Flashback
Take a walk through gaming history as we pick a random date in gaming history and bring you the news from that time as if it was now , different era every week - covering all of gaming history
Flashback
A look at gaming in April 1999
Use Left/Right to seek, Home/End to jump to start or end. Hold shift to jump forward or backward.
A gold rush of hype, a console arms race, and a toy aisle that felt like a movie premiere—April 1999 had it all. We dive into the month where Phantom Menace merch swallowed the shelves, Dreamcast teased an online future with VMUs, guns, and fishing rods, and PS2 whispers hinted at a built-in DVD player that would transform living rooms. Along the way, we revisit the games that defined the moment and the myths that didn’t age the way fans hoped.
We start with the joy and folly of collecting: cinema cups, jelly sweets shaped like Boss Nass, and why Episode I toys never became the next 1977. Then we switch to the games that soaked up our hours—Championship Manager’s long-haul saves and youth scouting magic; GTA London’s disc-based expansion before DLC existed; and Soul Reaver’s bold narrative design that helped chart the path to modern third-person adventures. Not everything made the jump cleanly—NBA Jam stumbled into 3D—but RollerCoaster Tycoon quietly built the blueprint for accessible, addictive sim parks.
The news beats are pure time-capsule gold. EGM reports a hidden South Park short on Tiger Woods ‘99 for PlayStation, a perfect snapshot of the wild west of content on discs. Then comes the PS2 breadcrumb trail: a 128-bit multimedia processor, MPEG-2 decoding, and the masterstroke of DVD playback that sold parents on movies and kids on games. Dreamcast counters with real innovation—peripherals that changed how we played and the early promise of online worlds like Phantasy Star Online. We round it out with pure nostalgia: N64 memories, Star Wars Episode I Racer’s blistering tracks, and the realization that even over-merchandising has its own warm glow decades later.
If you love retro gaming, hardware lore, and the stories behind the games you grew up with, you’ll feel right at home. Subscribe, share with a friend who had a VMU or a Phantom Menace cup, and tell us: were you team N64, PS1, or Dreamcast? We want your best 1999 gaming story.
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Cheers gamers!
Hello and welcome to Flashback. The games you loved, the stories you forgot. And it's me, RGT, and as always, I'm joined by the old nostalgia nerd himself, the A-class gamer, the collector, the head of the Unofficial Controller podcast. It is George. How are you doing, George? Are you liking these intros?
SPEAKER_03I'm struggling under the weight of that intro. That was big. That was something that I personally probably don't see myself as. But if you do, I shall continue to be that man in your eyes. Beautiful. And how are you doing? I am fired up. Do I reveal the year? Do you reveal the year? I don't know.
SPEAKER_00Well, I can do it if you like. Well, this this week is episode four of Flashback, and we are in April 1999. So, yeah. An interesting year and an interesting month. Um I'm wearing a Phantom Menace t-shirt for a character.
SPEAKER_03I've got no idea who he is. I am pumped up. I'm drinking out my KFC uh cup with a princess Samadala topper. I am eating various candy confectioneries, not really fit for human consumption, but one of them looks like Jar Jar Binks. Why not? I said. Who's this? Another supplementary character, it's Boss Nass as a jelly. Fine, I'll have that. And then I walk in my local news agent, and there's these gold figureheads as well. I don't know what's going on, but I'm collecting all of it. I think one day this merch, this toy range, will be worth some money.
SPEAKER_00You just reminded me then, just when you're talking about Phantom Menace, and I was uh I liked Star Wars, but I was never a hardcore fan. But for some reason, when you mentioned them cups, I suddenly remembered the cinema cups with the different heads on the merch that people had, and that just suddenly clicked with me. Yeah, I remember people buying them with a drink at some extortionate price in the cinema, but everything there was popcorn holders, everything when they went to see the movie. I mean, they absolutely merched that to death, didn't they?
SPEAKER_03When that came out honestly, mate, it was destroyed, and obviously, people caught a little bit of the fever. Um, of I've got another story to tell you as well, kind of related to last week's episode. Just quickly, I'll do this. I was in the car the other day, and I was reminded, I was listening to that Flashy B episode we were talking about 2004, and it reminded me a friend of mine bought four copies of San Anne thinking that yeah, this is in 2004, but four copies of San Anne thinking that he could then scalp people because it would sell out. Unfortunately, much to his frustration, when we then popped in the local supermarkets a week to two weeks later, there were more copies there of San Anne than you can.
SPEAKER_00Oh, they knew what they knew what they had. There was plenty printed in his own.
Phantom Menace Merch Mania
SPEAKER_03So he begrudgingly had three extra copies of San that probably are still with Warwick Glynn to this day. Bless him, what an absolute love. Yeah, fair play to him, actually. Hopefully, he probably shilled him off. Threw him in the bin knowing Warwick. He was quite mercurial, but sort of insanely fun uh dude to be around. So yeah, I wonder what he's up to now. If you know him, because it's a rare name, tell him to get in touch with me. He'll know who I am. Anyone know about his uh four copies of Santa? Anyway, moving back, that why that sort of prompted me to remember it again was uh and if you haven't heard that or any of the other flashy bee episodes, as we're now calling it colloquially, it's actually called Flashback. You're not gonna find Flashy B on Spotify or Amazon Music. Well, you might, but it won't be this show. Um Flashy B. This is called Flashback, uh, as you know because you're listening to it, but tell all your friends. Um, there was a lot of noise around Phantom Menace, and people went and bought all the toys up thinking, much like the original Star Wars, these would be worth you know a lot of value, but it never happened for the Phantom Menace toys still to this day. What are we probably the same distance between '77 and '99 as we are between 99 and 2025. We're equally, we must easily be the same distance between 99 and whatever.
SPEAKER_00So because obviously I'm not into the toy scene or anything like that. So they've they've never reached the city.
SPEAKER_03Well, they were when Toys are Us first stopped it. The you see scenes in America, I can't really speak for the UK, were much more, we're much more civilised, darling. Uh we probably just politely trip somebody over, but people are like literally busting to get in, and they were coming out with the toys, like, I don't know who these characters are because the film's not out yet. It was that kind of buzz. It was uh it was exciting, and as you said, the toys, the the sweets, the t-shirts, the bubble bath. I'm sure we all had a Darthmall bubble bath at Christmas that year uh that ended up becoming a figurine on our shelves. Uh what's that? Is that a figurine or more? Yeah, don't pick it up. It's bubble bath. Wish I'd filled it with sand. Made by maybe yeah, it would have been something like that. Uh there's always those.
SPEAKER_00So why do you think the toys didn't get so expensive? Is it because there was more of them? Because there was a big massive steering brand or something.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, when when I don't know how this has become a retrospective on the 1977 release of Star Wars and its associated merchandise, but they didn't actually manage to get any of the toys out. Um they didn't have the ability to get them out in time. So what people were able to procure for Christmas of 1977 was a like a card slip of a coming soon type scenario that you know, as soon as the figures became available, they were sent to you in a card stand pack, I believe. Oh wow wave of the first so many. Obviously, some crazy kids have still got these things sealed or whatever. There's probably an insane value attached to them. There's probably a load of rotten melted carb uh plastic inside, but you know, thoughts there. Um, did that create the buzz? Did the lack of anything being around create a buzz and therefore create a wave of toys? Also, don't forget Star Wars was like an irredefining moment, a little bit like the Beatles. You you kind of had to be there. We were fortunate enough to live within the shadow of it, but probably weren't cognizant within the launch of the original movie or movies. I was for Jedi, I know that for a fact. Anyway, side step and a half.
SPEAKER_00No, it's just interesting to go on sort on the toy front and yeah, different bits and pieces, especially.
SPEAKER_03Well, one of my secret passions that I have well buried since the toy collecting scene went crazy is uh I have got a lot of toys also.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I've never that's never one thing as I've got a couple of things from when I was younger. I've got the sort of the die-cast original A-Team helicopter and a few of the figures that fit in there, and um a couple of bits like that just from nostalgia from childhood, but other than that, I've never really got into collecting toys at all.
SPEAKER_03Oh dude, here's a confession. Turtles, playset, sewer playset, the van, the blimp, ecto one, ghostbusters fire station, the full range of the toys. All loose and I collect.
SPEAKER_00Oh, you've got the Ghostbusters Fire Station. Wow.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, yeah. I've got StarCom, a load of stuff from StarCon, Mask, Boulder Hill, most of the main ships from that, uh, Bookie O'Hare, all the ships, the only real things that ever came from Bookie O'Hare because we never got the righteous indignation, which is what I one day will call my boat when I get it, because that's an absolutely kick-ass name. Um, well, see we have Muscle Men, uh, load of sewer sharks, uh Street Sharks, got a load of the spin off, a load of He-Man Castle Grimms. Thundercats, some OG Thundercats, but I have got some of the newer bits and bobs, some of the collectible bits and bobs for that. Uh the kids were mad into it, so I just bought it and gave them it. They're running around with a£40 lino figure. I don't care.
