Publisher: Sega of America Developer: Sega Platform: DC Category: Action/sports Rating: Teen for mild language and animated violence
Story:
Its the 21 century, in Tokyo. Depressed kids are every where. The only thing that keeps their spirits up are motorized skates, and a radio station called Jet Set Radio. The kids express themselves by spraying graffiti every where. Cop crackdowns are getting more brutal. S.W.A.T teams, tanks, and helicopters are being sent to stop these kids from expressing themselves. You will spend the whole game spraying graffiti, avoiding the cops, and solving a mystery about a mysterious record.
Game play:
The game play is where the game succeeds. The controls are wonderful in this game. The A button does pretty much everything in this game. You\'ll be riding walls, doing backfilps over cops, grinding rails and spray painting ever wall you can ever think of. There are not many game glitches, the AI follows a pretty straight path, but sometimes if you\'re in a race they will run into a wall and get stuck. But nothing critical.
Sound:
The sound is also good. During the game when you\'re talking to someone before a race or something there will be subtitles, no voice-overs. But when you are watching a cut scene there are great voice overs especially from Professor K. the Jet Set Radio DJ. For the most part the music is ok. The first time I played I thought it was made up music but it turns out that most of the music from the game is music from Japan with English words. You\'ll also be hearing some Rob Zombie, he sings his hit song Dragula (yuck).
Graphics:
No doubt my favorite part about the game. The game is cell shaded! The Graphics are very well done. I have seen some games look better cell shaded (Thirteen etc) but it?s done well enough to give Sega a pat on the back. There is some collision problems like heads getting stuck in walls but again nothing serious.
Camera:
The camera is horrible. You have to adjust it every time you go around a corner. It makes races aggravating and pointless. Though the camera is bad you can still adjust it. But still this is another reason to think about it before you buy this game.
Difficulty:
Extremely difficult. The AI is very smart even though this is an old game. The computer will call for backup, send in helicopters, tanks, the S.W.A.T team, (yes the S.W.A.T team) and their oh so loveable captain (not). You will wonder how they found you when you hide, you will wonder how the follow you when you run. Be afraid, very afraid.
Controls:
I thought you might want to know the controls. A definite plus to buy this game A= Jump/trick B= nothing X= nothing Y= nothing R= Dash L= Center camera/Graffiti Start= Pause/Select
Features:
The features offer great replay value. First off you can make your own graffiti. The one I made said EAT AT JO (I tried to make it Joes but it didn\'t have enough room). Next there are 10 characters you can get to join your team. There are also a bunch of un-lockable characters (I haven\'t unlocked any of them). Also there is online play, pretty cool huh? These are all good reasons to buy the game.
Appropriateness:
Now for the reasons not to buy the game: First off, every time you escape from the police captain or S.W.A.T team, they say the D word. So one of the characters when he runs out of time or loses a race. They also say **** a lot. There is some bad music, like Rob Zombie for instance. You can turn the music off but its still there. Finally, this game is all about vandalism. You are destroying public property for fun. This can not be avoided.
Overall:
This game is good and bad. Though you are vandalizing things its just a game. There is a warning at the beginning of the game that says graffiti is against the law.
