The review title I've written here is the last line of monologue that the main character states in Conker's Bad Fur Day. Released at the butt-end of the Nintendo 64's life cycle, people, like the quote says, didn't really knew what they had the Nintendo 64 until it was under the shadows of the Nintendo 64. Actually, scratch that; people didn't knew they had Rareware on Nintendo gamers' sides until it started producing inferior games on the GameCube and then Xbox.

Even the rest of Conker's Bad Fur Day seems like this: it's a short game, half of it composed of cut-scenes and the other half gameplay, that is a heck of a ride the first time through, and it leaves the player begging for more. Whereas good games like Banjo-Kazooie and Donkey Kong 64 make you feel just a little fatigued from collecting things, Conker's Bad Fur Day never gets old, even as the jokes don't get funny anymore after the umpteenth playthrough--and even that is debatable--because of the sheer amount of variety in this game! One moment, you're jumping across platforms, and the next thing you know, you're rolling a ball of poo, or even fighting a pile of poo...that sings! This game never ceases to amaze almost all players (and yes, supperflipper76 with his YouTube video "Why I Hate Conker's Bad Fur Day" is completely wrong--that guy wishes he made Conker's Bad Fur Day), especially someone like me who is into video game development and taking college courses on it. It is my personal inspiration to make a game just like this--raunchy, disgusting, somewhat obnoxious, but ultimately fun despite it being a little more British than most Americans are used to, much like a good album from Cubanate--and inspire another generation of gamers, even if it is going to be a niche audience.

Actually, that is exactly what this game is: a cult classic. The game only sold 50,000 around its launch window, so with the price of $70 (and it still sells for about that high on eBay), Rareware managed to earn only $3,500,000 on this game...and they must have spent much more on the game considering the production levels of this game! But hey, at least it's more than what Conker made in the end of the game! ("Millionaire!")

But is this game any good? Well, I only really write reviews for games (unless IGN decides to hire me of course, ha ha) if I really like a game or really despise it. Fortunately, this game fits the former category, so I am about to gush about this somewhat forgotten game that everybody, including the CoD kiddies, should play on Vizzed.com. It does have faults, and the game is definitely not perfect, but only because Rareware had to iterate quickly just before the Nintendo 64 got too unpopular, and I'll explain why in this review:


Overview:
?? Though the game itself doesn't mentioned this, Conker is supposedly 21 years old by the time the game starts, so naturally, he goes to a bar to drink plenty of alcohol with his friends, who are off to a war against the Tediz. However, Conker has had one drink too many and wanders off aimlessly in a futile attempt to go home but ending up in a place that is covered in crap. Meanwhile, the Panther King almost literally cries over spilled milk as he complains about the table not being stable enough for his glasses of milk, forcing Professor Weasel von Kripplesack to come up with a solution.

As Conker tries to figure out a way to go home, while learning new tricks and begrudgingly helping others along the way, the Professor comes up with a stupidly brilliant, brilliantly stupid solution: find a short, red squirrel to fill in the gap in the broken leg of the table! So the Panther King sends off his incompetent minions to do his bidding...and naturally fail as the witty and clever Conker gets away with calling himself an elephant rather than a squirrel, "according to the description" given to those buffoons. More things happen to Conker as he explores the parts of the world unknown to him before, until he eventually meets up with his girlfriend Berri to perform a heist and untimely face the Panther King.

Yes, the premise of the game is just as ridiculous as it sounds, but the game does a very good job selling itself as a comedy game, meaning that only snobbish critics unlike myself would try to take it seriously...well, up until the very end, which is tragic and worthy of discussion outside of reviews so as to not give away too many spoilers...even for a ten year-old game. At least part of the ending is not hard to figure out on your own, since it's pretty much already shown in the introductory cutscene, but trust me when I say that it will surprise you a little bit! Anyway, the story itself, unlike most games, allows for more creative gameplay than most platformers, rather than detracting from gameplay, which I'll explain in the next section:


Gameplay:
?? After a lengthy introductory cutscene that you cannot skip (unless you played through the game once), you start off drunk, walking very slowly and not being able to jump very high, until you learn about "Context Sensitive" pads that allow for more variety in gameplay, ranging from obtaining an item that you need to earning a new ability, to riding an animal to complete the next objective. Other than that complexity, the game is basicly Super Mario 64 if it turned to South Park with animals, but without any sight of Cartman...sort of. The game never sacrifices the story, and the story almost never sacrifices gameplay, and because of the sheer amount of variety that's mostly done well, the game is more impressive than Rareware's own Banjo-Tooie! While Banjo and Donkey Kong have mini-games separate from the actual gameplay, Conker has those diversions integrated extremely well into the main portion of the gameplay without it being too spontaneous like in Duke Nukem Forever. Actually, it's a lot like Duke Nukem 3D in that respect, only better-integrated.