SPEAKER_00Uh I remember in the day I had a lino figure, quite a big one, and you used to have the the battery pack on your finger and you push it in his back and his eyes used to light up. I had that. I wish I still had that.
SPEAKER_03Well, we've got one of them somewhere kicking around. Have you? Oh, yeah. We've got um a couple of the real Ghostbusters Ecto backpacks and the trap. No, really? We haven't got the trap, but we've got the um I really wanted the trap, but for some reason I look at it now and it's like completely skyrocketing in price. Got the little Ecto meter that clicks on the side of it. Got a load of the blasters that put the faces, the month the guys on the wall, and you kind of find Nerf darts, soft projectile nose, darts at them with a little blaster. Honestly, the amount of toys, Trance G1 transformers, obviously, a load of stuff.
SPEAKER_00You can start your own retro store up.
SPEAKER_03I know, but I can't because they're my memories. I can't start my memories, can I? And more 80s town classic Katie space Lego than you could possibly imagine. If that's endeared me to you in any way, listener, or forced me further out of your solar sister, solar system gravitational pull. Uh let that be what it is. We're slowly rotting in the loft as we speak.
Collecting Toys And 80s Relics
SPEAKER_00Yeah, let's uh move on to some games then of what we would have been playing, um, or would like to have been playing in um April 1999. Um, the one top of the list here, I'll take. Um it was on Microsoft Windows, but I played this and its two counterparts on the Amiga, which was this is Championship Manager 3. Um, predominantly I played the original Championship Manager and then Championship Manager 97, I believe it was. But I mean, oh, they were such great games, absolutely, you know. You'd had sort of managed management games on consoles and on sort of mega drive and bits, but they never had that depth and scope of what you'd have on your home computers. Um and yeah, championship manager was br the hours and hours. My mate got so good at it, he used because they used to they had all the real use listed on it as well. Obviously, you'd get update discs and bits, and he would um he would like pick out youth players, he'd always take a lower team all the way up through the leagues, and he would pick out youngsters, and he picked out Matthew Everington, who went on to be a you know Premier League player. There was another guy at Spurs, he picked out, he went on, and this is when these were 15-16-year-olds, he picked them out and trained them up, and all these players did come to fruition from what he'd done with the game. So it's obviously they were they were really tracking younger players, they knew what the what what the players were at these clubs, even though we didn't ourselves, they knew who all these younger players were.
SPEAKER_03There'd be there'd be you know names and TV personalities. Now one would have to think about when that game came out. Yeah, they're all retired and had their careers and some weirdos are still playing their games in that game in a shed.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, well there was, and I've said this on on our other show, um underfish controller podcast before, but there was a guy up till I don't know if he still is, he was still playing his original save of championship manager, and he was he was on Twitch, yeah, and he was like in 2097 or something, and was Yeah, had played like yeah, decades of the game.
SPEAKER_03So all the players would just be randomly generated names, then one would imagine.
SPEAKER_00I suppose they would have to get to a certain level once the update discs had finished that they were they're just randomly.
SPEAKER_03I would love to be able to get that and record like stories of like the greatest players within his team over that hundred-year period, like these big stars that came and went in his own imagination and within the game's sort of device. Like there's a player that came from nowhere, he picked him up, he signed in, became played for the club for like 15-20 years, went from like youth player to captain, captained his country. His name's like I don't know, Ralph McCheesel or something like that. And it's just that'd be amazing, wouldn't it? See the stack.
SPEAKER_00Well, I keep thinking now, now I've got I've got a monitor set up on my recording desk where I am now, and I've also got the I picked up the A500 when it came out a little obviously it's not an Amiga, you're not allowed to say it's an Amiga by copyright, but anyway, we all know it's an Amiga 500 mini. Um but I've got the I know it's mad, but um I've got the I've got all my games installed in that what I had back in the day on on an SD card or on a memory stick, sorry, and I've got championship manager on there, and because that comes with a little tank mouse as well. So I keep thinking, do I set this up and play championship manager again and just sit at my desk boop boop boop and just yeah, see if we can uh just that music is iconic and yeah.
SPEAKER_03Getting my Atari ST from that era set up would be difficult, but I'd love to get like an A500. But the thing is, I'm not clever enough to put the games on it myself because I would just want like spatial simulator B17 Flying Fortress. Shall I let you in a little secret? Yes.
SPEAKER_00Um you can actually go on on like Amazon and actually buy just a USB stubby stick pre-loaded because a lot of the games are license free now after the year's because the licenses have run out. So they actually legally sell them on Amazon. You can actually buy them.
SPEAKER_03Is bat one and two on there? I need to chase up my rouse actually. Is bat one and two on a band on uh Ant Stream or not? We need to get all over that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, definitely. Yeah, definitely. Anyway, that's 1989.
SPEAKER_03This is 1999.
SPEAKER_00What else isn't playing? Um a few that take my eye off here. We've also got um Grand Theft Auto London. And then they done the two mission packs, which is that really early DLC, buy the extra discs and did you have to load London up first, then put the change the disc and put in?
SPEAKER_03I'll be honest with you, mate. I can't remember. I can't remember. I think you had London, but I don't know if I had any of the extra discs. I can't quite remember. And I don't even think I've I'm not I I ought I don't know. I I think I've got it, but I don't 100% know.
SPEAKER_00I've got London up there, and I think I've got 61, I think, but they done 61 and 69, which was then obviously tatting that game a bit further. And I always remember the cover with the guy who looked like he was in the Beatles on the front, and then the car you had like the Union Jack Jaguar, didn't you? And there, which was obviously like Austin Powers, and how you know for thinking they were then, DMA designs that hang on, this game's done really well. They sell extra content for that game, but in a disc form, obviously you couldn't download stuff then. And I just thought, what a great idea, and I've I would imagine that probably sold quite well.
SPEAKER_03I think people probably it's a s it's it's a treated as a standalone in itself. I mean, it's got its own fans, never really clicked with me. Uh, and I think we talked not that long ago about the the original GTA. Um, I don't know what episode that was. I I talked about playing it on PC, I think I said. Yeah, you said your friend was absolutely rinting it on that. Yeah, Hewing was absolutely brilliant in that game. Um, but I I enjoyed it as like a curio, like, oh what is this? But never really clicked with me fundamentally until I I literally walked past a friend playing on a PlayStation 2, and he was playing three, and I was like, What's this? He told me, and then I just sat down in his ecosystem, literally just gobsmacked for 20 minutes solid. Like, can you do this? Can you do that? Oh, it's raining, what's gonna happen? Oh, but it's not really oh wow, this is wow, they've thought of everything.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that was unbelievable.
What We Played In 1999
SPEAKER_03It was uh you look at it now, and I sometimes think, like, wow, mate, you know, the first time you saw this, you were literally st dumbstruck, brought to your knees. Um not many games have ever done that to me, but GTA 3 was one that brought me to my knees. GTA 1, GTA 2, GTA London, nothing more than like a sort of a bad boy game, weren't they? You knew it because you could do yeah naughty things in the fundamentally the top-down controls, a bit like micro machines, it's uh quite hard to master, to be honest with you. Yes, you know, when the moment's on and the police are right on you, or you're trying to chase someone, or trying to get in an alley and you've got uh and all of a sudden you go the wrong way down the screen, you have one of those momentary moments where you haven't flipped your head round upside down, all of a sudden you go left when you should go right.
SPEAKER_00Trying to turn your control pad upside down, so you get it.
SPEAKER_03It's we it's those weird things that we did or had to do because of the games and the infrastructures that we were given, but and for that reason, GTA was interesting to me, and I I played one most heavily, I think I even had it eventually on something like Game Boy Colour or something daft, which was just the most obtuse drivel you've ever seen in your life. Um yeah, what else is on that list? Um do you want me to slap you with the phone?
SPEAKER_00Oh no, I'll go this next one because I think this is probably more for you anyway, which is Legacy of Kane Soul Reaver, um which I've got, I believe, on the Evocade. Um you've got the re-release. Yeah, the double pack on the Evercade, which I still need to really get into. But obviously, you were I remember you quite enjoying this game back in the day. Yeah. Um so what did you what were you playing this on?
SPEAKER_03I played this on Dreamcast, but have come back to retrospectively play it on PlayStation 1 as well.
SPEAKER_00Okay. Um Dreamcast was probably the sort of definitive version, was it the better version? Oh, good God. Yeah.
