A half-century has passed since Earth began moving its burgeoning population into gigantic orbiting space colonies…
It is the year 0079 of the Universal Century. The cluster of colonies furthest from the Earth, Side Three, proclaimed itself the Principality of Zeon and launched a war of independence against the Earth Federation…
Intial fighting lasted over one month and half of the human population was lost. People were horrified by the atrocities that had been committed in the name of independence…
After eight months ahd passed and they were at a stalemate, one boy had a fateful encounter with a mobile suit.
Who will survive?
My used copy of Mobile Suit Gundam: Federation vs. Zeon from EBgames.com arrived in the mail recently. Good thing I got the lowcost EBSaver shipping because while their site said to expect 5-10 days, I got my order in 3 days, although I must be close to their facility. Another nice surprise since I was expecting to play it a week from now. As mentioned on EBgames.com, the game came with the original box and instruction manual, both in good condition. Great thing about games coming in DVD cases today is the box and manual don’t get thrown out for used games as easily
Cartoon Network’s recent weekly run of the new Gundam Seed, a modern reimaging take on the original Mobile Suit Gundam anime series, has brought back my interest in Gundam. One of the reasons I wanted a PS2 was so I could play all these Gundam games that were coming out for the console, and now that I have one, I thought it was about time to pick up a Gundam game. I decided on Federation vs. Zeon because I had remembered EGM giving it a good review and basically saying it was one of the better games of its type, that is, a game based on a anime TV show that was not average, but good. Being a home version of an arcade game developed by Capcom probably helps too. Except when I played it, I thought I was in for a disappointment…
With about an hour to play that night, I went through the Arcade mode. Naturally, when presented with the mobile suit select screen, I picked the Gundam RX-79 At first I thought that it was really cool. Playing the controls, I found the Gundam could do most the things it did in the show. Square shoots the gun, while pressing Triangle whips out the beam saber and the shield is used for protection (although it may be decorative) in the other arm. The X button uses the boost, which allows the mobile suit to jump, or if you continually hold it down, to fly for a short distance until the boost meter runs out. Once you land, it refills again. I was miffed at first about the lack of a camera control, but found it isn’t really needed because of the targeting feature. When there are enemies on the map, you press Circle to target one, and from there the camera and your mobile suit’s focus stays on that enemy. So even if you are facing the opposite direction and shoot, the mobile suit will turn around and shoot the current target. When there are enemies around you out of your sight, an arrow will flash to alert you, and you can press Circle to cycle to the next target. The beam sword can be very effective, but it requires closing in on an enemy. I’ll occasionally miss my chance and strike too soon or late and get pummled by the enemy. When you do hit, the camera quickly shifts to a more cinematic side viewpoint so you can see the action of the saber hitting the enemy, then shifts back to your normal view, all without effecting your control and sight. You can even attack large vehicles with your beam saber, even flying ships if your can catch them with the boost.
The simple controls aside, I was having a hard time playing the game. Besides fumbling through the controls on my first time, I found the Gundam to be very slow. I was getting hit a lot and having a real difficult time executing a hit with the beam saber. The slow movement of the mobile suit also made it hard to dodge attacks. Why would they make mobile suits move so slow that you couldn’t properly control and move them to evade and manuever around the enemies? Checking out the game’s manual for the controls, I was missing out on the dashing move. By pressing the d-pad in the same direction twice, the mobile suit will move quickly to evade, while using up a small amount of boost. The left analog stick can be used, but I find it much harder for my thumb to comfortably reach and pull off the tapping. Ah, now I was getting better and the game was getting fun, if only for a moment. Throughout most of the arcade mode I was fumbling about. To make matters worse, most of the last stages took place in space, so I ended up drifiting around a lot because of the floaty physics of that stage type. The last stages seemed to have so many enemies coming at me that I couldn’t get a break at times. Finishing the arcade mode, I felt disappointed about the game. Overall the control of the mobile suits felt too slow and sluggish, it just didn’t feel like there was much to the actual gameplay here to make it a good game. I even thought about turning in the Bandai customer survey form with ‘make the mobile suits move faster’.
The next day I tried the Campaign mode and found out just how awesome this game is and my disappointment faded away. Not awesome in that its a classic/must-have game, but awesome in that its a game based on Mobile Suit Gundam, and it’s good.
The reason the Campaign mode was enjoyable to play was that it starts off easy, while on the Arcade mode, your kinda thrown into the game with too many enemies blowing you to pieces while you learn the game. The first mission in Campaign mode starts off on the Outside of Jaburo map, where you control a GM and destroy all enemies which have low A.I.. And from there the difficulty gradually increases. A chart on the Campaign map shows the different levels of difficulty as marked by color, ranging from Very Easy to Very Hard, the harder missions don’t appear until after you’ve played several missions to get used to the game. Now that I’ve played enough of the game to realize that it was mainly me sucking before, I’m having a good time with Federation vs. Zeon.
