Certainly not the best fighting game around, but it’s the best-looking on the PS1. And, surprise, it’s a Gundam game.
Often times, a cheap cash-in made to take away the hard-earned money of the fan, other times, a slightly better game still made to take away the hard-earned money of the fan. And games from Bandai are often the biggest examples of this philosophy, sadly. Recent games like ‘Mobile Suit Gundam: Crossfire,’ for example, barely even count as playable – much less enjoyable experiences made for the fans.
However, Bandai wasn’t always that lazy. Let’s take a trip back in time to 2000 – back when Bandai released ‘Gundam: Battle Assault’ in the states.
Before I start, though, it’s worth noting that this is actually a remake of the original game in Japan – ‘Gundam: The Battle Master 2.’
In that game, random and uninteresting characters made for the game piloted the mecha used in the Gundam shows – fighting against one another for no real reason. But for some reason, for the US release, Bandai decided to put the actual pilots from the shows into their mecha.
So now, instead of getting Bob Everyman as the pilot of the Zeong, we now have Char Asnable piloting the unit. This does get a little awkward with some Gundam characters, two of whom get more than one mecha in this game.
Also worth noting is that this game also gets one different mecha to use than the Japanese edition of this game – and a character change, to boot.
In order to capitalize upon Gundam Wing’s release in the United States, they went ahead and replaced the Hamma-Hamma (a suit from ZZ Gundam) with Wing Gundam – the title mecha from Gundam Wing. However, doing so does seem just plain lazy: the Wing Gundam plays almost exactly like the Zeta Gundam.
Also, the former main of this game was replaced by Gundam Wing’s main character and pilot of Wing Gundam, Heero Yuy. While this doesn’t change much, it does give a purpose to the story mode now.
You see, the story mode now has a semblance of plot – and it’s actually a solid one, compared to most hacked-together plots.
The story given is that it’s A.C. 19X, and ‘war is over.’ So, for some reason, Heero Yuy decides to go out with one of the twelve selectable mecha in the single-player mode and take down whoever’s still supplying fighting robots to the people. Or something – it’s never really explained.
It’s also worth noting, one of the more unique things about this game is the fact that it ditches the whole idea of rounds in combat – instead giving each player three full life bars. When a life bar empties, the suit it belongs to ‘overheats,’ becoming stunned for a few seconds. While not the best idea ever, it’s certainly one way to make sure fights are interesting.
Regardless, the player gets to choose from a good variety of mecha – though a little more limited than it should be, considering both the Zeta Gundam and carbon-copy Wing Gundam are both available to select.
In any case, the mecha range from melee-masters like the Acguy and Hygog to ranged attackers like the Quin Mantha, Queblay and the Full-Amour ZZ Gundam. Each suit control differently enough for each one to be a nice break from using the other – and each one have their own unique attacks, to boot.
However, despite the variety in attacks and combination of moves, the controls are literally all the same for the most part. Each mobile suit has the same button combinations for firing plain weaponry (quarter-circle forward + square or triangle), and the controls don’t vary much beyond that. This certainly makes it easy for just about anyone to pick up and play the game – but it also limits the game from being much more than ‘average’ in terms of how it plays.
On top of the general punching, kicking, beam rifle shooting and machine gun firing, each mech also has an unblockable melee attack, often represented by a beam saber or similar item. Used by making a full half-circle on the d-pad and then hitting one of the punch buttons, the actual animation and weapon used will vary depending on the mecha used. Unfortunately, because these are unblockable, the animation moves rather slow – allowing your opponent to fight back or get out of the way. But it’s still a nice balance overall.
The combat in general is pretty solid, even going just plain hand-to-hand winds up making the game somewhat exciting, as each mecha often has a few moves that can be used by hitting a button and a direction on the d-pad.
On top of all that, each giant robot has a super move that they can use as well (two quarter-circle forward motions, plus either square or triangle). Each super move is different, and each one takes some getting used to. Some are simply almost comical in appearance, such as the Acguy’s tuck and roll, and others are often just ‘hit the crap out of the enemy,’ such as with the Sazabi’s torso shot cannon.
In fact, a few of these moves could even be considered ‘breaking the game.’ The O’s super special puts the suit into a special ‘hyper mode,’ allowing any button press to use a beam saber – each saber hit not only being unblockable, but doing a major amount of damage. And this is repeatable for the 20 or so seconds that The O is in the hyper mode.
As the player progresses through story mode, Heero Yuy fights his way through different characters of the early Universal Century era of Gundam. From Camille Bidan to Char Asnable, Heero will fight just about every character in the game… and some more than once. As each fight rolls around, Heero and the person he fights will exchange words – and for a fan of Gundam in general like me, it’s very nice to see something like this happen outside the Japan-only G-Generation games and Super Robot Wars series.
Also worth noting is that the player is guaranteed to fight four mecha in story mode: The Big Zam, Neue Ziel, Psyco Gundam Mk.III and the Hydra Gundam. The problem is that all of these bosses cheat something major. All four of these suits aren’t stunned by being hit with anything but a shot that hacks off the first of their three life bars, and their attacks will still carry on through the damage in most cases. If you’re not careful, this will result in a lost match in seconds, especially against the Psyco Gundam Mk.III.
As the player continues to beat the story mode with the suits Heero can use, a few more suits become unlocked for the VS mode. These suits will either be the four bosses from the story mode, or three limited ‘bonus suits.’ While the bosses remain cheap, the other three suits are sorely lacking. One of the suits, the Ball, lacks an unblockable attack… and all three lack a super move. They’re enjoyable to use, but ultimately hard to use thanks to a lack of full features.
In any case, there’s also a VS mode to use those unlockable suits (as well as a bonus suit – Char Asnable’s Zaku II), and the game saves the best time it took for you to beat the story mode is saved so the player can continue to pit themselves against the clock if they want.
Other than that, there’s not much more to describe about how the game plays. On the plus side, the average game play is outshone by much of the presentation.
Unlike many fighting games that showed up on the PS1, Gundam Battle Assault looks wonderful. Each character is made up of dozens of sprites, all working in unison to create the illusion of a perfectly functioning giant robot. On top of that, these characters are massive on the screen – each one with details that you don’t normally see in the show they’re from. The effect is astounding, especially with the PS2’s ability to smooth out old PS1 games.
However, this is counter-balanced by the fact that the battle field is often the size of the TV screen itself, which gets to be a real pain against the larger opponents in the end of the story mode.
As for sound, it’s not half-bad. Some of the battle themes are downright wonderful and packed with adrenaline, but that’s balanced out by some really painful menu music and an announcer that loves to sprout ‘Engrish,’ such as ‘Gundamn: Battle Ass-sault” for the title.
Overall, this isn’t that bad a game. Certainly, it has some flaws here and there, but the game can be found often for less than 10 bucks these days in a bargain bin or online. And at that price, I don’t think anyone can really complain for a game like this.
Final Score:
6.6 our of 10.