SPEAKER_03By a long stretch. That game on there looked beautiful. Colour palette, graphical fidelity. Don't get me wrong, right? It's still incredible on PlayStation 1. But my goodness gracious me, if you want to experience it, get the oh obviously get the remake now, but or play the Dreamcast version, I would say. But the PS1 One still is great, it's obviously got a little bit more of that sort of weird PS1 sort of tank uh triangle textural jank to it, which I think adds to some of the allure if you're into that ecosystem. I've recently seen announced uh a fishing shen you type mashup that's been sort of paraded around on the Holy Trinity, such as Push Square, etc. And that's got this sort of Yankee sort of aliased look to the side of the graphics, it's got like a Shenu kind of style to it, and that's very much got my interest peaked. But to that reason, I think that Soul Reaver on the PlayStation 1 has enough of that going on where it's it's got that look to it. Now, it's part of the graphics at the moment. Let's talk about the sound design, absolutely brilliant. Let's talk about the um level design, absolutely brilliant. Let's talk about the the story and the way that your powers evolve as you go through. Really, really good, and actually, in some way, you could argue, the forerunner for the current template of games or the the last gen and and maybe into this gen current games of how over-the-shoulder story games are written. This literally is maybe the embryonic first steps, and I don't think that should be a surprise to anyone when they find out that I think it was one of Amy Hennig's first sort of um high level roles within the game. Yeah. So it's nice to see the narrative threads to Naughty Dog, the narrative threads through that to other projects, and how that then kind of really ballooned off. To give us those kind of and little is this that really, but those cinematic third-person story adventure games that many of us know and love. Um Soul Reaver really is the protogenic child. I'm sure someone could trace it back even further and further than that. But for me, from my experience, especially with Amy's name attached to it, and the kudos and respect this game has, and the pantheon of the world of video gaming, I think this is a this is a great title, and people should check it out.
SPEAKER_00Brilliant. Yeah. I also saw in here, now I didn't. I do believe I have this. No, I do have this on N64, but I've never really played it. This is more of a game I played on the Mega Drive back in the day, but NBA Jam 2000.
SPEAKER_03I can't speak for this. I remember it kicking around loose cart in like EB or game or game station, and it never really piqued my interest. I was a you know a mad kid for nostalgia and stuff like that. And NBA Jam was certainly an arcade game I looked at. It was a game I kind of jealously heard my school chums talking about playing on their mega drive, and they were sat there in their sort of Michael Jordan tops and Chicago Bulls and yeah, all that sort of good stuff. And I was like, oh wow. Now, obviously, when I got a Mega Drive later as an adult and then played it retrospectively in my own time, not just round at a friend's who's like, I'm not playing that anymore. Let's play Mortal Kombat. Well, please come in. I mean, you know, I had it to myself, I could put some time and effort into it. The OG NBA Jam on Genesis Mega Drive is actually banging.
unknownReally?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, oh yeah, brilliant game. Brilliant game. Loads of playability, loads of extra little bits, loads of opportunities to taunt your friends, go one-on-one versus the computer. It's absolutely insane fun. I can't speak for this, but I do know that NBA Jam had a rough kind of transition from the 16-bit era.
SPEAKER_00Was this this was this the one with the massive glitching where the I don't know, mate.
SPEAKER_03I can't speak for it as I said.
SPEAKER_00If anyone's listening and you're on our Discord, pop it in community corrections if you know. Now I'm thinking this might be the game where what they've done, I don't know if you heard this story. If you play the game, everyone's bought the game, started playing it, and going, We're getting absolutely rinsed by the computer here. We can't work out why. And that was because the developers had added themselves in the game, and they'd been concentrating so much of putting themselves in the game, they'd actually done the the uh difficulty controls the wrong way round, so easy was super hard, but even you had to set it on super hard to get the easiest level, and even then that was still quite tough. But obviously, in them days there was no way of fixing this. The game had been printed, the game had gone out, and that and that was it. And I think they lost NBA Jam started on the tilt down, then that sort of lost a lot of respect, and the game was all a bit from then on, but I'm sure that was MJ NBA Jam 2 phase bug.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it might well be. For me, in a way, the PlayStation and Saturn kind of herald the maybe the best iteration of the NBA Jam arcade board that we were probably gonna get until modern times, but then after that, in their subsequent bid to chase 3D and all that other stuff, NBA Jam just died hard. Uh, I remember, you know, on PlayStation 1, an example, I had the PlayStation NBA series, but I didn't have NBA Jam.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
Championship Manager Legends
SPEAKER_03I think we maybe well, I think maybe the consumer, especially at this time, and I've talked about this in length on the show, but here here it is again. Here's an example bad influence. Shogun on the Saturn on the Saturn got absolutely destroyed because people said, Oh no, we're bored of this 2D stuff, we want 3D stuff. That was the mentality. We wanted a little bit more realism, a little bit more 3D, and the arcades kind of if you remember the arcade games kind of tailed off, and we started to get lots more 3D animated characters, and it was all about chasing the polygons in the arcade at that moment. And I think we were all about chasing the polygons at home as well. And I think I think there was a move, and I know there was a move to kind of snub 2D platformers because they felt kind of derisive and a little bit old hat. Yeah, you want the latest tech and so we were kind of wanting to see a very crude triangular figure walking around and would think that was oh my god, look at this. Look at this, yeah. A hand animated, hand-drawn Raymond, you know, meh for babies. So last gen. Exactly. And and I'm not here to say Rayman's not a great game, it is, it's insanely difficult, but it's absolutely wonderful in everything that it does. But it you know, games like that were taking a hard time in the consumer's hands because it wasn't justifying their next gen purchase.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, very true. Um, also on here, I see the game. Now I've I haven't got this now, and I I seem to have a memory of having this, but Roll Cage on the PlayStation. They didn't they re-release that on the PS4? Didn't they remake that? Sorry, on the PS4. I'm sure they done a newer version of that Roll Cage, but that was where you could sort of drive upside down as well, couldn't you? So your lot of car wheels were bigger than your chassis, so you could.
SPEAKER_03I remember the I remember the artwork, I remember seeing the box art kicking around possibly, but I don't really remember the game.
SPEAKER_00I remember it being um decent and decent a decent game to play, and I it was very wipeout aesthetics, you know. It had that you were just like a car version of wipeout.
SPEAKER_03Confession for you, I was so deeply inserted in the N64 ecosystem at this point that I wouldn't even know what Roll Cage was if it ran me down in the street.
SPEAKER_00Really?
SPEAKER_03Obviously, now I've matured a bit more and I've played all these different a lot of these games on different systems and yeah, but at the time I had no other obviously I'd sold my PlayStation 1 for some um lads holiday drinking money. I'd then gone without a console until I got ill, and then as part of my rehabilitation, I got myself an N64 and then kind of just through probably laziness or whatever, just just pursued that as my main gaming platform, much to my annoyance at times, because uh there weren't any bigger boy games on there, so you had to make do with what you had, but the but the industry was a little bit more immature in terms of that, so you know you took Mario 64 for what it was, as you do now. You you know, I took Ocarina Time for what it was. That was the game I'd have been playing at this moment. I think I was you know drawing a line under my playthrough of that when I picked it up in November, it'd see me all the way through to now. What can I say about that game that hasn't been said? I know to a modern audience now turning up to it blind, they'd be like, What is this, sir? But to me, even now, that even the Kikiri Forest, that little village that you start in, I can I can hear the little plucks now.
SPEAKER_00See, this is how you feel about this is how I feel about how I feel about Breath of the Wild.
SPEAKER_03Because I obviously never played it, but I never played um you see, and that's the reason why I bounce off Breath of the Wild every single time I pick it up. It's got it's so stark, it's so barren. Yeah, I know there's other people in it, but initially, absolutely not. There's a strange bearded guy taking an un sort of warranted approach in a strange young man wandering through his area.
SPEAKER_00Um odd. Oh, I love it. That's why I love it. I love that being alone and out in the white wilderness and fighting your way around brilliant.
SPEAKER_03But anyway, see I appreciate in Death Stranding, but I just didn't appreciate it in that.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, strange, innit? Um also on here, we've got Safe Park on the N64. There was that was that the one that weren't the one where it was like the snowball sort of fighting one, was it?
SPEAKER_03I think so. I think it was.
SPEAKER_00But first person sort of it was a weird game.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. A couple of my mates had it, and they were they were crazy for South Park anyway, because obviously it was the kind of just emerging in yeah, edgy comedic adult uh cartoon at the time. Uh, and it was huge, you know. We're talking chocolate salty balls right now, yeah. And and this game was very derivative, it was it it was exactly what it said on the tin. My mates loved it for what it was. Uh, it kind of extended their golden eye sessions into a world that they were really enjoying and laughing about at the time, so yeah, yeah. You know what? It it kind of I think it it did okay in reviews from memory. It was never something that I was gonna pick up though, to be honest. No, I think I yeah, I think it was I think I got dragged into the old multiplayer session, and I'm like, oh god, what's happening?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, oh uh but the next one down is what we me and my mates played quite a lot was Save Park Rally. Now you enjoy that. We had it on the PS1, they had it on Dreamcast as well. Um the thing about it was you go back and play it now, it's probably quite a shoddy cart racer. But the thing that was funny at the time, because you were that age, playing kart racing game that so had that essence of Mario Kart, but was very offensive and rude, was right up our street at the time. Yeah. And I'm not even gonna mention on here that some of the weapons you could have because they were you know, you didn't you didn't do an oil slick, you know, you like threw up on the track to make the other ones skid out, and you could throw Mr. Hanky in their face and all this lot, and you know, but it was because of that stupid juvenile humour that we loved it, and it was just it was just why Subok hit so hard at the time. Yeah, it was just against mainstream, and just you know, we'll say what we want, do what we want, and they just did.