The Campaign mode is based upon the events of the one year war of Mobile Suit Gundam, with you in the role of an annoymous support unit helping the Federation instead of playing the role of one of the main characters from the series. Most of the missions will involve clearing the area of a certain amount of enemies, and certain conditions my vary. You might be alone, or you might have a CPU teammate to back you up that you can issue simple movement commands with L1. Some missions might introduce you to a new unit where you test it against enemy forces before acquring it for later use.
There are unique missions sprinkled throughout, based on the events from the TV show where you can support the main characters. One mission in particular involves defending White Base from enemies. At this point, I had thought it was kind of funny that I was doing all of the defending for White Base while Aumro Ray and his Gundam were absent, although I understood that this is a game so its more fun if you are the on taking part in the action. Then all of the sudden Char shows up, and bam, there’s Amuro Ray himself charging from White Base in his Gundam with me backing him up.
As you progress through the Campaign, you’ll be given various new units that you can use, some slightly stronger versions of the same mobile suit, differentiated by the extra stars on the unit select screen. As you progress, you’ll even acquire captured enemy Zeon mobile suits to add to your list, with a new Federation paint job of course. I personally stick to the Gundams and GMs.
Eventually you get Amuro’s Gundam RX-79 when your taken to Side 7 to test the suit out. I especially liked how the mission starts with the Gundam preparing to launch with the apporpriate theme in the background, and instead of starting from a standing position, the Gundam is shown running down the side of the colony, an action I just thought was neat to see. I usually reserve the Gundam for the harder missions. You need to use different suits between missions, as the damge you take during one mission carries over, and they need a few missions to pass to recover their life.
Another mission I thought was cool involved using the G-Fighter and Gundam to destroy a Zanibar cruiser. Like in the TV show, you actually get to jump on the G-Fighter and let it fly you around like your on a surfboard. If you go too high or fall off, you have to look around for the G-Fighter to land and try again.
The game box claims there is over 200 missions in this game, so far I’ve done about 60 missions, and I’d guess the Federation and Zeon sides each get 100 missions. The large number of missions goes along with the fact that the missions themselves aren’t so complicated, as I’ve said, your mainly just destroying enemy forces. It’s not exactly on the level of complexity and scripting as Rogue Leader for example. There’s a good variety of stage types available, and although you basically have a square border showing you the boundaries, the actual playfield level design is unique enough to be fun. You’ll have to make good use of the boost to get to higher elevations of land, or pull yourself out of a canyon. Some stages include water to jump into and fight underwater, while some stages are set entirely in space with more floaty control that can be a pain. Space battles just aren’t as fun as the land battles.
I really like how the stages have different types of terrain like tall buildings, mountains, canyons, and water. Using the boost, you can scale the top of a high building and attempt to take out the enemy below. Might not be that effective, but its neat that you can climb to that kind of height. You can even land on a large vehicle like White Base. A nice touch to the buildings, if they take too much damage, they’ll collapse and leave a leveled space behind.
All the familar (or not so familar if you’ve never seen Gundam) music from the show is present and sets the mood well. It’s been a while since I’ve seen the show, but the music sounds like its high quality midi that sounds very close although I could be wrong. The voice work provided by the Ocean group is excellent, all of the actors from the TV show reprise their roles.
Mobile Suit Gundam: Federation vs. Zeon, while appealing immensely to the Gundam fan in me, is actually a good game, although if you aren’t a Gundam fan, the appeal will probably be lessened. The gameplay isn’t all that deep, but it does a good job at providing lots of action, and many missions to play through to keep you entertained. I haven’t had a chance to try it out, but the game also has a 2 player split screen mode that allows you to either go against or team up with a friend. This game would be awesome if it had online play, and it seems its already being worked on in the form of the sequel, Zeta Gundam: AEUG Vs. Titans. I’d get a netplay adapter for my PS2 for that. I’d get a netplay adapter for my PS2 for that. MSG: Federation Vs. Zeon is long gone out of print and would probably make a good Greatest Hits title, but you can find it used at EB Games and Gamefly for about $20. I might have to check out the other 3 Gundam games for PS2, although I’ve heard 2 of them aren’t that great, and I hope Bandai decides to release this GC Gundam in the U.S.
