#244: Brunswick Circuit Pro Bowling
December 22, 1999
Point of View
THQ
$54.48 on Amazon
When Brunswick Circuit Pro Bowling was released in 1999, it was praised for boasting the most realistic physics of any bowling game yet. I see what they mean—compared to, say, Elf Bowling (the freeware game I used to play at my grandma’s house because it was the most fun thing available on her computer), it’s quite sophisticated. You can adjust your character’s position, angle, and spin with remarkable precision, and the pins react in a way that seems highly accurate (to me, a guy who is bad at bowling, physics, and video games).
That being said—how can I put this delicately—who gives a shit? It’s been 25 years, and the novelty has disappeared. You’re just adjusting the control stick and clicking the A button over and over. Nobody’s gonna break this out when Wii Sports exists—which was released just seven years later! This is the problem with games that prize realism above all: as soon as someone makes a game that’s more real-er, your game becomes obsolete. Plus, I can always actually go bowling—it’s not exactly an experience with a barrier to entry that calls for a video game to recreate it. Meanwhile, in real life, I can’t launch a wisecracking elf at an unsuspecting cluster of other wisecracking elves. So what’s the better bowling game, really?
Kudos to THQ for what I’m sure was a mind-blowing technical achievement for the bowling enthusiast gamers of 1999. But I’m a regular guy in 2023–and I can say with some degree of confidence that I could’ve died without playing Brunswick Circuit Pro Bowling. — C. Dean
#243. NBA JAM ‘99
November 30, 1998
Iguana West
Acclaim
Hey longtime NBA Jam fans! If you’re looking for arcade style, 2-2 basketball on the N64, then you’ve come to the absolute wrong place! This is a 5-on-5 NBA sim with an emphasis on pushing fouls that honestly might be ranked a little higher if it were called anything else. But since it’s named after one of the all-time great arcade games and is merely the second or third best ‘realistic’ basketball game on the system, it goes low on the list. If you want rim rocking, nasty ass dunks, you’re betting off playing NBA Hangtime or its sequel, NBA Showtime. This game just lacks a pulse. Don’t believe me? Check out cover star Keith Van Horn. It’s like if Al Gore could play power forward. — M. Roebuck
#242. Blues Brothers 2000
November 17, 2000
Player 1
Titus Interactive
$39.90 on Amazon
Let’s get this out of the way; the mere existence of this game is funny. It’s a game where YOU get to be Dan Aykroyd if he was a Nintendo Mii. The second stage is just Chicago. The game ends with you fighting an evil tree. It’s really, really funny that this is a real video game that you could buy. And you know what? It’s not the worst game ever made. It’s a 3D platformer and the jumping feels pretty ok. But then you’ll get sucked into a weird mini-game or play a god-awful rhythm game that makes you question your choices. You know those weird Chinese action figure collections that are called, like ‘Justice Friends’ and it will be Spider-Man, The Flash, and Shrek? That’s this game’s whole vibe. — S. Finkelstein
#241. Killer Instinct Gold
November 25, 1996
Rare
Nintendo
$99.99 on Amazon
This was going to be a launch title, but they missed the window, presumably because they were making sure the graphics and animation were exactly as shitty as they’d envisioned them. Some characters seem like they tried to adapt a Dungeons & Dragons handbook into a fighting game and got confused along the way, and others are just straight up borrowed from other fighting games. TJ Combo couldn’t lace Balrog’s gloves. — J. Knapp
#240. Madden Football 64
October 1997
EA Tiburon
EA Sports
$29.95 on Amazon
Madden’s entry into 3D gaming came out so long ago that it begins with EA’s long abandoned old catchphrase, “It’s in the game.” Not sure exactly what they’re referring to, but ‘it,’ most certainly does not refer to your favorite team, as EA did not have the full NFL license, which makes for the bizarre situation of having accurate players on generic teams. A red and blue team labeled Buffalo stands in fine for the Bills, but the Foxboro Patriots and Nashville Titans would like a word. Not offensively bad, but shortcomings like that and the awkward shuffle that is the ground game made this the brief moment that NFL Quarterback Club was the superior football franchise on the system. It didn’t last long. — M. Roebuck