SPEAKER_03And the it rode in on the dog of Beavers and Buttered, and then kind of just stayed way, way like you know, it's still running now. If it wasn't for The Simpsons, would it be the longest-running cartoon? Well, the Flintstones would be scared, I know that for sure. Yeah, it's impressive legacy, and the games that have come out of it haven't been half bad. Obviously, we've talked before about stick of truth and all that sort of good stuff. Yeah, they've got a good association with games, yeah, exactly.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, so anything else on there for you, do you think?
SPEAKER_03Uh I will pick out a couple of uh games that I feel we ought to talk about. Obviously, Metal Gear Solid getting a release on February the 26th is interesting. Obviously, the the modern reimagining of the Metal Gear universe. Uh I mean again, what's to be said about that game that's not been said already? Um but phenomenal piece of work. Yeah uh seminal PlayStation title. Still I think uh obviously a lot of the bits in there have been spoilt for seasoned gamers. Um but if you arrived to this bear, I think you would be quite impressed by it. Uh you're a modern, you never really dabbled with it before and decided to pick this up as a little thing for Christmas.
SPEAKER_00I think you'd be blown away. I think so. It's one of the first games that I ever I remember loading it up, and you had the snow and the wind blowing, and then you still had the credits rolling up like a movie and very James Bond-esque, you know.
SPEAKER_03Like that whole submarine torpedo launch at the start, and you kind of come in and he's giving you the brief, and then you get out, and as you say, you go through and you get up the top, and then you're leaving footprints, and it's like, hang on a minute, this is something, this is something else.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, this is you you're in this now, you know, you're in this world now. You're and I'm I remember just loading that up and thinking, oof, this is this isn't just a you know rally guide breath, no, exactly.
SPEAKER_03The hind helicopter taking off and looking like Devil as well. I was like, oh well, what what what what's this?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and you sort of thought, hmm, I didn't get this on me, Mega C D.
SPEAKER_03You know, this thing I found quite frustrating with that though is that if I went if I went in first person shooting view, I had a full 3D world that I could look at, and then it forced me back into that snapped forced asymmetric view. It's like just let me walk in this world, it looks incredible. Like when you I used to be in the game, go first person view and like look at the textures on the wall, which now people would laugh at me for. But at the time, I was like, You you find a flaw in this. Why aren't they showing more of this? This game looks incredible, but they make me view it from 60 feet in the air.
GTA London And Early DLC
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and there's things like when you'd go in certain rooms and the footsteps would echo, or the metal floor, and you suddenly thought, Oh, there's sound design in this. I know other games had sound design, but this had sort of gone almost this was like big budget movie sound design, and you started thinking, hmm, this is this is something here, you know.
SPEAKER_03A lot had been thought through, and gamers have you know tried to test the game and and you know, break it in places, and it's not having any of it, yeah. It's such a well put together bit of kit. So gotta speak about that for a moment. Um, in terms of another game, Legends Zelda Link's Awakening on the Game Boy Colour. I had some um quite good experience with, I have to admit.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and obviously the re-release on the Switch, so that is obviously quite a beloved Zelda you know, entry.
SPEAKER_03Uh we see Gex hitting the shelves with Gex3 deep cover gecko and gex 64 enter the gecko, both probably footnotes in history. Mortal Kombat 4 getting its release on the Game Boy.
SPEAKER_00Cool, that would have been tough with the two buttons. Many special moves happening in there.
SPEAKER_03I remember on the Game Gear, start became a kick, didn't it, or something daft, because there's just not enough buttons.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, and I think you look back now. I mean, people nowadays who play Mortal Kombat would say, why the hell did they release it on then? But sometimes in the day we had one console, and sometimes people who had a Game Boy Colour, that was their main console. It was. So and they sold well. So these companies thought, well, look, let's give them a Mortal Kombat because they'll buy it. Yeah, and they'll buy it, you know.
SPEAKER_03Imagine there must be someone out there that's a full Mortal Kombat head that was in the era of full Mortal Kombat nerd, but only had a Game Boy and had the boxes all lined up on the shelf. They probably had the t-shirt.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah, Johnny Cage headband, yeah, something like that.
SPEAKER_03Like just desperately hoping that Christmas they'd unwrap a mega drive or God forbid a PlayStation each time it was like an insignia like aftershave kit talc set.
SPEAKER_00Oh god, no, or action video systems destroyed.
SPEAKER_03Uh, one of the game I want to give a swift mention to because it it kicked started a lot of things, it didn't start the whole uh theme park um uh building subgenre, but it certainly, in my opinion, mastered it in its roller coaster tycoon uh seeing its release on Windows on April the twelfth, nineteen ninety-nine. Yeah, I had that and its sequel, never got the third game, uh bought them again for Switch, a bit of a Yankee port, really. It's uh you can't quite get the camera orchestrated properly. But I do believe there's been another classic version re-released, which might actually be this one. Uh, and I had a copy of that that had a load of classic parks built in. One of them was like a time stamped or a scrubb a snapshot of Alton Towers redesigned in the roller coaster tycoon world, it was done as it is in that moment, say 1999, 2000, with the rides laid out with the gardens, with the everything in that they could do with the roller coaster tycoon engine was in there and labelled up as the rides, oblivion, nemesis, all that sort of stuff.
SPEAKER_00No way, yeah, 100%. Brilliant. Yeah, yeah, it was. I mean, play, I mean, they were never them sort of parked builder games were uh occasionally I'll plan them, not really my thing, but roller coaster tycoon. I did play. I enjoyed that. It was it was just you know, I'd never played anything like that before. I'd played similar games, but they never had that depth or scale that they did with that, and getting the people through the door and earning more money and building more rides and pathway. It was, you know, it was big ski nowadays. You'd look at it and think, well, it's not that in depth, but then it was.
SPEAKER_03It was where I played it the most, and it's a great place to pick it up. It's uh and I don't know if it's one or two, but uh it's on the original Xbox. Oh, okay. I poured hundreds of hours. I was gonna say thousands, that'd probably be an over an exaggeration, but hundreds of hours into that game on there. Really? Yeah. So you had a mega park then? The thing is, it was never a mega park, it was always just going through the different objectives, and every now and then you would kind of settle on one that you'd kind of be into for a while, then it'd be okay. What's next? What's next? What's next? Gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme, gimme. Yeah. Uh like a little piggy.
SPEAKER_00Well, I think that's um drawn a line out of what we uh would have been playing, or you know, especially around that time. Um, so I think we'll head on um to the news. It's no time for this week's news. We've scoured the very darkest areas of the interweb and game and magazines to bring you the news for April 1999. First up from EGM magazine issue 117, and this is entitled, Oh my god, they've killed Tiger Woods. Excuse my language, but it starts with You bastards. If you own a copy of PlayStation version of Tiger Woods 99, yeah, PGA tour, then you'll be surprised to find that the original South Park short, the Spirit of Christmas, is contained on the disc. It's not supposed to be there, but slipped yeah, but slipped by and made it into the production version of the game. It was discovered when parents of a gamer found that it was on the disc. Apparently, he had found it by putting the game in the family PC. Media outlets picked up the story first and EA promptly issued a recall of the game. Apparently, Tiger Woods himself knew about the accidental place cartoon before EA did. If you haven't seen The Spirit of Christmas and are easily offended, you may want to exchange your version for one without the cartoon. You can do so by mailing your game to Electronic Arts, and that's their address for uh Louisyville. Um, so how can you or parents tell if your disc is affected? Pop your copy of Tiger Woods for the PlayStation into your PC and open it up. Go into the archive movie player in Windows 95 and open the file zzdummy.dat. And if it plays a movie called The Spirit of Crispus, then you have one of the affected discs. Warning the movie contains material that may be deemed offensive to some viewers. Watch at your own risk. If you have a Mac, you can open it off the CD in QuickTime Movie Player, which makes me laugh that they've put a warn on and started the the the uh um piece with you bastards.
Soul Reaver’s Narrative Breakthrough
SPEAKER_03So but yeah, how it's one of those classic, weirdly written classic articles that you bring to us here at Flashback RDT, and even the article itself is a historic curio. I don't know what happened to me. Um there, but uh a couple of things that made me laugh. So the very rare chance that this kid Stumble into his room. Maybe there was a buzz around school, I don't know. Uh, and where he slapped this in his PC and watched this. And let's face it, you say offensive, but on the scale of offence, it's probably quite low. Um Spirit of Christmas, I haven't seen it myself, nor am I acquainted with it, but if it's South Park, it can't be that bad. Um, it's probably more a copyright issue for EA that they're freaking out about. Um, yeah, I didn't think of it like that.
SPEAKER_00Oh, yeah. Yeah, oh yeah, that's yeah, because that's not their property. Oh, yeah, that's why the reading was rather oh yeah, I didn't think of that.
