Sewer Shark (3DO) Playthrough
170A playthrough of Virgin Interactive's 1994 FMV rail shooter for the 3DO, Sewer Shark.
Digital Pictures' Sewer Shark was a best-selling showpiece title for the Sega CD in the fall of 1992 ( • Sewer Shark (Sega CD) Playthrough ), so it made sense to trot it out again once another viable platform - the Panasonic 3DO - gained a foothold in the market.
Releasing a little over a year after the Sega CD version, Sewer Shark for the 3DO didn't land with the same impact - FMV games were no longer a novelty by 1994 - but it did make clear how powerful the 3DO's hardware was.
The resolution, color depth, and bitrate of the video is a massive step up from what was seen on the Sega CD, as is the audio quality. The Sega CD's FM music was replaced with prerecorded tracks, and the speech and sound effects are way less hissy and distorted. Better yet, thanks to the improved compression routines, the entire game still managed to fit on a single disc.
It's exactly the improvement that you'd expect from a machine with more memory, a stronger CPU, and a double-speed CD drive. The quality was better than anything you'd see on a typical PC the time, and could only be practically matched by a computer (or a CDi deck) with a dedicated MPEG decoder card installed. It was a clear generational leap.
The only complaint I can muster against the 3DO version is that the crosshair's movement is stuttery, which makes the controls feel less precise, as if they were tied directly to the framerate of the FMV background. It feels off at first, but I grew accustomed to it after a few games. I'd argue that the clarity of the video improves the game's playability more than the controls hinder it.
_____________\nNo cheats were used during the recording of this video. \n\nNintendoComplete (http://www.nintendocomplete.com/) punches you in the face with in-depth reviews, screenshot archives, and music from classic 8-bit NES games!