Flashback

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Martin III
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Flashback

Post by Martin III » Fri Mar 27, 2015 2:57 pm

I ran a search on the forums just to see what other folks here have had to say about this game, but despite several people listing it as one of their top five/top ten 3DO games, there appears to have been no actual discussion of Flashback here. Just wondering what people's thoughts are of the game in general and of the 3DO version in particular.

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Re: Flashback

Post by klogg » Sat Mar 28, 2015 5:30 am

Frankly speaking, I see no great difference between the 3DO version and the others, except for the cleaner sound and sharper cinemas. Of course, the cover image is beautiful and be able to play in S-VHS at the time was something.
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Re: Flashback

Post by Austin » Mon Mar 30, 2015 11:20 am

I've always held Flashback in fairly high regard. It's like a more puzzle and story oriented Prince of Persia, with guns. I'm not sure how much replay value it has though, as despite it making a big impression on me in my younger years, I never went back to complete it in more recent times.

The 3DO version is the nicest looking of the bunch (cleanest FMV, sharpest in-game visuals). My biggest issue with it is that it doesn't feature full in-game tunes like the Sega CD version does. In the 3DO one, much like other non-Sega CD versions, it's mostly silence in-game until something important happens in-game, then a jingle plays.

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Re: Flashback

Post by T2KFreeker » Wed Apr 22, 2015 11:19 pm

Flashback has always been one of my favorite platformers of it's era. Games like it, like Prince of Persia, Another/Out of this World, Heart of the Alien, and Blackthorne have always sat high on my list of awesome games well worth playing. The 3DO version of Flashback is easily my favorite version of the game. It has the sharpest visuals as already stated. The controls are nice and tight, and it's missing the slowdown and jumbled framerate that the Jaguar version sadly suffers from later on in the game.

On a side note, since it was so nice, always made me wonder what Pitfall The Mayan Adventure would have been like for 3DO. I would have loved to have gotten that game on the console, so badly, I might add!
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Re: Flashback

Post by Martin III » Sun Dec 18, 2016 2:49 am

Very belated thoughtful thanks for the replies, which helped prompt me to seek out this game way back when. After the fiasco with a seller who sent me a scratched up, unplayable disc, I finally got around to hunting up a loose copy of the game for cheap and have started playing!

A lot about the game is pretty intriguing, particularly the puzzle design. However, I'm getting pretty frustrated with having to start the whole level over every time I die, especially as the running jump controls are astoundingly hit-or-miss. A look at a walkthrough tells me that I'm only 1/3 of the way through the first level, so I doubt I'll have the patience to endure the endless replaying of the same screens long enough to get through level 1, much less the entire game. Curiously, the instruction manual recommends you "save regularly", but gives no instruction on how to save. Experimenting with the controls hasn't solved that mystery either.

So, can anyone here tell me how you save in this game?

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Re: Flashback

Post by CasetheCorvetteman » Sun Dec 18, 2016 10:33 am

klogg wrote:Frankly speaking, I see no great difference between the 3DO version and the others, except for the cleaner sound and sharper cinemas. Of course, the cover image is beautiful and be able to play in S-VHS at the time was something.
S-VHS? :shock: That is a video tape format!!

Im reasonably sure you mean S-Video, and sure, its better than composite by a little bit, but pretty near every other console of the day had RGB-S output, which is miles better than S-Video!
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Re: Flashback

Post by Austin » Wed Dec 21, 2016 5:59 am

I believe saving is done at various kiosks throughout the stages. You probably haven't run into the first one yet. At least, I think that's how it works. It's been a while.

Flashback is, like Prince of Persia and Out of This World, full of trial and error.

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Re: Flashback

Post by Martin III » Wed Dec 28, 2016 2:34 am

Austin wrote:I believe saving is done at various kiosks throughout the stages. You probably haven't run into the first one yet. At least, I think that's how it works. It's been a while.

Flashback is, like Prince of Persia and Out of This World, full of trial and error.
Thanks Austin. I had thought that saving was likely limited to specific points, but I figured that the save points must be those devices which beep whenever you get close (there's one right next to the holocube at the beginning of the game). I'll keep persevering until I can find one of those kiosks. This game is tough, but it's intriguing enough that I'd like to see it through to the end.

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Re: Flashback

Post by Austin » Wed Dec 28, 2016 5:54 am

You'll get the hang of it. It takes time but there will be a point where the jumping, platforming, rolling and the gunplay feels natural. It's stiff and rigid, but you get used to it and eventually get into a flow with it.

Just a fair warning for the second level, there is an auto-jump mechanic for platforms higher than you and it's required on the very first room there. I remember being stuck at this for ages since I didn't have a manual on hand when I first played it. If you start running and there's a platform higher than you, your character will auto-jump and grab onto it. I'm not sure if you have to hold down the run button or let go completely (letting your character run on its own), but if you do it right he will run and jump and cling to platforms you normally can't reach from a normal jump or a still/standing jump.

The cool thing about that mechanic is that it works on any regular ledge just slightly higher than you, so when you get comfortable with the levels you can really bolt through them by doing lots of running and letting your character lunge and grab onto platforms in a dash instead of playing super stop-and-go.

Oh, and here's the first save station on the first level. It actually says "Save" on it. https://youtu.be/4K7YG49egx0?t=12m11s
You still need passwords from level to level, but these stations will at least let you continue from the save point if you get a Game Over.

The beeping things you are talking about are sensors on the ground. They will make platforms rise and if they have something crossing their paths (like if you throw a rock on them) they will make that noise.

