Top 25 N64 Games of All Time: #16-20". IGN. 2000-06-13. Archived from the original on 2011-07-13. Retrieved 2011-03-01.
  30. ↑ Tom East (2009-02-17). "Nintendo Feature: 100 Best Nintendo Games: Part One". Official Nintendo Magazine. Archived from the original on 2013-11-02. Retrieved 2013-12-05.
  31. ↑ Nelson Taruc. "Banjo Tooie Game Guide". GameSpot. Archived from the original on 2011-06-28. Retrieved 2011-02-10.
  32. ↑ Brenna Hillier (2012-08-22). "Minecraft Xbox 360 Skin Pack 2 due August 24". VG247. Archived from the original on 2012-08-25. Retrieved 2013-08-14.
  33. ↑ Stephen Totilo (2015-08-03). "Rare Replay: The Kotaku Review". Kotaku. Archived from the original on 2015-08-05. Retrieved 2015-08-05.

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