Thought that only just occurred to me days after watching this. I was wondering why the creature from the egg resembled dinosaurs even though it was supposed to be what wiped them out. Then I realized that the first thing nephilim did was take on a form based on nearby things, which it retains throughout the entire game. And if nephilim and the super Dino are the same species or 2 parts of the same creature then they might function the same. Meaning the beast looks like a Dino because it absorb or copied the genetic information of the things it wiped out when it landed.
Wait. You might be on to something. It might be sort of an alien planetary exploration and data research sort of thing. The giant alien monster is what gathers the genetic information of the planet, while Nephilim is gathering the cultural and conscious information of the planet. The sphere in the start of the game is more akin to a containment system as to not damage the ecosystem outside of the sphere since it seems the information gathering process causes quite a bit of destruction. We might be seeing a botched version of the information being gathered since the impact of the two aliens caused an extinction event and the alien monster is possibly corrupted whether through the absorption of the DNA or being stuck underground for 65 million years.
It's really IS fucked up how game companies don't care about game preservation at all. Piracy is "illegal" and treated as "immoral" when the games haven't been sold for 20+ years and are on a console that also hasn't been sold for 20+ years. Imagine if books were like that.
I’m highly against piracy when it comes to using it to bypass the monetary trade, but if there is no longer a monetary trade then preservation takes priority.
And of course, now that AI generation is the big craze, NOW they're all on-board the "buy it once, own it forever, maintain access after it becomes unavailable" model when it comes to actors.
It has nothing to do with the game companies. It's the government. It's.stil just seen as entertainment and not aomwthing worth investing in like museums
@@maxisenberg9093 You don't solely preserve things in a museum. You can preserve them by just keeping them available. Something that is not done, explicitly and notoriously, by GAME COMPANIES as they either tether the game to online services that are required to operate the game, or just refuse to continue keeping it available on an online storefront to manufacture a sense of scarcity or because they themselves don't see it as worth preserving.
James I just want to thank you for all your videos. I recently lost a best friend that I would binge watch your videos with and they sadly never got to see this finished project so I am watching in honor of them. You are one of my favorite reviewers on all of RU-vid so thanks!
A really good arcade racer with wacky racers/track design/etc. It's a great fun little time IMO and I HIGHLY recommend checking it out if you enjoy silly little experiences. It's like a wacky game show/race deal. @@NitroRad
There's this item collecting mechanic for some reason which adds to the variety since you can use those to customize your chosen race character. But it's just a fun time to experience. I had it growing up and it was one of my favorites to go back and replay over and over again. The characters names are silly, the load screens are fantastic vibes too.
I don't usually comment on stuff but I feel compelled to here: This game is a very well established and super well conceived, overarching, cosmic horror narrative despite the game not being very well put together. The way that this game sets up the ending is utterly brilliant. Admittedly the overall execution is...lacking, to say the least. That said, I can't help but feel this is a uniquely well thought out story. The characters aren't really the protagonists but, rather, merely cogs in the machine that keeps the plot moving forward; our proverbial lens through which we see the narrative unfold. Sure the graphics aren't great: they're outdated and goofy looking. Absolutely the dialogue and writing is, at best, campy and, at worst, borderline painful. Of course the mechanics could have been better designed and executed. But name another game with a 'Color Out of Space' style, cosmic horror narrative that leaves such an implication as this games ending does. The only thing I can really think of is something like Parasite Eve, but even that doesn't end with the characters feeling so contributory but utterly inconsequential. A wonderful narrative wrapped in a poorly put together cheese sandwich. Thank you for covering it: I love the Dreamcast (it's one of my all time favorite consoles) but there are so many games (like this) that I've simply never heard of or encountered. Awesome work James!
Fun Fact - According to the game's creator, the voice actors were only paid $100 each. (Interview - Remembering Shinya Nishigaki and his "Crazy Games" Blue Stinger and Illbleed)
man poor SA cast could not catch a break. I play sonic adventure with japanese dub because i find the overall quality to be much higher but i have a lot of respect for the english cast. They're genuinely great voices, if only they could have the proper conditions to flex their muscles. I guess it speaks to their talent that theyre still so memorable despite the shortcomings of the situation beyond their control.
