Good old Ecco the Dolphin, after saving his dolphin chums from an invading alien race you would have thought he could have just spent the rest of his life in peace spinning a ball on his nose! These plans were shattered when the queen of the Vortex took it upon herself to travel back in time to start her trouble again. An older and wiser Ecco must kick some aquatic butt in order to ensure the survival of his world.
Many will be tempted to write off Ecco 2 without even playing it. I mean how can a game where the main character is a dolphin be any fun? It is hard to put into words but this aquatic action-puzzler does have a lot more going for it than it might appear from a causal glance. You’ll spend your time swimming about the sea using sonar to communicate with your aquatic friends and charging and nose-butting the bad guys. The levels are vast and there is a lot to explore. To cap it all off there are some challenging boss fights to spice things up.
Sega obviously listened to fans of the original Ecco game. The unbalanced difficulty level has been addressed. There are 3 difficulty levels so you can decide for yourself how tough you want the going to get. There are also some nice new features in Ecco 2 such as the ability to morph into different forms such as a jellyfish, a shark, a school of fish, a seagull or even a Vortex drone. The 3D stages where you swim though teleport rings are a welcome addition to the regular 2D side scrolling exploration levels.
For a Megadrive game Ecco 2 looks amazing. Ecco has a 3D rendered quality much like what is found in Donkey Kong Country. The backgrounds are amazing and the whole environment really feels like it is teaming with life. If all this has whet your appetite then we recommend that you give this a try - you’ll have a whale of a time!
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1. Mendez
04 Jun 2007, 13:47 GMT
Can't wait for this game. Much much better than the original in my opinion, and well worth the 800 points.
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2. Mendez
25 Jun 2007, 18:50 GMT
Brilliant game, and improves on everything that was in the original.
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3. Stretchdog
02 Jul 2007, 21:57 GMT
Rated T for Teen?? Seriously?
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4. PresidentLeever
02 Jul 2007, 22:57 GMT
Excellent game! Very atmospheric, immersive and definitely an improvement on the original, not just in difficulty but in the variety of the missions as well.
Why would anyone write this off because you're playing a dolphin when it's the sequel to a great, unique game which also stars a dolphin as the main character? A more likely reason would be the frustrating (but short) first level.
On a side note, I feel it has a similar atmosphere to Super Metroid, except this feels even more alien because of the underwater setting and story.
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5. "L"
06 Jul 2007, 10:34 GMT
I may get this, as a child i loved Ecco the dolphin 1, but when i downloaded it on the vc, i found it boring, and felt like it had lost its charm, never played this one tho...
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6. Boo!
06 Oct 2007, 09:59 GMT
This game looks really interesting, but does it have replayability?
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7. Adamant
11 Nov 2007, 08:34 GMT
Playing on the hard difficulty level alters some stages to a great extent, in attition to adding a couple new stages, so you'll play the game through at least twice to see everything (sure, you can play on Difficult right away, but the Ecco games have always been rather hard, so it's not recommended. Play Easy first to learn the stages before tackling Difficult). Other than that, it's a fun adventure game you'll certainly wnt to play again every now and then.
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8. Nigel
09 Feb 2008, 03:03 GMT
I like it, but it's hard. I haven't played it that much though.
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9. Lonewolf21
14 Mar 2008, 21:20 GMT
I like it and when I get it I'll play for hours...lol
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10. Mikaro
06 Apr 2008, 18:33 GMT
Better than the first game. Tides of Time is hard but the musics are great. Tube of Medusa is one of the best game musics. Dark oceans...flying dolphins...time travel...
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