SPEAKER_03It's not about parents. Yeah, they don't care. Yeah. They just don't want to get into some litigation, do they? Um interesting to me that they then detail how you would find out if you had an affected copy, basically telling you uh a kid reading EGM that oh right, I'll go see if I can watch this Spirit of Christmas thing on that's PC. Uh and don't worry if you've got a Mac, uh, because they've just got you covered in the last sentence as well.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, that's like ER have told us to do this and give us a few quid, but also go and watch it.
SPEAKER_03And it does like how you get it to play is a bit like you know, the planning consent form at your local council being at the end of a corridor marked no entry at the bottom of uh I think it's a hitchhiker's guide to the galaxy, the bottom of a stairwell with no stairs in a cupboard marked mind the alligator. Yeah, and here it's like so so to actively view this movie, you've got to go through the following steps. Yeah, you've got to put it into your PC, which is a bizarre concept for a PlayStation game, you then you've got to open up the active movie player, then you've got to open up the file, so then you've got to go into the files of the game and open up zzdummy.dat. And if you click on a file that says zzdummy.dat, then shame on you. Uh you've now clicked on that and it's playing the spirit of Christmas. I think after all those sequence of events, if you're still surprised that you're witnessing Spirit of Christmas, you're a bloody idiot.
SPEAKER_00See the thing the yeah, the thing also is how is it in there?
SPEAKER_03Is it a disgruntled employees chucked it in, or it was maybe bouncing around the files within because it was just a bit of a laugh in the office at the time. Maybe they really enjoyed that little snippet of Spirit of Christmas and it kind of sat within the file. Oh, I'll put that file and have you great. Don't forget, EA were kind of in trouble around this period as well for um programmers leaving things in because I think SimCity 2000 suffered from an aggravate an angered employee leaving in some code within that game when you went into the 3D mode or something similar. Message in, but it certainly strikes me as there was a lot of hot water around at the time around these files being left in, which I think actually was further flames were fanned when the San Andreas hot coffee leak came out. But again, to access hot coffee, you're operating in a sphere well outside 99.9999% of the rest of PlayStation players, I would argue, but you know, knock yourself back.
SPEAKER_00And also, Rockstar done the best thing because they started then letting people, they were quite open to letting people get into the code, and they'd even leave little trails, you'd go in there and then you'd open this file up, you'd found deep in the code, and that would say, unlucky, you thought something was in here, didn't you? And they'd even leave little bits to wind up the the code and had a little game with them rather than suddenly going all locked down and serious. They went they went the other way, which was the best way to deal with it, I think. But yeah, this is and it's so strange to have a South Park spirit of Christmas in a Tiger Woods golf game. I mean, it's so completely random and different.
SPEAKER_03Did EA have the South Park licence at the time? I think it was actually a claim that had that. I think a claim had that, yeah. There was no sort of cross-pollination from my memory.
SPEAKER_00Imagine when this imagine when the CEO of EA, someone just went in and said, Oh, uh, we've got a bit of a problem. Um, they found a safer park spirit of Christmas movie in Toika.
SPEAKER_03It wouldn't be that, would it? The CEO would be sat there and some absolute yerp would be sent in. Like, who's the lowest ranking person in the in the office? Yeah, you tell him. It's the intern.
SPEAKER_00We've got a job for you. Just these glasses come flying out of the window. All right. Anyway, what we got up next, then, George?
SPEAKER_03Well, here we are. Also from EGM. You've got the PlayStation 2. The countdown begins. This is exciting stuff. So Ken Katagari, the father of PlayStation, I love how he's deemed that even in 1999, shows up at an electronics convention and happens to be on a panel where a new multimedia processor code developed by Sony Computer Entertainment and Toshiba Corporation is going to be the topic of discussion. Is it about PlayStation 2 or something else? Until now, few facts about Sony's next system were known, but they're that could change in the next few weeks because on February the 16th, at 9 in at the 1999 IEEE International Solid State Circuits Convention in San Francisco. Sony Computer Entertainment and Toshiba will be part of a seminar to talk about a new processor, details of which will already be revealed in the convention's website. According to that page, it's a 250 mHz 128-bit multimedia processor with an integrated MPEG 2 decoder with floating 10-point multiplier accumulators and four floating point dividers. This matches early expectations of what PlayStation 2 will include, namely the MPEG 2 decoder, which would allow for DVD movie and storage capabilities. A second seminar hosted by Sony Computer Entertainment International and Toshiba, but without Katagari's name directly mentioned, will present a 250mHz superscaler MIPS compatible multi-microprocessor for multimedia and networking capabilities, which suggests that the PlayStation 2 will have networking functionality out of the box. Considering Sony Computer Entertainment's sole business, minus a few PC products, is the PlayStation, it's likely that this will be the first official word on the PlayStation 2 specifications. Mr. Kutagari's presence at the conference fuels recent rumours out of Japan about Toshiba's involvement in creating the processing muscle behind the next PlayStation. A spokesperson for Sony Computer Entertainment America told us when asked what Kotagari is there only to is there only to deliver a paper to convention attendees and did not comment on whether his presence had any relevance to PlayStation 2. I see why you gave me that word, Salad. I don't know if I got it out of it intact.
SPEAKER_00I think you've done immensely well with that. The reason I added it in is I as soon as I see these rumours of these consoles coming out, I love this sniper.
SPEAKER_03No, mate, you added this in when you saw IEE International Solid State Circuits Convention in San Francisco. This could have been about a dog urinating on Ken Kutagari's leg. But if it had that word in it, you threw it in. And also the 10 floating point multiplier accumulators and four floating point. Can you understand any of that? I uh was trying to decode it as I was reading it and sort of struggled. But I do believe that um your EGM are absolutely bang on the money with what they found here. I think Ken Kutagari's relationship to the event is significant. I think the 250mHz, 120 120 100.
NBA Jam’s Awkward 3D Era
SPEAKER_00Debreaths. Come on. Here we go. I'm done here. What do you think about this? Um I think it's quite interesting in a number of points. The 128-bit multimedia processor. Um they were then they were obviously then putting two and two together and working this out, but also what I found interesting was the MPEG-2 decoder, which would allow for DVD movie playback and storage capabilities, and you start thinking, yeah, they're then getting wind that Sony might be putting a DVD player in this uh PS2, um, which obviously, as we know now, was an absolute master stroke. Um but I love all these tip bits because obviously at the time we're all chomping at the bit to find out what this PS2 was all about, how powerful this PS2 is going to be. Um, obviously, from the success of the first console. Um, so obviously the journalists were nipping at any convention going just to see if there was any little leaks, and then once they once old uh Ken was there.
SPEAKER_03We're in 1999, the PlayStation's doing well. It's the difficult second album, which we now retrospectively know they nailed, but I think there would probably be a little bit of fear of transitioning from the successful PS1 to the PS2 for Sony. Don't forget it's their first console migration, so this has to work, has to work, yeah. And from the gamers in the playground at that moment, you know, people are starting to get their chests out because oh Teddy over there's got a dream cast.
SPEAKER_00Yeah.
SPEAKER_03Well, have you seen what it can do with Soul Reaver? Oh whoa, this is serious. Sonic Adventure looks impressive. Yeah. Uh I'm not just going round to Little Timmy's to uh look at his mum anymore. I'm going around Little Timmy's to play on the Dreamcast. And plugging the mode in. Plug in the mode in. I mean, even that, even just going on a chat room on that felt fantasy star online, things like that. You're just like, well, you get spent hours on that game online. I had my little Dreamcast keyboard on the floor, and I'd be like, pick it up, no, come this way.
unknownOh, dude.
SPEAKER_03We used to go on raids on that all the time. And there was no voice chat, you just kind of imagine the person. Now I was playing mainly with this character I'd met. He said he was Irish, who knows? Right, and his name was like Uta Revson. And for ages I'd follow him around saying, Oh, what's Uta Revson? What's Uta Revson? What's Uta Revson? What's Uta Revson? And then one day he's like, Oh, it's Nasseratu backwards. I'm a big fan of like vampire movies. It's probably RV Retro or Johan.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, it probably is.
SPEAKER_03And I was like, Oh wow, this is incredible. Uh, and I, you know, I was I think I selected one of the robot characters, and me and him would just spend hours on this thing. I'd get in, is he there? Is he there? Where is he? Where is he? Oh, he's there. We can't remember how we used to meet up because we didn't exchange details, it would just be, you know, I think there was a message.
SPEAKER_00You just happened to play at the same, you just probably, you know, you had the same sort of times.