Also Jon St. John, who did some minor voices in the game (including Tim in the intro cutscene) hated the experience so much that he would frequently bring it up at conventions as one of his worst gigs ever. Mainly because they had him do VO for the game's trailer and made him pronounce the title like "Blue Stin-gahhhh" and kept making him redo the take when he didn't.
If you ever replay the game, there actually is something to Dogs’ wrestling shirt that makes it one of the strongest things in the game! He does different moves contextually, based on how close he is to an enemy. Up close you just do the weak punches and far away and you’ll do a running tackle, but if you’re spaced about 5 to 10 feet away from an enemy and attack, you’ll do a running dropkick that does tons of damage and knockback.
I love how during the Dreamcast’s life, it seems like the cast from the Sonic adventure games and shuffle just gets hired to voice characters for other Dreamcast titles by default.
@videogamecollecto100 Nope, most game developers didn't have the budget for a full voice cast; Usually it was just whoever was working on it. If they were lucky then maybe they had a few decent VA's and a decent voice director, but, for the most part it was just whoever was willing to mic up. This is why like 84% of VA work in early Video games, N64, Dreamcast, and PS2 era's, had pretty bad voice acting.
@@videogamecollecto100Pretty easily disproven considering how inconsistent a lot of the talent in that pool was. Early japanese videogames in particular mostly didn't care about the english voice cast as long as the game had one. If they weren't amateurs or actual dev team members they were obscure and cheap anime/cartoon dubbers looking for a big break, only to deliver their goofiest performance yet due to poor/lacking direction. Games like MGS were groundbreaking in large part because of the quality control on that end.
@@noone-mo6gy I don't know the year he die but when I was at the video game convention at the Scottish rite center located in Sacramento California they were the ones who told me Ryan Drummond in another guy
Blue Stinger and ILLBLEED being the two girls and the one guy being NitroRad. I see trouble in the near future. Super happy you covered one of my favorite games. It really is a game that you love/hate and I wouldn't want it any other way
you gotta love how the game SEEMS to be setting up the island as an umbrella esque experiment making monsters for reasons only to go, no, the island was totally on the up and up, it was set up to hide how the people in charge were using the area to watch a monster hatching and stop it from growing and destroying the earth, and the monsters are just side effects of the strange alien THING trying to get out.
The description of wearing the wrestling shirt making Dogs "feel like a professional wrestler" gives the vibe that it isn't that Dogs absorbed the skill from the shirts or knew the skills beforehand, but just that wearing them has him feel confident enough to use ad libbed moves on monsters in a life or death situation.
As a person who speaks Japanese, it's not the translation. At 23:14 it basically says: "Janine, what a good woman.", at 23:20 it's: "My type. Keep your hands off of her."
I guess this was a case where it could've been better to smooth out the translation rather than going with direct translation. Though for some, it was part of the game's charm so I dunno.
@@PScoopYT Given that the voice acting was the same in the Japanese version, it was probably one of those games where the translation was done in Japan by the only guy they could find who knew any English, and the recording sessions were directly supervised by their own guys who knew even less. That's why the voice acting in the _Resident Evil_ games is so terrible.
I still wonder what the sequel Red Stinger would've been like. It's really unfortunate that the creator passed before it came to fruition. Absolutely love this game though (specifically the Japanese version). I'd love to see it pop up as a cheaper downloadable title or as a bonus game in a Yakuza title one day. This game deserves a re-release. Edit: Correction. The title during it's planning stages was "Blood Stinger". The company Climax Studios who developed this was unable to finance the project before being absorbed into Cavia (NIER Replicant/Gestalt, Ghost in the Shell: SAC) who subsequently got absorbed in AQ Interactive (present day-still active). The project never got traction as far as we know due the previously mentioned passing of the director and lack of funding. All that exists is the desire and name of the sequel.