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Re: Flashback

Post by Martin III » Sun Jan 08, 2017 7:03 pm

Yeah, the control style is quite good. It took me a while before I realized that you can actually enter a command while Conrad is still performing another action and he'll immediately follow it once he's finished his first action. Not many games out there where you can do something like that! And sadly gaming society is too obsessed with instant gratification for another game with this control style to be a success.

You sure about that auto-jump? I do have the manual for the game, and it says you have to tap "up" to do the running jump. Plus, I have successfully run off the edges of platforms.

Found the save points no problem. Now I'm just frustrated that they're essentially checkpoints, not true save points. I made it almost to the end of Level 2 (I was fighting off the mutant revolt) and had to turn the 3DO off because it was past my bedtime and I was on the verge of falling asleep with the controller in my hand. It stinks to have to lose that much progress when you're playing on a system with a sizable internal memory.

On the bright side, getting through Level 1 was more fun than I expected, and my mind was blown on Level 2. What a huge change of pace. In a way it's almost like a different game, but the mechanics and "world" stay constant; it's like a movie going from an action scene to a moody investigate sequence. The plot's finally moving, which is cool, and I love the puzzles, the scenery, and the whole stylish "feel" of New Washington. This is good stuff.

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Re: Flashback

Post by Austin » Tue Jan 24, 2017 2:22 am

Martin III wrote:You sure about that auto-jump? I do have the manual for the game, and it says you have to tap "up" to do the running jump. Plus, I have successfully run off the edges of platforms.
You use it at this part here and the person narrating the video explains it: https://youtu.be/e3QsF3BzKAo?t=15m46s

Tapping up while running should make you do a standard running jump, not to a higher ledge.

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Re: Flashback

Post by Martin III » Thu Feb 09, 2017 4:34 pm

Austin wrote:
Martin III wrote:You sure about that auto-jump? I do have the manual for the game, and it says you have to tap "up" to do the running jump. Plus, I have successfully run off the edges of platforms.
You use it at this part here and the person narrating the video explains it: https://youtu.be/e3QsF3BzKAo?t=15m46s

Tapping up while running should make you do a standard running jump, not to a higher ledge.
Eh, tapping up is consistently what's gotten Conrad to do the running jump for me. The video you linked says the method he uses is described in the Genesis manual, so the instructions must have been changed in the 3DO manual. The only reasonable explanation I can think of for them changing the instructions is that the controls were changed as well.

I'm posting about this belatedly, but I finished the game. I actually blitzed through levels 3-7 in less than 48 hours, doing levels 5-7 in a single sitting. 'Twas quite a ride, though I found the Death Tower to be very annoying. The part in level 4 where you walk by a policeman NPC only to have him turn into an enemy once your back is to him genuinely freaked me out. Very nicely done, and glancing through YouTube videos of the Genesis version I can see that this wasn't in the game originally! Great addition.

Mainly, though, I loved the use of the teleporter. It really opens the game up puzzle-wise, and they did a brilliant job with building the level designs around it. Plus, it's always amusing when I browse through a walkthrough of a game and find that I surmounted an obstacle in a way other than the prescribed one.

Pretty classic overall. The ending was disappointingly short, but very different from the video game norm while still following naturally and logically from the plot. A shame that the voice acting is so bland and lifeless. I tried replaying the cutscenes with the language set to French, and was very disappointed that this doesn't give you different voices, just different text.

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Re: Flashback

Post by T2KFreeker » Sat Feb 11, 2017 8:14 pm

Has anyone played the sequel to this, Fade to Black? I'm pretty sure it was on PC and was on the Playstation. I know, the camera get's annoying, but I wish they would release a reworked version of it with the same storyline. The story was so good I tortured myself through the wonky camera system. Was a really good play though not on the level of Flashback.
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Re: Flashback

Post by blabla » Sat Feb 11, 2017 9:00 pm

T2KFreeker wrote:Has anyone played the sequel to this, Fade to Black? I'm pretty sure it was on PC and was on the Playstation. I know, the camera get's annoying, but I wish they would release a reworked version of it with the same storyline. The story was so good I tortured myself through the wonky camera system. Was a really good play though not on the level of Flashback.
I had played a demo of Fade to Black and watched an entire playthrough of it :
It's horrible to play; it's not very fun and it's just a huge waste of time in my opinion...
Honestly, the only good thing this game has are its graphics and even that has not aged well.
I did not like Flashback very much (i hate point & click games) and this sequel plays even worse than its predecessor.

I don't know how the PS1 version plays though but i think it's not much different, other than having worse graphics.

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Re: Flashback

Post by dark » Sun Feb 12, 2017 12:29 am

I really like Blackthorne and Prince of Persia which are kind of like Flashback, but I can't get into Flashback because the passwords are so few and far between. It's a slog to grind through an area for 45 minutes or more, and then die, and get put all the way back to the start or a checkpoint that won't save if I turn off the system, because I didn't get to the next password.

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Re: Flashback

Post by Martin III » Sun Feb 12, 2017 8:07 pm

dark wrote:I really like Blackthorne and Prince of Persia which are kind of like Flashback, but I can't get into Flashback because the passwords are so few and far between. It's a slog to grind through an area for 45 minutes or more, and then die, and get put all the way back to the start or a checkpoint that won't save if I turn off the system, because I didn't get to the next password.
This frustrated me too at first, but it's much less of an issue once you get to level 3. The later levels are generally a bit easier, and have more frequent save points and energy generators, but most importantly, once you've gotten the basics of the game down there are very few places where you can potentially get "stuck". The puzzles and obstacles are laid out bare, so that all you need to do is figure them out.

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