Fuzion Frenzy Review

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Hello all! Welcome to Nameless Gaming's Second xbox game review, Fuzion Frenzy. If you cant tell yet, Im getting more and more into the entire multimedia aspect of these reviews (the loop in the background is FF's menu music). I've also got a whopping 15 screenshots. Of course, finding a way to use them all in the course of this review (which I can expect to be very short) will be somewhat of a challenge. Anyways, its still more genuine gameplay screens then you can find at other sites. Take that IGN, heh. The basic idea of Fuzion Frenzy, is that its a party game, much like that of the Mario Part games, which Nintendo made the genre known with. Fuzion Frenzy offers its players 6 playable characters, over 45 "mini-games", a tournament mode, and makes use of the xbox graphical, and audio abilities.

The graphics in this game, are (in my own opinion) nothing to write home about. The textures, models are great, but they arent anything that was as impressive as I've seen in other xbox games (e.g: Halo) but the graphics were obviously not what the game's developer (blitz) were striving for. This game is one of the few instances I can think of where the gameplay was really top priority and the appearance was further down the ladder. The most impressive things about the game's appearance tend to be the reflections (that can be seen in the title screen, and the after game screens below). It also has some really impressive lighting in the mini games, and shadows corrospond appropriately.

The gameplay, as I've mentioned above, is fantastic. Even the demo version which is playable from all first party discs, is really something as it gives you access to all the characters, and 5 or so of the games. The mini-games it gives you access to are really some of the best in the game, but Im not saying stick to the demo, theres much more fun to be had in the actual game once you buy it. Being a party-style game, Fuzion Frenzy has no defined control set. The controls vary from mini-game to mini-game, and the only exception is the Fuzion Frenzy, which takes place at the end of every round in a tournament. The idea behind a tournament, is that up to 4 players will face each other in around 4 or 5 mini games per round (in up to six rounds) and the victor of the Fuzion Frenzy's at the end of each round decides the "Champion" at the end of the tournament. For each mini-game you win in a tournament, you are rewarded in "orbs" (6 for first place, 4 for second, etc). The idea behind the orbs seems fairly confusing at first, cause theres no real explanation, but it breaks down like this: you win the orbs, and then can "gamble" them in the Fuzion Frenzy. This means that the more orbs you choose to "gamble" the more orbs will become available for you to capture in the fuzion frenzy, its only called gambling because people can knock you down and take your orbs, which can set you behind. Now your thinking "well, if thats true then whoever has the most orbs in the fuzion frenzy will win everytime anyways, so whats the point?" But thats where it gets interesting. At about the last minute of the Frenzy, generic white orbs appear, which can be captured by anyone, bringing you up to victory, or throwing you to the dogs. Outside of Tournament mode theres a "Mini-game Frenzy" which allows you to play as any of the Characters, in any of the 45 games of your choosing, without unlocking them. Some of my personal favorites include "Sumo", "Twisted System" and "Rollermentum".

The sound in Fuzion Frenzy is what really made the game for me, because like most of the up and coming Xbox games, it makes use of the storage of music on the hard drive. Let me tell you, theres nothing like beating Dub in Twisted System while "The Tower That Ate People" plays in the background, more on that later. This is also one of those games where its actual music is so good you might choose not to replace it, cause it doesnt sound corny at all, although listening to this loop over and over again is driving me insane, because in the actual game the rythm breaks down and evolves into a hip-hop phase, and then again into a rock phase, and then again into a techno phase the thing i love about this is that the instruments dont sound fake or synthsized at all (unless thats intended, of course) and with surround sound its even cooler. The voice acting is also really good in this game, your characters reply to victorys, loses, etc, and the game also features the best announcer in the world. This guy announces the games, and announces the victor of the games (and always in a different tone of voice). I challenge anyone not to laugh when he screams "FUZION FRENZY" as if his head is going to explode. Not many people can top my history teacher when it comes to yelling, but this guy takes the cake.

Since I dont have a whole lot to go into detail about with Fuzion Frenzy I figure I'll cover one of my favorite features of the xbox, one Im going to especially enjoy when more of the games come out. Not only can the xbox play music CDs (as its playstation predecessors have) it also has a hard drive which allows its user to burn songs, and play them during games that make use of this feature. Fuzion Frenzy is one of the games that does this (the only other one I own being Project Gotham Racing). Its something that really can make the gameplay more personalized, and it brings a lot to fuzion frenzy (even though most of the games you play rarely go over 2 minutes.)

Air's Score: 8 out of 10