That ending was incredible, my dad asked me what I was watching and relayed that final message and he just sat stunned until he went “Okay!” And started watching football. Merry Christmas! (I know it’s November, but it’s fitting okay)
More games need that "fuck it, lets make something DIFFERENT" energy. This game looks absolutely crazy and now I really want to play it. (Side note its awesome seeing NitroRad so enthusiastic. Hope he gets to find more games that click the right buttons in his brain)
"3 holes and a guy?, i see trouble in the near future" has to be one of the most memeable things i have ever heard. Absolutely repeating it every time i can
The thing about the weird hand thing Eliot does with the map of the intro, I think is supposed to call to attention that the ruptured land mass resembles the open maw of a dinosaur, and he's just doing hand puppets in front of it. It's definitely a really dopey introduction to him.
The fact that this game has one of, if not *the* most thought provoking, potentially horrifying endings in a horror game is absolutely hilarious. And honestly? I actually prefer that it all ends there. No answers, but a simple question that sticks with you. If the rest of the game didn't make it a banger, that ending sure as hell did. I've never had a game shoot up from like a solid 6/10 to a 9/10 by ending alone. This is peak gaming.
The healing items for Blue Stinger remind me a lot of the healing items from Dead Rising, where you can heal gunshot wounds, stab wounds, explosions, and zombie bites with some orange juice.
The way you have to stop and eat / drink without being interrupted kind of reminds me of how drinking Potions in Monster Hunter was like pre-World. Maybe it was inspired by this game? XD
Never realized that the Hassy from the game 2064: Read Only Memories was a reference to this until now. According to that game, there are over 20 different flavors of the stuff, including Crystal Hassy, Vanilla Hassy, Fire Hassy, Mango Hassy, Winterfresh Hassy…
But wait! There’s more! Lots more! There’s also a British pudding version of Hassy, Hassy Zero, Hassy Infinity (which is the opposite of Hassy Zero, as it has a ton of calories), Hot Hassy Coffee, Hassy Cocktails, Classy Hassy, Crassy Hassy, Hassy-12 (banned in Australia), and even cross-promotional flavors for franchises such as Pac-Man, Klonoa, and… ugh… Bubsy… …For me, all of this only raises further questions about what regular Hassy tastes like.
I was searching to see if someone else had made this comment! Here was me thinking Read Only Memories came up with Hassy. Imagine my wide eyed shock watching this video. I know Hassy is also referenced in VA-11 HALL-A. Now I wonder where else this special beverage can be found.
… Is that an insinuation that Nephylim was the male equivalent for their species? Huh, oddly enough; that checks out for an Eldridge Horrorterror from outer space. >)X^D
This game got me in trouble back as a kid because the intros music was so damn loud that my mom ran in trying to turn down the volume and it was like somehow getting louder lmao
Man... what a game. You have no idea how happy it made me when you gave your final thoughts hah! It's trash but it's top tier trash and it's so much fun. The soundtrack is one of my favourites of the era, if you can find a rip of the official soundtrack CD they rerecorded it in much higher quality than presented in game. As a bonus, hunt down the Blue Stinger image song that they released called 'Sting Me' by the fictional group 'nePhY'. They appear in game on posters and Hassy adds! I'm not sure if you caught on, as I'm aware a lot of people tend to completely miss it, however the final boss you fight is the clone from within the lab. It woke up when Nephy woke up the original Jascony. So both you and Nephy are fighting separate entities.
I think at 7:14, the idea is he is doing something similar to the ‘finger squish’ trick people do with something in the distance that looks small. Except instead of ‘squishing’ the object, he’s modeling his hand like a dinosaur ‘chomping’ on the island.
Fun fact in illbleed if you go back and watch the video, In Cashmans level theres pictures of Eliot and Dogs i think in the toy isle. Also one of the bosses you can pick from at the end of the game is called Bullstinger, BlueStinger see what they did there. I really like this it shows that they really loved what they made, That theyre proud of it. Wonder what illbleed, BlueStinger references there could have been if Shinya Nishigaki and Climax Graphics/Crazy Games lived longer.