SPEAKER_03I think different regions of the world got lumped into different sort of um play areas, maybe. I think maybe I was in the European play area, maybe that was allowed to cross-pollinate with the Japanese, but I can't quite remember how it works, and I can't remember how the messaging and friend system worked within it. It's a long time ago. Uh again, that would be 2000, so it's not for now, it's not for now. No, but certainly Little Timmy had his dreamcast, and the PS1 boys were feeling a bit sort of nervous. Even the N64 made the PS1 boys feel a bit nervous at times, shouldn't have done, but it did. Uh Ocarina at time was a game that you know, even a PS1 diehard would have to admit would never have worked on their system. Like, yeah, it's poultry, yeah, it's on a cartridge, yeah, you know, it doesn't have any CD quality music on it or any of that jargon, but no one could deny that was one L of a game. Um and I think the PS2 it was coming down the pipe fast and hard from Kutaguri's own pen and mind and the engineers at Sony, and as I say, they had to get it right. And obviously, history tells us that they absolutely did get it right. The DVD player multimedia capabilities RGT. Sadly, that sold more PlayStation 2s to dad and mum for watching the Gladiator and Matrix before those DVDs collected probably 10 years worth of dust while the PlayStation 2 just migrated upstairs over a period of a day.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah. Yeah, unbelievable. I mean, they've just you know they're undercutting every DVD player at the price, but not only that, you had the latest gen technology under the hood as well. It was clever, clever market, and and um obviously starting off not quite so well with a PS3, they'd done a similar thing with the Blu-ray, but yeah, this was a master stroke, and just reading this, I love seeing all these early rumors and and how, like I said before, how these journalists are you know just trying to get the scoop on can we get any uh what's under the hood, you know, what tech is it?
SPEAKER_03Can we get the early I think they were they were proper journalists at this moment in time, and they had actually you know done some research on a not directly related convention taking place in San Francisco and actually pulled the deerstalkers on. I mean, not like modern press, so we kind of I need to be careful, yeah.
SPEAKER_00But they'd obviously seen you know Futuragi was there and just thought, hang on, what's he doing there? And what's he what's you know, and they started linking it and then yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03Listen to the concurrent episode of UCP for my opinion on news in the modern era, yeah.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, we'll we'll leave that one there. Uh but yeah, very interesting again. Um, and this last one, um, last story, it's from EGM again. I got all three from there because that was uh such a good issue.
SPEAKER_03Um and there's Electronic Gamer magazine or something, as it's standard.
SPEAKER_00Electronic games monthly, I believe it was. There's actually, if you watch um GameSack, yes, and My Life in Gaming, they've just recently done a proper big documentary on YouTube about EGM magazine, very interesting. Um it's all about how the guy that started it was really keen photographer, and he'd go to these conventions and screenshot, he'd literally do screenshots of his camera of the games, and they didn't like him doing that, so he had the first screenshots of games, so people would always buy EGM because he was there first. But he in the end, and they said, How did you stop glare on the CRTs? And he made a cardboard tube to put over his camera, and he was way ahead of his time, and that's how obviously EGM kicked off and had some of the biggest you know sales ever going of you know, games. Yeah, so watch yeah, watch that. That's uh yeah, that's um Joe from GameSack and the guys from My Life in Game, and they've done this documentary very good on YouTube, but yeah, definitely watch it.
SPEAKER_03Um but this next bit of story there is only Joe from GameSack now, isn't there? I don't know what happened there, but um yeah, yeah. There's only the one dude there now, isn't there?
N64 Memories And Zelda Moments
SPEAKER_00Yeah, I think the other guy's work took over a bit too much, so um that's just Joe do it now. He does it on his own. Um that'll be you in ten years. Uh yeah. Um so anyway, this next story from EGM is Dreamcast leaps into spring. After a rocky start, the Dreamcast has started to slowly pick itself up from a muffled Japanese launch. The company is confident it will reach its goal of a million systems by the end of March, with a goal of an installed base of four million units by the end of March 2000. Helping that along is a partnership with Toyota that will allow customers to purchase systems and games from car dealerships in Japan, in addition to a major software push, uh, with new titles coming out every week in March, leading up to a huge push on the 25th. As for release plans in the US, they are still shrouded in secrecy inside Sega's new San Francisco offices. What we know, what we do know, as revealed by Sega Enterprises VP, uh Tadahiko Hiroshi, not bad, um, is that Sonic Venture, yeah, Sonic Adventure, Sega Rally 2, Virtual Fighter 3 are definite launch titles. No big surprise, but what is surprising is the confirmation that Virtual Fighter 3 will be enhanced above and beyond the Japanese release. Oizio Akua, chairman of Sega Enterprises, ASCII, and CSK, mentioned to his recent in his recent annual address that later this year Sega would be adding a hard drive peripheral camera and video phone options to the system. Akewa said uh we are preparing not only for a hard drive to store email but a camera and microphone for Dreamcast. This peripheral will allow users to have face-to-face communication in multiple channels, which doesn't limit it to two-person communication, and users will be able to enjoy online gaming while seeing each other's faces. New peripherals landing in Japan shortly too, including the force feedback device called the Puru Puru Pack, uh 1800 yen, which equals$16.
SPEAKER_03Um, the app, I think we have about$50, 16 quid here.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, the aptly named Dreamcast Gun will be released uh simultaneously with the House of the Dead 2 for 7,800 yen, um which is 69 uh dollars with the game and features a VMS slot for the Puru Pura pack or VMS and a digital pad. Get bass fishing control oh, sorry, get bass fishing control they call them VMSs there, do they? Yeah. Um, get bass fishing controller will be released simultaneously with their title and sell for about 5,800 yen, which is$51 separately or$9,800 yen,$86 packed in with the game. Assilly is also planning his uh its first DC peripheral, a mission stick for release in March that will give you more control for flight games, retailing for about 69 bucks. Yes, so I chucked this in because obviously this was on the verge of this being released in the uh USA and bits and pieces, and that was they were all trying to see. Obviously, it had been released in Japan, and everyone was trying to see what they had with it, what was going on, what bits they had. And I love seeing this as the you know, me and you are collectors, we've got the dreamcast gun, we've got the fishing rods as well. But this is when that first all started coming out, and I just think how exciting would this have been back in the time to read this EGM magazine knowing you're gonna get a dreamcast, thinking, Oh my god, we can do bass fishing with a rod, we can play House of the Dead, like the arcade with a gun, you know.
SPEAKER_03Don't come in here and get me started on the Dreamcast, mate. I'll tell you that now.
SPEAKER_00I thought it was why I put it in here.
SPEAKER_03Oh, honestly, well, I didn't pick one up, so I don't know how specific this is, but there's news articles here, so I'm gonna run roughshod all over it like a like a wild mare. Don't let that distract you. I I love the Dreamcaster. I was thinking only the other day, I was talking to Rachel. I said, I think it's still my favourite console of all time. You know, I got it. I traded all my N64 box collection for a Dreamcaster, a demo disc and Sonic Adventure. And I came home and I wasn't bummed out at all. Uh I was blown away by Sonic Adventure. I used to watch the kind of static MSR thing roll. So it was maybe February, March 2000 when I picked one up. So I had a few games to pick from at that point. So it got through launch went into a bit more. The peripherals you talk of, the fishing rod, I had hours and hours and hours and hours and hours of enjoyment out of that game.
SPEAKER_00It's still good now. It's still good now.
SPEAKER_03I've got the official one, which I was for some reason was not ready. Readily available uh with Sega Bass Fishing when it launched in the UK, at least where I'm I was from.
SPEAKER_00I think mine is the it's actually called fishing one. I think it's F-I-S-S-O-N. I think it's the sort of aftermarket one, but even so, still so good fun.
SPEAKER_03It's still great. I've got a Madcats one that's got like a you know, it's it's already got vibration built into it, and the rod kind of flexes at the top to show you've got a fish on.
SPEAKER_01Really?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, it's very gimmicky. Don't get too good out of the way, but it looks great and the displays really, really well. Um, but the I have also from somewhere it might be um US because it's uh it could be, but I've got an official branded Dreamcast rod as well, and that's a great peripheral. I prefer it to the Madcats one because it just feels right. The Madcats one's got a lot going on, it's got a motor up the top for moving the rod, so it kind of sits weird in your hand. But nostalgia, I had to rebuy it. Uh, and I was buzzed when I opened it up, and it just looked exactly as I remembered it. The gun and House of Dead, I had the official gun. Uh, it is true. There were slots in there for the VMU. I don't know why they're calling VMS in this article, but whatever. Um that alone I could talk about for hours. The little games that you could get on that, etc. You know, they talk about the Dreamcast coming and its connectivity to the internet. Yeah, I briefly talked about that before with Fantasy Star Online in this episode. We got a little bit distracted. This will be the episode of the Ramble Ramble, but go work with us here. Work with us.
SPEAKER_00The thing I like as well, because you always think with them peripherals as well, especially with VMU, you think oh, you need the original hardware. But I bought the that's the Retro Fighters Dreamcast controller, and you could pop the V the original VMU in there. Yeah, so you've got that new style, you know, I'm sure very good green one, I believe.
SPEAKER_03Sure, Ro Space Monk within the unofficial controller podcast community is probably a saint at this point. Yeah. Um, but he's obviously big into his dreamcast. I think either he messaged me, or I'm sure I've messaged him, or if I never messaged him, I saw this and thought of you, Ro Space Monk, if you're listening. Uh and hope you are, because this hopefully is right up your street. Hopefully, you are very moist in your area right now in your dreamcast area. Uh and I mean that your little little area, your themed area for the Dreamcast.
