Link:
<div class='quotetop'></div><div class='quotemain'>Standing in line to play Seaman 2 at Tokyo Game Show today, we expected to be confused by the game. This is a sequel to a game about an interactive fish -- that you talked to -- that took months to play. And now the fish seems to be gone. Add in that the trailer playing for us while we waited in line looked like some kind of Russian infomercial/investigative report hybrid, and it was a confusing but intriguing setup.
The big new feature in the sequel is that you no longer interact with a fish. Now a cave man/gorilla with a curly belly button is your muse, which looks to change things quite a bit. Make him angry, and he will bend over, pick up a rock and throw it at the camera, knocking out your signal and making the screen go fuzzy. Please him by presenting a banana, and he will sit down and eat it slowly.
In the version on display at TGS, the game is presented uniquely in a special Seaman theater designed by Sega. When you get inside, you come across a thick piece of glass like you would find in a museum observatory with the cave man on the other side. It's not just the game playing behind the glass, though -- it's the game playing on a clear screen with actual trees and plants behind it, so it looks like the cave man is interacting with these objects as he gets the bananas from a tree and moves around. It's a neat effect for the version at TGS, but leaves us even more confused with what to expect from the finished game (presumably the real life objects will be represented on the screen in the game).
Seaman 2 also features its own PS2 controller that looks a bit like the custom pads available for fighting game fans, but with a microphone built in for players to talk. We're not sure if the basic controller functions will do much with the game, as the first Seaman was very microphone driven and this controller seems mostly like an excuse to get the microphone out to all who purchase the title.
Why it's still called "Seaman," we're not really sure, but we're excited about the prospect of this new virtual pet. Right now, however, the game is only scheduled for release in Japan, so we'll have to wait to see if the PS2 has enough life left in it for Sega to bring the title to the U.S.</div>
<div class='quotetop'></div><div class='quotemain'>Standing in line to play Seaman 2 at Tokyo Game Show today, we expected to be confused by the game. This is a sequel to a game about an interactive fish -- that you talked to -- that took months to play. And now the fish seems to be gone. Add in that the trailer playing for us while we waited in line looked like some kind of Russian infomercial/investigative report hybrid, and it was a confusing but intriguing setup.
The big new feature in the sequel is that you no longer interact with a fish. Now a cave man/gorilla with a curly belly button is your muse, which looks to change things quite a bit. Make him angry, and he will bend over, pick up a rock and throw it at the camera, knocking out your signal and making the screen go fuzzy. Please him by presenting a banana, and he will sit down and eat it slowly.
In the version on display at TGS, the game is presented uniquely in a special Seaman theater designed by Sega. When you get inside, you come across a thick piece of glass like you would find in a museum observatory with the cave man on the other side. It's not just the game playing behind the glass, though -- it's the game playing on a clear screen with actual trees and plants behind it, so it looks like the cave man is interacting with these objects as he gets the bananas from a tree and moves around. It's a neat effect for the version at TGS, but leaves us even more confused with what to expect from the finished game (presumably the real life objects will be represented on the screen in the game).
Seaman 2 also features its own PS2 controller that looks a bit like the custom pads available for fighting game fans, but with a microphone built in for players to talk. We're not sure if the basic controller functions will do much with the game, as the first Seaman was very microphone driven and this controller seems mostly like an excuse to get the microphone out to all who purchase the title.
Why it's still called "Seaman," we're not really sure, but we're excited about the prospect of this new virtual pet. Right now, however, the game is only scheduled for release in Japan, so we'll have to wait to see if the PS2 has enough life left in it for Sega to bring the title to the U.S.</div>