#239. Hercules – The Legendary Journeys
November 16, 2000
Titus Interactive
$79.00 on Amazon
This game is a syndicated Ocarina of Time. Much like its source material, I can’t recommend playing it unless it’s a choice between Hercules – The Legendary Journeys and watching infomercials. This game is hilarious in the sense that there’s exactly two types of things you do: run around helping people with absurdly mundane stuff, like procuring flour to help someone bake or finding a lost kitty cat, or go and fight big cyclops’ and shit. It kind of feels like the game is showing you all the (even more) boring stuff Kevin Sorbo was up to during the commercial breaks the terrible show that inspired this game. He doesn’t look like Kevin Sorbo here, though. He kind of looks like they borrowed the Diamond Dallas Page sprite from WCW vs. NWO and gave him a bow staff. I think they allocated a lot of this game’s resources into making Hercules’ hair bounce majestically. And you know something? Time well spent. It’s glorious and a perfect distraction while you’re wandering around having Hercules find people’s missing teddy bears and shit. My man’s hair and the fact that there’s a button to quickly center the camera behind you makes this a not-travesty. — M. Roebuck
#238. Duke Nukem 64
October 31, 1997
Eurocom
GT Interactive Software
$79.99 on Amazon
This game sucks! Let’s be real, games from this specific era can struggle to justify your time today, and not too many struggle more than Duke Nukem 64. I just can’t think of a good reason to play this game that ran so much better on other systems. Additionally, Duke Nukem got a superior (and exclusive to the platform) sequel in Ground Zero later on in the system’s life. Meanwhile, Conker’s Fur Day has better Kubrick references and Wave Race 64 has way more jet skis. There’s just nothing here to recommend, even if the game isn’t a total disaster. — M. Roebuck
#237. Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater
February 29, 2000
Edge of Reality
Activision
$39.99 on Amazon
I know, I know, this is probably too low. But have you played this particular version lately? This is the one I got into, the one I faked sick to stay home from school to play all day. I was ready for it to be a little rough upon a revisit, but it is a LOT rough. Games that treated the c-buttons as camera controls seemed weird at the time, but have aged pretty well. Games that treated the system as one that had six face buttons on the controller? Not so much. That, plus trying to perform precision moves with an analog controller that feels like worn down brake pads while only getting to hear the first 60 seconds of selections from the iconic soundtrack before they start over make this the worst way to play this generation-defining title. I love you Tony, I’m sorry. — M. Roebuck
#236. Midway’s Greatest Arcade Hits – Volume 1
November 14, 2000
Digital Eclipse
Midway
$14.99 on Amazon
You’re telling me Midway, the now-defunct arcade game developer, put out a collection of their Arcade Hits on the N64?
Yeah right, I bet they’re not even the GREATEST arcade hits.
What? They are the GREATEST?
Sure, ok, maybe I believe you. But who cares? So they put one or two games on an N64 cartridge. I put one or two dumps in the toilet every day and you don’t see me celebrating.
Huh? There’s SIX Arcade games on here, including Defender, Joust, and Root Beer Tapper, providing over 20 MINUTES of gameplay? And the emulation is FINE to MEDIOCRE?
That’s it, I’m selling all my other games at FuncoLand and picking this collection up STAT.
By the way, there was no Volume 2.
— S. Finkelstein
#235. NHL Blades of Steel ‘99
April 5, 1999
Konami
Konami
$44.99 on Amazon
Like NBA Jam on the basketball side of things, this is a N64 game with a recognizable title that was sure to excite gamers and just as sure to disappoint them when they discovered a generic sports game and not the groundbreaking original they fondly remembered. The original Blades of Steel on the NES stood out for its attitude, eschewing the politeness of Ice Hockey for the ability to drop the gloves and beat the shit out of one another. It’s sad to see the series go from being the tougher, cooler hockey game on the scene to just being the fourth or fifth best NHL sim among its contemporaries. This game should’ve had some generic title, like NHL Sticks or something. — M. Roebuck
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