Today's Goodwill Hunting involves a 64-bit system, a photography simulator, and a couple Rare games that aren't too hard to find.

A Nintendo 64 system, Pokemon Snap, Goldeneye, and Perfect Dark have all been spotted and purchased by myself at a local Goodwill. A nice catch, I say. A nice catch indeed.



Pokemon Snap

System: Nintendo 64
Developer: HAL Laboratory, Inc
Publisher: Nintendo
Release Date: 1999
Going Amazon Price w/ Shipping: $8.00

Pokemon Snap is a photography game that's played kind of similar to an on-rails light gun game. You ride around in a cart whiling aiming your camera around trying to take the best pictures of the various pokemon in the level. It was developed by HAL Laboratory, Inc, who have made a ton of games, but you may now them for the Mother and Earthbound series.

Game play in Pokemon Snap mainly consists of you taking photos and using a selection of three items to interact with the pokemon. By holding down the Z button you aim your camera and then press A to take a photo. When not holding Z the A button throws an apple, the B button throws a Pester Ball, and the C Down button plays a flute. All of these items have to be unlocked and do various things to catch the Pokemons' attention or make them act differently. You are scored based on the size of the Pokemon in the photo, if the Pokemon is centered, the pose of the Pokemon, and how many of that Pokemon that are in the frame.



I went into Pokemon Snap not expecting much. I knew a little about it and I've never been impressed with any console Pokemon games. I was wrong. This game is really fun. The feeling of seeing a Pokemon quickly peek out from behind a bush and quickly snapping a perfect photo is rewarding. Also, the interactions with the Pokemon and environments using the various items makes for some fun "I wonder what this will do" moments. Throwing an apple at Charmander causing him to fall in a lava pit and burst out as Charizard is one of many examples.

There are a couple downsides to the game. For one it only features 63 of the original 151 Pokemon. It's kind of disappointing that many people will missing out on seeing some of their favorite Pokemon. The game is also very short and can be beat in a couple hour sitting. There are seven levels and they only last a few minutes each. Factor in the amount of Pokemon and you'll probably be done with the game after replaying each level a few times.

Overall, Pokemon Snap is a fun and unique game. I highly recommend it to anyone interested in Pokemon or just a unique take on a on-rails "shooter". I haven't played a Pokemon game since the original game boy and I still had fun so being a diehard Pokemon fan is not a requirement. You can also purchase the game on Virtual Console for $10 if you don't own a Nintendo 64.



GoldenEye

System: Nintendo 64
Developer: Rare
Publisher: Nintendo
Release Date: 1997
Going Amazon Price w/ Shipping: $13.00

Oh, GoldenEye, do I even need to explain you? An extremely popular FPS for the Nintendo 64 developed by Rare. It's also based on a Bond move, or so I've heard.

By now, most people have played this game or know what it is. I've never owned a Nintendo 64 so my experience with the game is limited to playing multiplayer with friends a couple time. I've never played the single player so this is my first experience with that.



The game is still fun today, although, being used to high-res graphics and dual sticks does make it a little harder to enjoy. I do believe Rare did the best anyone could possible do with FPS controls on the Nintendo 64. They kept the controls fairly simple and I started to move around fairly naturally after getting used to the strafing and movement control layout. The best thing about GoldenEye has to be it's level design and objectives. The majority of first-person shooters at this point were shoot everything, get keycards, and get to the exit door. GoldenEye gives you several goals per level and lets you accomplish them how you want. The levels themselves are all unique and interesting and it's fun finding your way around while silently picking off the enemies one by one.

The only negatives to the game are the primitive controls and graphics. When turning corners or aiming up or down a staircase I would often become disoriented for a few seconds. Many textures are so muddy that it can be hard to tell what you're looking at up close and the controls certainly don't help the situation. The game does seem to understand that it can be hard to aim, which, is why there is the auto-aim option making the game a little less frustrating for those who have trouble. Also, the mission goals are sometimes a little vague and I failed quite a few times because I got to the end of a mission but missed talking to one person or doing one little objective.

Overall, GoldenEye stands the test of time. If you don't own it and have a Nintendo 64 I would still recommend it. The single player and multiplayer modes are still fun and enjoyable and it's a great piece of gaming history.



Perfect Dark

System: Nintendo 64
Developer: Rare
Publisher: Rare & Nintendo
Release Date: 2000
Going Amazon Price w/ Shipping: $8.00

Perfect Dark is Rare's "spiritual successor" to GoldenEye. Using what made GoldenEye so great and updating it with better graphics and more advanced game play, Rare tried to improve on their original formula. Whether or not their attempt was a success is debatable.

The main difference between GoldenEye and Perfect Dark is the setting and Perfect Dark's stronger focus on stealth and gadgets. Perfect Dark also required the expansion RAM cartridge for the game to be playable. Overall, the two games are very similar with the same control setup and similar single player mission structure and multiplayer.



To me GoldenEye does a better job on the single player but Perfect Dark adds some really inventive and fun multiplayer modes to the mix. Let's talk about the counter-op mode! Why don't more games have this?! What it is is one player plays the main character and plays the single player mission as they normally would alone. The second player controls the enemies in the level. His goal is to stop the first player from completing the mission objectives. It's extremely fun and addicting and I don't know of a single other game with a mode like this. Perfect Dark also adds a co-op mode, which, GoldenEye lacks.

The big downside to Perfect Dark is slowdown. It seems Rare tried to push the Nintendo 64 hardware too hard and even with the expansion RAM there are moments in levels where the frames-per-second get pretty low. This is especially true in multiplayer. It also suffers a little from poor controls and some muddy graphics at times just like it's predecessor.

Overall, I would recommend this game to anyone who is a fan of GoldenEye or wants some interesting multiplayer gaming. It's a little harder to play now because of the slowdown issue, but I was still able to enjoy it. Luckily, an XBLA port is coming next month and I'm going to guess that it won't have the same issues. It might be the first time Perfect Dark will actually be played the way it was meant to be played.