One of the things I’m most proud of was being able to upload a Blue Stinger video on the actual date it took place (12/24/2018). 😊 I also genuinely want to thank you for taking time to really unpack what this game has to offer, instead of writing it off like so many other people did.
1:14:57 And THIS is easily one of my favorite videos ya ever made! Its so entertaining, a good blend of critic and genuine love for the art form and just well made fucking review in general holy shit! An culmination of why i love yar channel in the first place!
What a unique and strange game... There's definitely some dreamcast era charm in this, I had no idea it got that strange but I'd expect no less from the Illbleed studio. It looks like there's some annoying parts in it but I kind of expected that. It's weird Headhunter (another Dreamcast game) had fictional energy drinks everywhere too, also charming B-movie acting and crazy out of nowhere plot twists. I definitely would like to see a video of that Ring game too.
Fun Fact About the Voice Acting in this game: John St. Jon (Voice of Duke Nukem) voiced the Title Screen and some other voices and he revealed at ConnectiCon one year at his panel that the voice director was Japanese and kept asking him to pronounce the game name the way he did and that's why it sounds like it's in "Engurishu" sorry, not the best term but it's the easiest way to explain it. That might explain why the dialogue is so awkward and voices so strangely, they were being directed by someone who wasn't a native English speaker.
This is probably my favourite video you've ever made. You really radiate enthusiasm for this wonderfully strange game which is so infectious. And that bathtub scene is a masterpiece.
This game seems kinda amazing, I almost wonder if it’s intentionally made to be hilarious, the healing items, the animations, the crappy cutscenes, the broken visual lines, the colourful assets, the way too long orchestral stings, and the dialogue. It almost seems like this is all intentionally bad to make you laugh your ass off, but I don’t know, since I remember reviews at the time treating this as a serious game.
Considering the other game from these devs was intentional B-Horror i'd say the goofy tone in Blue stinger is absolutely intentional. The bad english voice direction just adds to that. This game just screams dreamcast and i kinda love it for it.
Blue Stinger is like Batman & Robin 1997 for the late 90s "gaga era" of games. You either love the goof fest or hate it. I loved every second of Blue Stinger and it felt like a crazy over-the-top buddy cop movie, which was what the developers intended in interviews at the time. It wasn't meant to be a scary game.
Thank you for this, Blue Stinger is my favorite game, and I've gotten into the habit of playing it each Christmas. So thanks for bringing it to more people's attention so more people can enjoy it for the amazing Jank it is~ Couple of notes to help you if you play it again (Or anyone else reading this) 1 - In the Freezer, you can set the temperature to the right level (Or find a disk that does this for you) which defrosts the doors but doesn't melt the ice, meaning you don't have to swim the second part of it nor fight the boss afterward. 2 - In the power plant there's a panel in the control room which tells you which cables needs replacing, in the form of section, room then cable number Also another little thing to help maybe clarify things at the end boss, we fight the clone of the monster thing, not the actual one. Nephilim is still fighting or 'fighting' the much bigger one while you handle the much smaller clone. Thanks again for this! Shame Red Stinger will never be a thing :
You've got good taste. I've yet to play Blue Stinger myself (my Dreamcast is hosed but I own the game) but it seems like one of the most "me" games out there, in spite of the jank lol Fingers crossed for a remaster for this and Illbleed someday lol
ok but genuinely- the ending and the segments where Elliot gets mutated? PURE. HORROR. Like holy shit, imagine the scene with Dogs & Elliot agreeing to put Elliot down in even a smidge slightly more advanced animated state! it'd be horrific and gory beyond belief!!!! honestly gives me some inspiration to try drawing or writing that scene out in more detail, it'd be so wild to see
This game along with Sonic adventure was the reason I bought a Dreamcast. Don't laugh, it was fresh and new looking and here in the UK the Dreamcast game case looked good with the cover because that is how we used to choose 😂.