SPEAKER_00Anywho, um and your burgeoning collection.
SPEAKER_03Yeah. Um I don't know, I've got that distracted now, I don't know where I was going with that. Uh I just I wasn't controllers sloth. Oh, yes, someone I think has rehashed the VMU and give it a modern gen workover. Yeah. I don't know, I don't know the details, I don't know who's doing it, but obviously it's compatible with your old games.
SPEAKER_00And I think there's now a 2.0 of that as well. Where they've now oh, holy moly. Yeah, there's a coming. I don't know quite why they've done it or how, but anyway, they've done it now so you can play Game Boy Colour games on it, and it's got a colour screen, and it's got one still works as a function of VMBM as well. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Wow. So it I don't know. I mean, it's probably going silly now, it's getting quite that.
SPEAKER_03Do you get one and then you get I'll get one if you get one. Uh I'm already doing some interesting consumer advice on the main show, so let's uh let's see where it goes with this. Maybe I'll pick one up. I don't know. I don't know if I'm ready to get the dreamcast out. Um I'm not ready to be hurt again, I don't think, but uh maybe I am. But no, it was uh interesting times with all this uh the one thing I want to say is that one peripheral that we saw, obviously in this article, people can go look it up. I don't know if you share these articles on the flashback Discord. I think that might be a good idea, but I know it's a lot of work. Yeah, it could do, yeah. Yeah, it lets them read along and certainly sees some of these more unique images. But the the flight control stick there, now that's a peripheral I've never seen, touched, smelt, picked up, or had. I don't even know if it came to Power Regions, so yeah, that's interesting to me. That's interesting as well, obviously.
Rollercoaster Tycoon’s Park-Building Magic
SPEAKER_00Yeah, we're sort of audio based, but it almost looks sort of uh a mouse on a top of a joystick with the buttons on where you'd hold it, and then also a fixed mouse on the left hand side. So it's yeah, it's it's a strange peripheral and a different way of doing a considering there was only like maybe one really flying game I can think of, and then another one that was cancelled due to 9-11 controversy. So well, I've got that I've got that space one, is it Star Flight 2000, 3000 or something? That's really Star Lancer. Star Lancer, that's it. Star Lancer, yeah. So that I was maybe you could use it with that, that would be quite a bit.
SPEAKER_03It's a submarine game that's all so in a similar 3D vein, I suppose you could use it for. Yeah, I think there was a flight combat game as well. I the name alludes me right now. I'm sure. I've never seen this before, so I don't know if this was Japanese only or whether it actually ever come out, but if the listeners look this thing up and obviously you share the article, they'll also notice, at least to me anyway, it didn't it didn't scream anything like the rest of the Dreamcast peripherals. It didn't no, it doesn't look or feel like anything else that they ever did. And as you say, it looks like on the right hand side that mouse you spoke of actually looks like the rebel freighter from Empire Strikes Back with a cylindrical sort of cigar. It does, yeah. Over on the right hand side, or looks like the ship from flight from the navigator kind of zooming towards you. Yeah, over on the left hand side is only what can be described as a raised mound, and in the centre of an eye of Sauron or some sort of gaping hole of some other kind. I don't really know what's going on there, but I do see the orange swirl underneath the D-pad. So maybe it's a photo playing tricks on us, but you know, I know that I feel like I can see the gun and the fishing rod and the main controller all feeling part of the same design uh philosophy. This thing looks like how you'd sort of impregnate an alien in the year 4000.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's crazy. Yeah, it doesn't look it doesn't look dreamcast at all. Like I said, I don't know if this was just a mock-up prototype that never saw the light of day or what, I don't know. But you know, but yeah, very interesting. Um great seeing, you know, the talk of the PS2, great seeing what was happening with Dreamcast in Japan, um, and then just a wacky story of having a safe park offensive video chucked in a Tiger Woods game, which is very, very unusual.
SPEAKER_03Um it's very, very '99, early 2000s, isn't it?
SPEAKER_00Yeah, very. Um, but I think that uh brings us to the end of the news, and I think it's now time for what we affectionately call Stingray's boot. What's nestled between some counterfeit nappies and a dodgy copy of Battle for Endor is some of the new releases from April, May, and maybe a little bit of June 1999. Stingray, 1999. What is he doing, George, in 1999?
SPEAKER_03This is Ray in his prime. This is him, this is prime Ray. This is prime Ray. He's never made so much money as he's made in 1999. He's already got pre-release screening. Bad tapes, bad tapes, bad, bad tapes of Phantom Menace.
SPEAKER_00People are slathering for he's doing when you're watching it, you just see someone get up and go to the toilet. It's worse than that.
SPEAKER_03It's upside down, so dad's turned the TV upside down, then seconds later, it's the right way up, so he's got up, he's mad or you're flipping, you're trying to invert yourself 360 inverted. Oh, I listen to the show to watch it, and then boom, it's back up again. But then halfway through, it's Star Trek, the Undiscovered Country, and then bam, snaps back after the pod race. What's happening? You don't know, but Ray promises you this is what you'll see in the cinemas. He can't get enough of it. He's also got a slew of uh Phantom Menace merchandise and memorabilia. His little son, Wayne, has come out with a Jar Jar toy that's got like an elasticated tongue on it that actually can grab little bits of paper, and he's frustratingly, this is what kids do. He's absolutely larrupping the living daylights out of your genitals, clothed, trying to hurt you by kicking by by blicking your uh scrotum, basically. He's that annoying little kid. You've got him at arm's length because he's a wee man, only because he's a kid, he's not challenged in any other ways, he just needs to become an adult, you know. That's what happens here. He's he's small, so you've got him, you've got him at arm's length, but he's still really lashing at you, and he's just getting you on the side, and you're looking at Ray saying, calm your kid down, for God's sake, Ray. You know, and he's just looking and going, Oh, he's wild that way, you know. He's like, Yeah, just give me the phantom menace and go.
SPEAKER_00That's where we're at. Wow. Well, for me, um he's it is prime, it is prime, uh Ray, but he is he's all over his two latest merch lines. He's got Millennium Dome t-shirts. The structure's a bit wonky, and it looks like he's drew it himself, but very good. Um, and he's also got Watch Eight for the Millennium Bug t-shirts as well. The world's gonna crash. They're all a rage at the moment. Everyone is worried about the Millennium Bug, the world's gonna crash. He's petting the theories. He's do it covering both angles, but he's also got his Star Wars merch, like you say. He's got a bit in the boot and he's just laughed, is he? He's just dressed this is old merch, I think, right? He's dressed weighing up as an ewok. He's like and he's got a little he's got a little um what do you call it like a little spinny um catapult, he's throwing rocks at everyone around the car park.
SPEAKER_03Mate, you laugh, right? You laugh, police got called. You know the village hall's got like that glass ceiling, yeah. It's it's opaque, isn't it? With the safety glass with the wires running through, so you can't quite really see. But uh he lobbed Wayne dressed up as the Millennium Bug up there the other day during the WI meeting, and he kind of scuttled across making weird noises. Obviously, sting ran in. He was like, Everybody, everybody, quick, it's a millennium bug. And the women were like, Oh god, get out of the millennium bug, it's real, run away, ran home. He went round, collected maybe 10 or 15 quid off each of them to exterminate the Millennium Bug on top of the village hall. Obviously, he's one step ahead, isn't he? He he he is obviously oh PC, can't remember his name, season one content insert here, make it look good, RGT edit in, make it slip. He was furious, okay. And he obviously chased Ray about, got a little bit dupes of hazard. He owed Ray got air over the level crossing on the way out the village. PC, insert the name here, RGT from season one lore, make it look good, make it look like I remembered everything. Perfect.
SPEAKER_00It's the best. If you're new to Flashback, check out the early episodes of Andrew Controller Podcast, you know what this law is all about.
SPEAKER_03And he kind of just handbraked you didn't want a piece of it. He was like, I can't risk the suspension because the budget for Farmerton Police is low at the minute, and if this goes down, I'm reduced to the 1920s push bike. My legs are done, he's old boys, you know.
SPEAKER_00Wow, there's some law there. Anyway, um let's see what Ray's got in the booth.
SPEAKER_03But yeah, if you if you I used to blame Tom for the law, but I've gone, you went deep then.
SPEAKER_00I wonder now if I was the law. Maybe this is like near parallel universe stuff here. Um but let's see what we would have been um hoping to play anyway. So um a game here that I've always been quite intrigued when I know it's got launched. RGT.
SPEAKER_03Yes. You as the lead as the lead in Flashy B, you do need to say because there's been calling for it.
SPEAKER_00Yeah. I can't even remember what it is. Spring stop whattle. Oh no, yeah. Spring stop whattle. Whoa! Sounds ridiculous. Did I used to say keep it in? Yep, every week. Um, yeah, so a game for me. Um I've always been quite interested and still are in interest in picking this up, although it is quite uh an expensive pickup nowadays. But this was released in North America, and this was Luna Silver Star Story. I see that.