I recorded 3 movies to show off a few stages of the game, one involving the appearence of Char and Amuro battling it out that I mentioned. WMP 9 is required, and the movies are in zips to save bandwidth.
movies
Arcade stage 1, Side 7
Escort Supply Corps
Defend White Base
It is the year 0079 of the Universal Century. The cluster of colonies furthest from the Earth, Side Three, proclaimed itself the Principality of Zeon and launched a war of independence against the Earth Federation…
Intial fighting lasted over one month and half of the human population was lost. People were horrified by the atrocities that had been committed in the name of independence…
After eight months ahd passed and they were at a stalemate, one boy had a fateful encounter with a mobile suit.
Who will survive?
My used copy of Mobile Suit Gundam: Federation vs. Zeon from EBgames.com arrived in the mail recently. Good thing I got the lowcost EBSaver shipping because while their site said to expect 5-10 days, I got my order in 3 days, although I must be close to their facility. Another nice surprise since I was expecting to play it a week from now. As mentioned on EBgames.com, the game came with the original box and instruction manual, both in good condition. Great thing about games coming in DVD cases today is the box and manual don’t get thrown out for used games as easily
Cartoon Network’s recent weekly run of the new Gundam Seed, a modern reimaging take on the original Mobile Suit Gundam anime series, has brought back my interest in Gundam. One of the reasons I wanted a PS2 was so I could play all these Gundam games that were coming out for the console, and now that I have one, I thought it was about time to pick up a Gundam game. I decided on Federation vs. Zeon because I had remembered EGM giving it a good review and basically saying it was one of the better games of its type, that is, a game based on a anime TV show that was not average, but good. Being a home version of an arcade game developed by Capcom probably helps too. Except when I played it, I thought I was in for a disappointment…
With about an hour to play that night, I went through the Arcade mode. Naturally, when presented with the mobile suit select screen, I picked the Gundam RX-79
At first I thought that it was really cool. Playing the controls, I found the Gundam could do most the things it did in the show. Square shoots the gun, while pressing Triangle whips out the beam saber and the shield is used for protection (although it may be decorative) in the other arm. The X button uses the boost, which allows the mobile suit to jump, or if you continually hold it down, to fly for a short distance until the boost meter runs out. Once you land, it refills again. I was miffed at first about the lack of a camera control, but found it isn’t really needed because of the targeting feature. When there are enemies on the map, you press Circle to target one, and from there the camera and your mobile suit’s focus stays on that enemy. So even if you are facing the opposite direction and shoot, the mobile suit will turn around and shoot the current target. When there are enemies around you out of your sight, an arrow will flash to alert you, and you can press Circle to cycle to the next target. The beam sword can be very effective, but it requires closing in on an enemy. I’ll occasionally miss my chance and strike too soon or late and get pummled by the enemy. When you do hit, the camera quickly shifts to a more cinematic side viewpoint so you can see the action of the saber hitting the enemy, then shifts back to your normal view, all without effecting your control and sight. You can even attack large vehicles with your beam saber, even flying ships if your can catch them with the boost.
The simple controls aside, I was having a hard time playing the game. Besides fumbling through the controls on my first time, I found the Gundam to be very slow. I was getting hit a lot and having a real difficult time executing a hit with the beam saber. The slow movement of the mobile suit also made it hard to dodge attacks. Why would they make mobile suits move so slow that you couldn’t properly control and move them to evade and manuever around the enemies? Checking out the game’s manual for the controls, I was missing out on the dashing move. By pressing the d-pad in the same direction twice, the mobile suit will move quickly to evade, while using up a small amount of boost. The left analog stick can be used, but I find it much harder for my thumb to comfortably reach and pull off the tapping. Ah, now I was getting better and the game was getting fun, if only for a moment. Throughout most of the arcade mode I was fumbling about. To make matters worse, most of the last stages took place in space, so I ended up drifiting around a lot because of the floaty physics of that stage type. The last stages seemed to have so many enemies coming at me that I couldn’t get a break at times. Finishing the arcade mode, I felt disappointed about the game. Overall the control of the mobile suits felt too slow and sluggish, it just didn’t feel like there was much to the actual gameplay here to make it a good game. I even thought about turning in the Bandai customer survey form with ‘make the mobile suits move faster’.
The next day I tried the Campaign mode and found out just how awesome this game is and my disappointment faded away. Not awesome in that its a classic/must-have game, but awesome in that its a game based on Mobile Suit Gundam, and it’s good.
The reason the Campaign mode was enjoyable to play was that it starts off easy, while on the Arcade mode, your kinda thrown into the game with too many enemies blowing you to pieces while you learn the game. The first mission in Campaign mode starts off on the Outside of Jaburo map, where you control a GM and destroy all enemies which have low A.I.. And from there the difficulty gradually increases. A chart on the Campaign map shows the different levels of difficulty as marked by color, ranging from Very Easy to Very Hard, the harder missions don’t appear until after you’ve played several missions to get used to the game. Now that I’ve played enough of the game to realize that it was mainly me sucking before, I’m having a good time with Federation vs. Zeon.
