In honour of the Dreamcast’s ninth birthday last week we are going to take a look at a game that time didn’t really forget, but a game that has quite wrongly been left to live out its days in that great game shop in the sky, Sega’s excellent Chu Chu Rocket.

Created and developed by Sega’s legendary Sonic Team, Chu Chu Rocket is probably most famous for being the first online game widely available for games console users, that and for being given away free to promote the Dreamcast’s online service.  Despite its price tag Chu Chu Rocket stills stands as one of the top titles the Dreamcast had to offer, its blend of simplicity and a perfectly judged difficulty curve added to the crazy multiplayer experience made it a game not to miss.

The aim of the game is simple, guide mice (or Chu Chu’s as they are called in the game) into your rocket, the player with the most when the clock runs out wins.  The mice will come thick and fast, always walking forward from their starting point, the 4 players can then place up to 4 direction arrows each to alter their course towards each players own rocket (or away from your opponents).  Added into the mix are the cats (or Kapu Kapu’s), if one of these makes it to your rocket you will lose a third of all your mice, and special pink mice that when collected generate a random effect ranging from slower mice to the players rockets swapping positions on the map. These can really make the difference between a landslide victory and epic failure towards the end of the round!

Also included in the game is a ‘Stage Challenge Mode’ where you are given a series of different goals to complete in a set time limit, these ranged from getting a specific number of mice in the time to guiding the cats to eat al the mice.  This mode was afr less frantic then the standard mode, but could still be played in 2 player co-op.

The game was later ported to the Gameboy Advance in 2001 with an additional 2500 puzzle levels to supplement the original 100, but some of the magic seemed to be lost in translation.  The basic game was there but the fun was not, mainly being let down by the clumsy controls bought about by the limited inputs on the GBA.

Chu Chu Rocket really needs, nay deserves, to be brought back to life on XBLA & PSN just for the fantastic multiplayer experience.  There is currently nothing on offer on either of those services that lives up to the fun of 4 player Chu Chu Rocket!  Playing it again has reminded me why I really think that the DC/PS/N64 era was the golden time of gaming!

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