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Developed for the Nintendo 64 by Eurocom, and released for the
Nintendo 64 on October 17, 2000 by EA,
The World Is Not Enough adapts the 1999 Bond film as a first person shooter
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1997's
GoldenEye 007 is the entire reason I purchased a Nintendo 64
in the first place. I played Rare's incredible game for hundreds of hours, more
than I've played any game before or since. At the time, I thought every new
James Bond film would receive an incredible Nintendo 64 first person shooter,
but when
Tomorrow Never Dies hit later in 1997, and a game never came (except for the weak and poorly reviewed PlayStation third person game), I
gave up hope. However, in late 1999,
The World Is Not Enough hit
theaters, and a Nintendo 64 first person shooter tie-in was announced (a much
weaker (and more poorly reviewed) PlayStation version was too, but who cares). I
grabbed a copy of
The World Is Not Enough when it released the next year, hoping for the
best...and thankfully, the game was pretty good! I enjoyed it, and have picked
it up again for the 25th anniversary of the film to see if it still holds up.
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| One of the few games I know that has... |
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| two "start" screens! |
Eurocom developed two Duke Nukem titles for the Nintendo 64 before
007: The World Is Not Enough, and it's clear early into the game that
they know what they're doing. For starters, the graphics engine is quite impressive.
Environments are highly detailed, and most importantly, look like the
environments from the film. Weapon detail and effects looks great, as do
enemies and enemy animations. In some Nintendo 64 games, attempts at creating human faces are
abominations, but not here: Denise Richards looks like Denise Richards. Judi
Dench looks like Judi Dench. The face digitalization works. Also, the game's
texture quality is high, there's little distance fog or draw in, and level environments are fairly large. Best of all, with assistance from the N64 expansion pak,
the graphics are not only sharp, but
The World Is Not Enough runs smoothly.
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| And the bullet casings fly! |
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| Considering that Christmas Jones' look in the film is based upon Lara Croft, it's ironic she's now in a video game |
The overall sound design also feels like it's from a late generation Nintendo
64 game. Voice acting abounds, and though only John Cleese from the film's cast
shows up, the impersonators for the other characters are quite good. Bullets
zing all over the place, engines rumble, explosions boom. The music is good, and
fairly Bond-like...but this is the first downgrade from
GoldenEye.
GoldenEye is not only a very Bond-like game, but literally injects the classic, famous James
Bond theme into every moment it can.
GoldenEye feels as purely Bond as a game
can be. Whether due to licensing issues or simple oversight, it is absolutely
inexcusable that the James Bond theme does not appear in
007: The World Is Not Enough. A few scattered moments from David Arnold's
music does appear in the game, notably a quick motif from the boat chase scene, as well as some music from just before the end credits in the film, but again, the actual Bond
theme is nowhere to be heard. Also,
Goldeneye features unique music for
each of its myriad missions. Not only does
The World Is Not Enough feature less missions, but the same couple of
music tracks are used for most of those missions. Unfortunately, this causes
those tracks to feel repetitive. So while the soundtrack isn't bad per se, it is
an unfortunate strike against the game compared to its closest competitor.
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| Hey, but it does have explosions! Wait...GoldenEye has explosions too?... |
The actual gameplay here is also a downgrade from
GoldenEye, as well as from several of the console's top first person shooters, but it's still solid and
quite a bit of fun.
The World Is Not Enough follows
GoldenEye's
mission format, presenting a little over a dozen missions that follow the plot
of the film it adapts. Each mission (I am referring to individual levels as
missions here) features several objectives that must be completed in order to
progress, i.e. retrieve an item, protect someone (escort missions), rescue
hostages, eliminate an enemy before they escape, get from point A to B
undetected--there are a large variety of goals, often found within the same
mission. Thankfully, Bond is given a large variety of weapons and gadgets (often
detailed in the mission briefings) with which to tackle each level. However,
while these levels are generally fun and well-designed, I must again give a negative comparison to
GoldenEye. Most of
GoldenEye's missions
also contain several objectives,
but there's a certain freedom in how those objectives can be tackled. A player
can often roam around a
GoldenEye level and work out unique ways of handling each objective, often in any chosen order,
which gives that game a more open and interactive feeling.
