Virtual Hydlide fascinates me.
It's a game that is typically considered a laughing stock. It's said to be ugly, stiff and headache-inducing remake of Hydlide that no-one asked for. It's the last Hydlide game ever. This obscure game on Sega Saturn is the end of the road for the series that influenced Legend of Zelda amongst others.
Well... I dig it. It's hard to explain, but my admiration of Virtual Hydlide is a mix of actual appreciation for what the game does in addition to marveling the weirdness and clumsiness of it all. It's an ambitious game with questionable implementation. It offers an intriguing snapshot of what 3D action adventure games were on consoles during their early days.
While it's finicky and stiff in its gameplay, it's also nicely experimental. The game is a sort of procedurally-generated speedrun ARPG. The game keeps track of your time and score, and also has a high score lists for best performances. You can randomise the game world with a 10-character seed of your liking (the sillier the better). This lets you run with the same randomisation or even share the seed and let your friend run the game – if you actually manage to find someone else that has the game. The game is quite short too, which suits the score attack nature of the game. At least in theory. Most people don't want to complete the game even once.
Weirdly, the game does not have experience points and levels. While killing enemies nets you points, your character gets stronger only by defeating bosses or doing main objectives. The points are, of course, for the high score list but you can also find a shop in the overworld that you can use your points in. It's a pretty weird system. You also get so much points by doing the main stuff that killing the enemies is never really worth it for shopping purposes. Personally, it would have been nice to have the ability to grind levels but this progress-based strengthening kinda fits the game as well.
I think visuals are the most notorious part of Virtual Hydlide. The game looks downright bizarre with its grainy, digitized sprites, short draw distance and choppy framerate. And I do mean choppy. The main character is pretty much the cheapest looking fantasy hero ever. So called Fashion Hydlide builds are impossible since all his gear looks ridiculous. The enemies are quite the sight as well. They twitch, stagger and sway around in odd ways. While most of the game is unintentionally weird-looking, the final section of the game goes full-on psychedelic with pulsating walls and chromatic skies. This is like. As a true mid-nineties game, it also has cheesy full motion video opening and ending cutscenes.
Sometimes Virtual Hydlide even sounds bizarre: the bosses have the weirdest pitch-shifted mumblings. The soundtrack is mostly pretty ordinary, though, but there are some gems there too. I like the whimsical main menu music as well as the rocking music of the fire cavern.
As said, the game is a remake of the original Hydlide from 1984. This means it has kept the story of main villain Varalys transforming the princess of Fairyland (great name btw) into three fairies. The main character Jim (even greater name btw) needs to gather the fairies, defeat Varalys and thus rescue the princess. There is next to none storytelling during the game but one has to appreciate how the equally nonsensical and generic story of the original Hydlide still lives here as a backdrop.
Somehow, all of its weirdnesses, experiments and mishaps contribute to Virtual Hydlide's overall off--kilter charm and atmosphere. Is it a stone cold classic worth five stars? No. Is it a game that has inspired, amused and intrigued me so much so that I can't honestly give it anything less than five stars? Yes.
