By playing Vib-Ribbon, Western gamers got to experience a wildly unique visual and audio experience, unlike any games that came before. Despite never arriving here, or perhaps because of that, many gamers imported a copy anyhow. One such game was Vib-Ribbon which launched in 1999 for Japan and Europe. Tons of surprising titles launched, although many never made it to American shores. Generating meaningful patterns that also sync to the beat of a song is very hard as it is, doing it automatically is almost impossible.Back in the original PlayStation era it really seemed like video games were on the precipice of something amazing. Unfortunately, with emulation the process of getting my music into the game is rather convoluted and the result is hit and miss. The trick is that you can use your own music. There's only 6 songs included which I didn't like very much, so there wasn't a lot of replay value there. On top of that, if you fail to get over some obstacle the line starts shaking all over the place, which then makes it even harder to nail the next button prompt: a positive feedback loop of failure that is not fun at all. The combination of the walking character and the shapes means that the precise timing of the button is not always clear. I do think that the weird presentation can get in the way of the game, though. The ideas are solid and even more innovative than some new rythm games: shapes in the track signal which of the four buttons you need to push, but the trick is that shapes can be combinen in different ways. This is a title that would be great to see make a comeback on a platform like Steam, where modders can have at it with their own specially-crafted levels and tunes. I won't say the music is outright bad, but it is something of an acquired taste. I just wish there were more hand-crafted levels, and perhaps some other bands to play some songs. You time button prompts to the shape of the objects approaching your rabbit (a cute character named Vibri) - and for harder difficulties you'll be pressing two buttons at a time for obstacles that are a combination of the two corresponding shapes. I do want to give kudos to the devs for coming up with a control scheme that feels very intuitive. At the end of the day Vib-Ribbon is a pleasant curiosity, something I think is well worth giving a shot at least. I'm sure that for the time, the technology was very impressive- and indeed I do think it is very cool that they were able to pull this off at all. They're not terrible, but they didn't impress me either.
The problem is I don't think the levels generated for your own songs are as well put-together as the ones specifically made for the game. but it also has an infinite number of songs, perhaps comparable to games like Audiosurf.
So on one hand the game has a measly six songs to play through. I was drawn to Vib-Ribbon though thanks to its unique gimmick - you have the songs to play from the game itself, but you can choose an option to insert your own CD, and play through stages based off your own music tracks. This is from the same team that made Parappa the Rapper, which I have yet to play. Vib-Ribbon is one of those games, in this case a rhythm title with a unique graphics style, strange music, and just an overall quirky charm and flavor that I couldn't help but find a little fascinating. I can't help but give extra imaginary points to any game that is bold, trying to do something new and different - even if the end result is something of a miss. (This was retro game club game #4 on the Grouvee forum.)
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