Gaming Target - GameCube: SpyHunter

Written by Daniel Ekman on March 04, 2002

Final Glimpse: Can you feel the nostalgia?

Spy Hunter devoured many a coin in 1980's video arcades. The franchise was recently revived on PS2 while relying heavily on fast and furious action thrills coupled with sweet vehicles and mission objectives aplenty. The turn has now come for the GameCube to host the title and the question is how will the port stack up against the PS2 original.

How can we expect Spy Hunter to play? Well, pretty much the same as the PS2 version. What that means is that Spy Hunter will perhaps not strike you as particularly great at first, but will immediately convey the feeling of a cool game that for some reason just feels good to play. The smooth gameplay physics of the PS2 version will hopefully be left intact and help to augment this feeling.

While the graphics in Spy Hunter for PS2 might not have been anything to write home to your mamma about, it was still a good-looking game. Expect it to look a bit more polished where both framerate and lighting are concerned when the GameCube version rolls in.

A feeling I had when testing the game on PS2 for the very first time is a feeling that I think you will experience yourself when popping in that GameCube disc. After starting up the game for the first time you will probably feel a lot like James Bond. Being a part of an international espionage organization, you will be setting out to stop Nostra and its wicked plans. Nostra is an evil corporation with the intent of shutting down Earth, so to speak, by way of four satellites that will send electromagnetic pulses towards our planet.

To help you in your quest to bring down Nostra is the fashionable G-6155 Interceptor. This tight piece of machinery has as many tricks up its sleeve as any James Bond car. Guided missiles, GPS trackers, and pulse cannons are only some of the weapons that will be available to you. In the slickest variation from the arcade original, if your car happens to take a lot of damage you will be able to witness the Interceptor turning into a motorcycle. Furthermore, if you jump out into a river the Interceptor will turn into a slim speedboat.

The big question is whether or not the NGC version will boast anything beyond the PS2 original. Point of View, the company that is handling the conversion will hopefully be able to cram some brand new goodies in. It has been reported that the original arcade Spy Hunter might make it onto the disc, and we can only hope that Midway and Point of View will have enough time to make it a reality.

Spy Hunter for PS2 was quite a cool game; let's just hope that it remains that way when the GameCube port arrives on the market shortly. Frankly, I don't see any reason why it shouldn't.