This seems like one of those games where you're not sure whether you imagined it, dreamed it or it was something else only to discover it years later and realise you weren't going nuts.
This kind of game is peak Sega and peak Dreamcast. It's exactly why that little white box is still one of my favourite consoles. I adore this flavour of b-game jank.
I don't wanna be "that person" but Killer7 allows you to change characters in the pause screen, saw you bring it up and figured hey, maybe you genuinely didn't know and were planning to play it in the future. Apologies once again for being the "ackshually" commenter lol
This game is a prime example of why the Dreamcast is my favorite game console. There are so many other games like Illbleed, silver, headhunter, cannon spike, EGG and so many others that flew under many peoples radars and even today are not properly covered as much as nintendo stuff
Eliot is just the average food service worker. Slamming back endless energy drinks, wasting time doing the same thing over and over for extra money on top of his paycheck, and listening to Christmas music on loop. Only difference is that he gets to kill shit. Livin' my dream.
Dogs says "It's the smell which lures out those monsters" in 58:31 On another note, man... this game brings back memories. I agree, objectively not a good game, but it has enough to be a memorable and enjoyable one. And, if I dare to dream wildly, the perfect choice for a remake in my opinion.
Oh, one other thing--an easter egg in Illbleed you might not have noticed beyond just them sharing Hassy--in the Killerman chapter, I'm pretty sure at one point Dogs' Model ('corpse' in context, I guess) gets plopped into a mine cart.
I remember playing this at a friend's house when it originally came out and getting completely stone-walled by the first timed part. I've never had a great sense of direction and this game really puts that to the test quite a few times. And that Christmas music, holy moly. Really letting you live the terror of working retail in December.
Oh hell yea! Saw this in my feed and needed to watch it. Blue Stinger & ILLBLEED are two games that will never be replicated again, so the more people that get to witness them in all their glory, the better.
Yeah, we just helped a species of sequentially hermaphroditic eldritch space dinosaurs get laid. That's the plot. Or maybe the creature looks like a dinosaur because it crashes into a planet, then absorbs the DNA of the creatures around it and then uses that information to create the the next generation. It's just that the last time it was active was during the cretaceous period, hence absorbing mostly dino-DNA. If there is one thing about this game etched into my brain... it's the animation of your character opening up a vending machine bought steak dinner, tearing a bite out of it and then throwing the entire rest of the perfectly fine dinner over their shoulder.
Oh man, imagine they made a sequel to this game where you played as a bunch of aliens trying to fend off a bunch of mutant dinosaurs. The aliens would look like humans with extra bits, of course; it's a B-movie in video game form, after all!
To be fair, Shinya Nishigaki's inspiration for his games included movies, especially because his father worked for what eventually became Toho-Towa, one of the most respected film distributors in Japan and a subsidiary of Toho.
This game is such a gem. Great video as always! I laughed my ass off so many times, I wish I could forget it to experience it all over again. Fantastic writing (unlike Blue Stinger HAHA). EDIT : I really can't emphasize enough how good this video is. It lasts an hour and a half yet nothing feels out of place or dragged out. I had an excellent time, and would love if you ever were to work on videos of the same length again. One has to pay rent so obviously that ain't always gonna happen, but just letting you know your audience beyond Patreon supporters is just as invested too! You're an excellent entertainer.
SPOILERS FOR BOTH THE VIDEO AND THE GAME... I like to think the ending INSTEAD implies that the Meteor and Stinger are more like Parasites, the Meteors being the eggs that latch onto a planet and lay in wait, and the Stingers acting like a Sperm Cell of sorts, sent to concieve, or in this case, AWAKEN the monster inside, the big point of my theory being, this isn't something that is EXCLUSE to Earth, but happened to our planet by chance, kinda like Leviathans from Metroid Prime 3 Corruption, just looking for different planets to infect and turn into a clone of their Homeworld, Phaaze, there was no gaurantee it would hit Tallon IV in Prime 1, but it just so happemed to by, again...pure chance.