The Campaign mode is based upon the events of the one year war of Mobile Suit Gundam, with you in the role of an annoymous support unit helping the Federation instead of playing the role of one of the main characters from the series. Most of the missions will involve clearing the area of a certain amount of enemies, and certain conditions my vary. You might be alone, or you might have a CPU teammate to back you up that you can issue simple movement commands with L1. Some missions might introduce you to a new unit where you test it against enemy forces before acquring it for later use.
There are unique missions sprinkled throughout, based on the events from the TV show where you can support the main characters. One mission in particular involves defending White Base from enemies. At this point, I had thought it was kind of funny that I was doing all of the defending for White Base while Aumro Ray and his Gundam were absent, although I understood that this is a game so its more fun if you are the on taking part in the action. Then all of the sudden Char shows up, and bam, there’s Amuro Ray himself charging from White Base in his Gundam with me backing him up.
As you progress through the Campaign, you’ll be given various new units that you can use, some slightly stronger versions of the same mobile suit, differentiated by the extra stars on the unit select screen. As you progress, you’ll even acquire captured enemy Zeon mobile suits to add to your list, with a new Federation paint job of course. I personally stick to the Gundams and GMs.
Eventually you get Amuro’s Gundam RX-79 when your taken to Side 7 to test the suit out. I especially liked how the mission starts with the Gundam preparing to launch with the apporpriate theme in the background, and instead of starting from a standing position, the Gundam is shown running down the side of the colony, an action I just thought was neat to see. I usually reserve the Gundam for the harder missions. You need to use different suits between missions, as the damge you take during one mission carries over, and they need a few missions to pass to recover their life.
Another mission I thought was cool involved using the G-Fighter and Gundam to destroy a Zanibar cruiser. Like in the TV show, you actually get to jump on the G-Fighter and let it fly you around like your on a surfboard. If you go too high or fall off, you have to look around for the G-Fighter to land and try again.
The game box claims there is over 200 missions in this game, so far I’ve done about 60 missions, and I’d guess the Federation and Zeon sides each get 100 missions. The large number of missions goes along with the fact that the missions themselves aren’t so complicated, as I’ve said, your mainly just destroying enemy forces. It’s not exactly on the level of complexity and scripting as Rogue Leader for example. There’s a good variety of stage types available, and although you basically have a square border showing you the boundaries, the actual playfield level design is unique enough to be fun. You’ll have to make good use of the boost to get to higher elevations of land, or pull yourself out of a canyon. Some stages include water to jump into and fight underwater, while some stages are set entirely in space with more floaty control that can be a pain. Space battles just aren’t as fun as the land battles.
I really like how the stages have different types of terrain like tall buildings, mountains, canyons, and water. Using the boost, you can scale the top of a high building and attempt to take out the enemy below. Might not be that effective, but its neat that you can climb to that kind of height. You can even land on a large vehicle like White Base. A nice touch to the buildings, if they take too much damage, they’ll collapse and leave a leveled space behind.
All the familar (or not so familar if you’ve never seen Gundam) music from the show is present and sets the mood well. It’s been a while since I’ve seen the show, but the music sounds like its high quality midi that sounds very close although I could be wrong. The voice work provided by the Ocean group is excellent, all of the actors from the TV show reprise their roles.
Mobile Suit Gundam: Federation vs. Zeon, while appealing immensely to the Gundam fan in me, is actually a good game, although if you aren’t a Gundam fan, the appeal will probably be lessened. The gameplay isn’t all that deep, but it does a good job at providing lots of action, and many missions to play through to keep you entertained. I haven’t had a chance to try it out, but the game also has a 2 player split screen mode that allows you to either go against or team up with a friend. This game would be awesome if it had online play, and it seems its already being worked on in the form of the sequel, Zeta Gundam: AEUG Vs. Titans. I’d get a netplay adapter for my PS2 for that. I’d get a netplay adapter for my PS2 for that. MSG: Federation Vs. Zeon is long gone out of print and would probably make a good Greatest Hits title, but you can find it used at EB Games and Gamefly for about $20. I might have to check out the other 3 Gundam games for PS2, although I’ve heard 2 of them aren’t that great, and I hope Bandai decides to release this GC Gundam in the U.S.
I recorded 3 movies to show off a few stages of the game, one involving the appearence of Char and Amuro battling it out that I mentioned. WMP 9 is required, and the movies are in zips to save bandwidth.
movies
Arcade stage 1, Side 7
Escort Supply Corps
Defend White Base
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