SPEAKER_03Please in the boot, you dog.
SPEAKER_00And I always I just like that big PS1 sort of case that they done. That was um Grant and uh what was it? Designs, weren't it? Working Designs done that, weren't it? Translation for that over to America, I think. And that was a lovely looking game and still is quite a quite a collector's piece for the PS1 collector. But yeah, I've always been interested in that. I I thought I wouldn't mind picking that up. Um Micro Machine 64 Turbo. Now I never played Migromachines on the 64, did you, George?
SPEAKER_03Yeah, I think I did actually.
SPEAKER_00So was that like 3D or oh I can't really remember.
SPEAKER_03It would have been like low-angled 3D. Um maybe I didn't have it, but I definitely saw the cart again everywhere. It was always in the sort of you know, the budget section getting kicked around the floors of shop sort of scenario. So yeah. I the last micro machines game I had that I bought was probably the one that came out on PlayStation. I bought it because I remember the the tabletops and things you drove over in that at the time looked photorealistic, especially on a CRT. So I was like, oh, look at me driving over this, look at those beads. Absolute loser, but you know, there's a confession if you want it. This is this is not good for me, flashbacker. Basically, confess all the sins that I atoned for as a teenager child.
SPEAKER_00Sort of you'll know you ain't gotta confess, that's just that's that was you know what it was at the time, wasn't it? Do you know what I mean? It was you'd look at that and just think how wowed you were by it.
SPEAKER_03Now you look back at it and think, oh I've got it, I've got it, I've still got it, and there's a little bit of charm to it. I can't ever find the copy I had. It was literally just labelled up straight as micro machines. The copies I've tried to acquire since, it's been hits, it's been this, it's been that, it's been the closest I've got is the one I've got now, but it's still not the one I had. It's got this weird border on it, and it's like just give me so is that on the PlayStation, is it? Yeah, I know I had this with none of this drivel on it, and I can't find that just original vanilla version. It seems like they didn't have it for that long before they started sticking promo codes and weird stuff all over the box art. So annoying. I think it's is it not Micro Machines V4 or something like that? Yeah, Micro Machines 3D, yeah.
SPEAKER_00V3, weren't it? Was it V3? I think yeah, and then they they did try that Micromaniacs, didn't they? But that didn't quite that was running game, wasn't it?
SPEAKER_03Nothing ever quite hit as good as bigger drive one, if I'm honest with you. Uh, what else are you taking out the boot or is that you, fat dumb, and happy?
News: South Park Hidden On A Golf Disc
SPEAKER_00Um well one I am because I'm I've put a few different regions in here because this was sort of the era where people started importing consoles and importing games, and I saw this, which I thought was a bit of a curio, was Metal Gear Solid Integral. Um, which doing a bit of research, turns out it was Metal Gear Solid released in Japan with more content, I believe, which then later on went to be in 2000 the PC port. So whether that would be worth looking into that and what the differences are, but that seems quite interesting and something I'd like to uh like to play, I think. What about you, George?
SPEAKER_03Um, of the games on this list, I'm mildly intrigued, and I had this game back in the day with Pokemon Snap. Uh Pokemon Pinball's a banner. I think that's the one with the built-in vibration module that you put battery in the top. That's pretty cool. Pokemon Blue coming out in the Game Boy. I mean, that's not to be overlooked. We talked earlier, I waffled earlier about you know iconic first entries or people's, you know, things that cannot go unwanting, I don't think, in its terms of its mention in the strength of what was going on here. You know, 1999 with Prime, SMTV, CD UK, Pokemon, Cartoon, all that sort of good stuff going on. Anton Deck, Kat Dealy, Holly Willoughby, uh, um, when she was just a normal person. Probably the same for them all, to be fair. Um, what's that on? N64 Rugrats Rugrats Scavenger Hunt, probably gonna be a nostalgic memory for a few people, but the game I'm actually gonna take home, the actual game I'm taking home is Star Wars Episode 1 Racer. I thought it might be it's a game I have a hell of a lot of nostalgia for. N64 was a bit of a dead system in some ways in the UK. You saw a lot of the license good stuff going on on the PlayStation, it had the ability for the CD, all that good stuff. But Episode 1 Race was a serious win for me on the N64. I got it later in the year because I don't think it released in the UK until around the time of the movie, maybe after. Um, but it was banging, the music was great, the ability to recreate the Buntareef classic, although you don't get to play the full uh Tatooine race circuit until you finish the game, BTW. You only play the shortened version until you finish the main game, or probably put the cheats in, you little scallywags. Um but yeah, I thoroughly enjoyed that, mate. And in terms of what I'm taking home, I'm not even gonna deny it. I'm picking up Phantom Menace, and the older I get, the more I love that film. Um it certainly shines in the light of two, and um, in for me it kind of usurps three in many ways. Obviously, it pales to four, five, and six. Anything else apart from solo and road one that came after that, and maybe Force Away because I got a little bit of Sauceport before, but those other two films don't don't bring them near to me. Show them to me. I don't want to see them, I don't want to know anything about them, I don't want to acknowledge that they exist. Don't make me do it. But anyway, I'll take your Phantom Menace. A time when innocence was pure, a time for yearning and want, a time for a frustrated Star Wars fan to feel like he can rock a subalbite shirt and not get laughed at. A time for a guy to think that he might call his first child Anakin. A time a time before innocence was taken from us and overcommercialised, because even the commercialisation of Phantom Menace is now nostalgically quite enjoyable. But everything that came after that just felt I I was being force fed crap I didn't want like a far foie gras goose.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, no, definitely.
SPEAKER_03So is that and I don't think I've woken up from that distorted reality for the last at least 20 years.
SPEAKER_00Still still in it.
SPEAKER_03Let that be a reflection on society. It is not right.
SPEAKER_00Got damn serious air at the end.
SPEAKER_03What movie are you taking, RGT?
SPEAKER_00What movie I'm gonna have? I'm gonna do probably my one of my favourite films in 1999, and I'm gonna have Payback with Mel Gibson. Oh loved that film, yeah. Great film. That's cheeky. Yeah, that was uh that was out this year and all. I think I might have it on VHS somewhere, but oh my goodness gracious me.
SPEAKER_03Get a cheese board out.
SPEAKER_00I'm horned up. What film are you having then, George? Phantom Menace. Oh, yeah, sorry, you did say Phantom Menace, didn't you? Yeah, yeah.
SPEAKER_03He said he's got a new version of it, one with less Star Trek in it. So I'm intrigued to give it a go. Interesting. Last time he told me that though, I ended up watching basically just the original Battlestar Galactica Pilot. Uh yeah, he sees me coming a mile off. Each week he's got a few minutes.
SPEAKER_00He has that power to convince you though, don't you?
SPEAKER_03Well he's an absolute legend, he's probably the best salesman on planet Earth.
SPEAKER_00Definitely definitely without a doubt. I mean I'm sitting here in a Millennium Dome t-shirt. So I like the way he's positioned the dome, but I think he was a lot of weird sort of aesthetic. But if you actually look closely, I think he's upturned an enamel sausage pudding basin and he's put a couple of bits of Makana around the outside. To be fair, I mean great job, Ray. Great job. You know? So fair play.
SPEAKER_03Um but yeah. I thought it was uh I thought it was Trace Ray's bra just exploded. Huge can't just the underwire just flicked up in the right angle.
SPEAKER_00That would do say still have t-shirt.
SPEAKER_03Yeah, RGT will wear that. If you don't buy it some lending day, I'll tell him it's your bra and won't get it on his body quick enough, Trace.
SPEAKER_00Right, on that note that was April 1999. Um great looking as you always great looking back at the games and the the stories and how many stories are written in the era.
SPEAKER_03Um and the confessions of frustrated podcasters.
SPEAKER_00Yeah, exactly, yeah, and uh little hate he has for a certain two movies. Um but yeah, um it was good, really enjoyed that. Um great like I say, great looking back at you know, that early early whispers of the PS2, what what they were doing with the Dreamcast in Japan, and just you know, that silly story of Safe Park on Tiger Woods, absolutely brilliant. Um don't tend to tend to get that sort of thing nowadays, so it's even you know more fun looking back and reading up on these. But yeah, so thanks everyone for listening. Thanks for downloading, I hope you're enjoying these shows. Um next week we'll be doing our little Christmas special we're gonna be doing. Um so yeah, something to look forward to there. Um don't forget Unafficial Controller Podcast. Go download, follow, watch us on YouTube. Um this will be on YouTube as well, so you can uh listen to us there. Um check out our Discord um if there's anything um you want to mention about these shows. Uh questions at unofficialcontrollerpodcast.com. Um or you can DM us on X or Instagram or I'm on Instagram at RetroGamerThomas. So yeah, look forward to hearing from me if you want to contact us. Um just leaves me to say thank you, George, as always. My pleasure. And just to finish up, it is flashback, the games you loved, the stories you forgot. See you later, George.
SPEAKER_03See you do. Thank you, everybody.