3RRDC PowerStone

Oh how it felt good on 9-9-99. The day the Dreamcast launched on the
shores of America and the day that I got to go home and play some
great games. Now the DC launch titles were excellent, covering a lot of
the genres and featuring a ton of great games. For fighters, everyone
was of course excited over Soul Calibur (as was I, it was my first DC
game). But there was another 3D fighter for the DC that would pave the
way and show what the DC was all about. Its name was Power Stone,
one of the last original series of games to come from Capcom. It was
being held as the first true 3D fighting game where you could grab
anything and go anywhere. If it really came first and did this, I'm not
sure, all I know is Power Stone did it right, and it did it with anime style
and awesome game play.

The story didn't follow the tournament style scheme that most fighting
games do. Instead, the game was set in the 19th century, and all
across the globe people were looking for the legendary Power Stone, a
stone that could make any wishes come true! And so, warriors from all
across the world went on a search to find the stone and unleash its
potential. It's a cool story that isn't too complex, but it's original for
being in the 19th century and not being a fighting tournament.

But it would be the characters themselves that pushed the story into
good places. The character selection, although at a slim 8 with 3
additional unlockables, all had great character designs. These were
some of the best characters that Capcom had come up with in some
time. From the British Plane flyer Falcon, to the mysterious and creepy
slayer, Jack (like Jack the Ripper), and throw in some samurai, ninjas,
a big steel worker, pirates, and more and you've got a collection of
characters that shine as bright as the Power Stone itself. Bravo to
Capcom here.

But it was the game play that was gaining attention. Most 3D fighters
are still 2D, the character models are 3D but you fight on a limited 2D
plane. In Power Stone you can go anywhere and fight your opponent.
That means that you can use the environment to help defeat your
enemy. See a trash can on the ground, pick it up and throw it at them.
See a pole, jump on it and swing off it clobber your foe. Slide off walls,
jump on platforms, grab and catch items it's all great fun. Every
character has their own level, and they are all varied. So in GunRock's
steel mine, there are traps set around the level, and in Ayame's tent,
you can climb on the ceiling and get the drop in on your opponent.
Another cool level was Ryoma, the samurai. In it you could climb atop
the roof and battle on the temple, or fight below in the snow filled
ground. It was awesome.

But, the name of the game is Power Stone, and amongst the items you
will find across the levels are some special stones that, once you
collect three of them, allow you transform into your stronger alter ego.
The character designs here are just as good as the original
characters. Falcon turns into a red robot, Ryoma turns into a silver
samurai, Ayame into a cute pink bunny ninja; it's super sweet. When
you're in your Power Stone mode, you have all new attacks and special
attacks that do loads of damage, but you only can stay in Power Stone
mode for so long and then the stones leave you and you're back to
normal mode. As you can see, this gives the game a very original twist.
I love it.

The fighting is kinda limited, there aren't many special attacks per say,
but you do use all 4 face buttons and the triggers to punch and kick.
Then there are the items that are inside the treasure chests across
the levels that do extra damage. From bombs, to guns, to more modern
devices like ray guns and power poles, it adds more fun to the mix. Of
course, the lack of special moves is okay since you can climb, catch,
grab, throw, swing, jump, slide, and do more to win the game. Then
there are all the options you can set to the game, like match numbers,
damage levels, time amounts, and also number of Power Stones,
difficulty, damage amount when in transformed and normal states and
auto recovery. So that's a nice little bit of customization to the game if
you feel like the super forms are too powerful, or maybe not strong
enough.

The anime-style character designs work very well for the game, and so
the 3D graphics look really good. Now, mind you, that this is not as
detailed as Soul Calibur was, but instead this game wins more in the
style department. The graphics are just good fun. The artwork for the
characters is great, the levels are great, and I really can't fault the
graphics too much. Today, things look a little simpler then they did
back then, but for it's time Power Stone looked great. The endings are
just still pictures with many a hint of animation here and there. But,
they are all drawn very nicely, and feature full voiceovers. The staff roll
ending is Falcon in his plane riding over the ocean. It's very calm and
soothing.

The music is still memorable after all these years, so that must mean
something. It's kinda classical meats techno beats. Like take
traditional Japanese music, or Western music, or Native American
music, and kick it up a few notches with a beat you can dance (or
fight) to. My favorite pieces of music here are Ayame's high octane
music, and Wang Tang's equally great track. Also the closing theme, is
a soft piano ballad, the rages into a victorious melody, and then fades
away with more light piano. It's moving, let me tell ya. The characters
all have their original Japanese voices, and the announcer is another
hard to understand but you love him anyway kind of voice. The sound
is great.

Of course, being an arcade game first, you're gonna have to add stuff
to the home version to keep the replay factor up. First, every
character has a cool story book-like ending. Then there are three
unlockable characters, two of which have their own ending. Then you
can unlock a first person mode, both against the computer or a friend.
This is very weird, but very cool that they tried to do this. Then there
were 3 VMU mini-games you could download and play on the memory
card: slots, ninja stars, and flying. Getting points in them helped unlock
everything. Then there were a few extra items you could unlock, you
could unlock art work and endings, and finally the music and voices of
the game. That's a nice set of unlockables right there.

So there you have it, this game simply shines in every category. Sure,
it's easy to beat on the easy levels of difficulty, and there's really only
Arcade and Vs to play. So a few more modes would have been nice.
The character selection is a little small, but what's there is great.
There needs to be more items, but what was there was nice. As you
can tell, what is has is good, but it needs just a little more in every
section. That would be something that the excellent sequel would take
care of, and change the way Power Stone was played. But for now,
let's return to a time when this was just coming out with the DC and all
was well with the world It's games like this one, that made Dreamcast
owners very, VERY happy.

Review by: Orochi Sonic