The only issues with some of the levels are the water level (of course) and some of the controls in said levels. Conker controls like a squirrel could possibly move in a 3D video game environment, and while that is fine for more open areas, in tighter platforming sections it could get out of hand if the player tries to rush things through. A little bit of patience, and having a zen-like ability to fight the camera, are what you need for those sections. But other than that, the levels are well-designed and thought-out even if there are repetitious parts like "kill boss by doing something three times". It all makes sense when you actually play it, which you should do it right now.


Graphics:
?? Perhaps more impressive than the gameplay, much like Crysis, is the graphics. This is the only Nintendo 64 game that has true facial animation in the main character, as well as other characters to an extent. The only thing "fake" about Conker's animation is the eyes, which look like they are painted in much like in Mega Man 64, but other than that, you can see the model make faces like smiling, frowning, and the like. Rareware worked very closely with Nintendo to push the Nintendo 64 to its limits without having abysmal framerates like in Perfect Dark and Banjo-Tooie, without ever using the 4MB Expansion Pak. Not to mention, there are clean-looking, well-placed textures everywhere, and the draw distance is just as impressive as in Banjo-Tooie, again without the same framerate issues.

Actually, the game does drop in frame count at times, but you don't really notice it because the game is programmed in such a way that the character movements are not tied to the framerate like in Banjo-Tooie, meaning that you don't get slow motion. This programming technique could get out of hand if the framerate drops too low, which can cause imprecise platforming and frustration, but thankfully Conker's Bad Fur Day never seems to have that problem, and it is also not even susceptible to having the same game-breaking glitches that Donkey Kong 64 has.


Audio:
?? Equally as impressive as the graphics is the audio, which perfectly fits with what's going on in the game. Presented in Dolby Surround sound and using MPEG-3 compression techniques (I know, I sound old), the game has fantastic audio for almost every object, every character, and almost every level. You can probably tell that the character voices are compressed to fit the cartridge if you hear it closely enough, but the voice acting is so good anyway that you ignore it completely! I believe (correct me if I'm wrong) that Robin Beanland worked on the soundtrack all by himself, so there aren't as many tracks as in most other Rareware games, but there is a ton of variety in the soundtrack to encompass the sheer craziness of the game! And, of course, Chris Seavor does all of the male character voices, which proves his talent as both a voice actor and junior game designer. Dolby should be pleased with this game, and it should post it in its portfolio of "games that are made a crap-ton better by Dolby"!


Depth:
?? As mentioned before, the game has a lot of variety, but it is short. It is certainly more replayable in my opinion than something like Banjo-Kazooie, especially with its fantastic and equally varied multiplayer mode. But the setup of the game is rather simple even with the sheer variety, so it is not quite as deep as Perfect Dark, yet that does not stop me and others from enjoying the game.


Addictiveness:
?? Very. A game with a well-written story that rivals what a South Park movie would be, fun gameplay that makes you want to know more about what happens next, and a multiplayer mode that rivals Goldeneye 007, I would not be surprised if the game manages to sit in your Nintendo 64 beyond its measly 10-hour campaign. I managed to clock in over 40 hours into this Nintendo 64 game, which is almost half as high as my playtime of Banjo-Kazooie (thought admittedly, that was more because it was difficult for me as a kid to complete, rather than its length or replayability). It's a shame that its Xbox port doesn't have as good of a multiplayer, but this version gets more replay value because of it!


Difficulty:
?? The game gradually ramps up in difficulty in a pretty natural curve. It starts off easy and almost holding your hand without being too condescending to the player (but giving him or her a good laugh or too in the process), then builds up in challenge and intensity in each level. The War levels, especially, feel like the culmination of everything that is learned up to that point without it being contrived like in other platforms, as good as some of them are. There are frustrations with controls and some level design confusion here and there, but for the most part, the difficulty is just right.


Conclusion:
?? I did mention a lot of other Rareware games in this review, but in a lot of ways, Conker's Bad Fur Day feels like a culmination of all the past efforts of Rareware, ranging from mostly tight platforming from the Banjo games, shooting from Jet Force Gemini and Goldeneye 007, racing from some other obscure Chris-and-Tim-Stamper production pre-Rareware, and their lessons mostly learned from what they had done before. Even if an incorrect YouTuber named flipperboy76, or whatever his name is, mentions that Conker "got lucky" and made Rareware shift away from collect-a-thon games, which subsequently took away from what made Rareware a great video game company, I have to (dis)respectfully disagree with him because the other games since Conker's Bad Fur Day are like the obvious cash-grabs by Microsoft for profit rather than actual works of art that have actual effort and man-hours put into it. Conker's Bad Fur Day is Rareware's final masterpiece and should not be ridiculed by some cowardly YouTuber who has the nerve to shut down comments of his own video--if I can take criticism for liking this game, and he can't for disliking it, then people like me deserve to carefully explain just how much of an idiot he is. Conker is not the cause of Rareware's demise, but their lack of vision afterward did.

Now, if you excuse me, I'm going to mourn the loss of Rareware while listening the the score at the end of this game, then proceed to hate on the latest Killer Instinct, then go play some more Conker's Bad Fur Day.

Foodperson : incredible review! This game is a true masterpiece and your review does the game justice!