I played and beat this game right when it came out on brand new Dreamcast. It was one of the first new games I experienced and liked it A lot. Still have it too!
The Sega Dreamcast and its collection of games are so criminally underrated. They might not be Resident Evil or Conker's Bad Fur Day, but they're still good games nonetheless.
I have to admit, throughout the video I was struggling to see much horror in Blue Stinger. In hindsight, all the game’s silliness makes the ending pulling the rug out from under you all the more jaw-dropping. That’s some well-played cosmic horror.
I like to imagine the healing item one bite thing was like, one of them did it first and it pissed off the other. So now for the rest of the adventure they're just taking a single bite and tossing it just to spite one another lol
Your pacing with your videos is getting phenomenal, this is exactly what I'd want from a video like this. Something I've felt could always be improved with most game reviews is they're so "jumpy" between shots, that by the end of the review, even if it's reeeally long, you'll get an understanding on how they felt about the game, but not really what it would look like to actually play it. Not to mention that your feelings are so well described and comedy is great
I finally found it! I've been trying to find the name of this game for a long time now. About 20 years ago when I was seven years old I played Blue Stinger with my late father, but annoyingly we were never able to beat it. I guess I was a dumb kid and my dad wasn't really into gaming or tech in general and only really played this so we could hang out. Anyways we always died on the part where you start turning into the monster and your partner kills you if you don't find the antidote. Every now and then I would think about this game and the small parts I could remember, but I was never able to find it. I only just found the name today by watching a video that ranks every single Sega Dreamcast game. Finally! I was beginning to think that I dreamt it all up! It was so cool to watch this video and have all the memories come flooding back! Also, I finally got some closure by seeing how it ends, but maybe it's better I didn't see that final scene as a kid 😂 Thank you so much Internet!
A few elements that might give some key to understanding the plot, especially the end, is that "Nephlim" comes from Nephilim, basically violent giants born from dissident angels reproducing with human women as explained in the book of Enoch, a prelude to the big flood and Noah in the bible. The book of Enoch isn't included in the common Canon but it WAS known throughout History and several anime/manga seem to get inspiration from it.
The Illbleed episode was my favorite video you've made since that dropped, and I love that this one is now one of my favorites too. Both of these games are pretty flawed but are such fascinating looks into the developers and the time period. Your commentary adds so much, you've definitely improved a lot over the years and a lot of your recent videos have been great.
Thank you so much for talking about this game! I have very fond memories of this one myself. I also have a funny yet true story to go along with it. At the time I had just bought my SEGA Dreamcast all the way back on launch day of Sept. 9th, 1999 (I was 14 at the time). I had my copy of Sonic Adventure ready to play (I'm a huge fan of Sonic The Hedgehog and grew up with the Genesis classics from my early childhood) and I was so eager to play it. Sadly, the console would not read the disc properly (some consoles at launch had this issue with the game). I would have to wait roughly a week before I could go back and exchange the console for a new one. My Dad felt bad that I could not play Sonic Adventure right away, so he went out of his way and rented me Blue Stinger from our local Blockbuster. And I was HOOKED! I LOVED playing it and had so much fun. I loved it so much that I even went out of my way to buy it for myself, along with Evolution: The World of Sacred Device. I never forgot what my Dad did for me. Thanks Dad.
If you like ridiculous games with ridiculous plots, I bet you’d enjoy Fossil Fighters Janky graphics, silly sense of humor with surprisingly gripping story, dinosaurs and space and space dinosaurs… etc
This game seems amazing in every way possible. I plan on playing the game soon hearing the ending is apparently legit peak fiction makes me so, so excited to play it and see what is for myself (skipped the spoiler section for once) and show it to my friends too. It's gonna make this a fun Christmas season.
The fact that Janine had a rifle at the beginning of the game when she took out the water creature on the bridge, but then SENDS YOU TO GET ONE toward the end pissed me off back then and still does now.