The World Is Not Enough's missions are often far tighter and more rigid
in their dedication to ordered objectives, and the player will often have to
figure out exactly what the game wants done in order to complete a mission, and do that exactly, without
almost any room for improvisation. So while
The World Is Not Enough's
gameplay is beyond serviceable and mostly fun, it can't help but feel like diet
Goldeneye.
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| It even has less missions than GoldenEye! |
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| Then again some of the mission objectives are quite satisfying... |
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| if you're into the plot of the film |
In fact,
The World Is Not Enough missions that involve the most simple objectives, i.e.
"kill the bad guys" are often the most fun because they allow the most
freedom, and freedom is what a Nintendo 64 first person shooter should be all about. Thankfully, the controls at the service of the game's levels don't feel like diet
GoldenEye. They
follow that game's blueprint successfully, but also add some fun additions like secondary
weapon functions and gadget accessibility. If you're a fan of the
classic
GoldenEye controller scheme--joystick for directional movement,
C-buttons for strafing and looking up and down--you'll feel right at home
here. If you're a died in the wool "Call of Duty twin sticks is the only way
to play a first person shooter" person, you'll be disgruntled, as you will with just about any Nintendo 64 game. I think the
control scheme, which includes utilizing the classic Z-trigger button to fire weapons, is
perfect.
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| Shooting blocky Nintendo 64 henchmen is fun |
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| One cool aspect that didn't make the body of the review: shoot somebody on a balcony, and the animation of them falling off is awesome. All of the animations in this game are awesome! |
Since I've suddenly leapt from negatively comparing this game to
GoldenEye to positively comparing it to Call of Duty, I'll shoutout
another department where Nintendo 64 shooters have a leg up on today's
games--split screen multiplayer. That's right, no online multiplayer with
some stranger whose Mountain Dew and Dorito-stained clothing you don't have
to smell.
The World Is Not Enough is yet another Nintendo 64 multiplayer
triumph. Players can grab up to three friends and squeeze together on the couch
for up to four-player first person shooter multiplayer action.
The World Is
Not Enough even allows the player to throw a few bots into the action (and
the ability to go solo against some bots). The bots, like the general AI in
the main game, are not incredibly bright, but they still add a lot of fun to the multiplayer.
There are a decent amount of multiplayer modes here too, from classic
deathmatch, to capture the flag, to team matches and more. The option menus aren't as
intuitive as
GoldenEye's, or as highly detailed and option-heavy as those in the Rare
Nintendo 64
GoldenEye sequel,
Perfect Dark, but the availabile modes, skins, environments, and weapon selections are extensive. The environments aren't quite as well-designed as those in the two landmark Rare shooters, but admittedly,
The World Is Not Enough's multiplayer actually runs more smoothly than theirs does.
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| The classic GoldenEye "radar map" also returns to the top right of the screen |
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| I guess that's revenge for me calling it "not incredibly bright" |
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| The game even gives players the option to lower weapon detail to ensure the framerate remains acceptable |
The World Is Not Enough isn't a long game, though it does offer
several options that extend gameplay beyond just the multiplayer. The first
is additional difficulty modes, with the game offering a medium and hard
mode (yes, it's also called 00 Agent mode). Generally, this means more difficult enemies, and more, tougher
objectives. The main additional draw to keep playing is again lifted from
GoldenEye:
unlockable cheats. These are accessed by beating certain levels on
certain difficulty modes within a certain time limit. Again, there's a
downgrade in the freedom these cheats provide. Some of
Goldeneye's cheats
are delightfully game-breaking, like infinite ammo, starting off a level
with every gun, and invincibility, all great rewards for being good at the game.
TWINE's aren't really cheats at all though, but multiplayer unlockables: additional arenas, skins, weapons, and scenarios. This is cool, especially if you're a big fan of the
multiplayer, but still a bit of a downgrade from...
GoldenEye.
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| To curb this negativity, here are some things that The World Is Not Enough has that GoldenEye doesn't: helicopters with buzzsaws that cut through the level, and you have to blow them up. |
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| This kind of uzi detail |
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| Anything that looks as good as the Turkey rooftop level |
While it may not crack the hallowed top tier of Nintendo 64 first person
shooters,
The World Is Not Enough is still a worthy entry in the
Nintendo 64's first person shooter catalogue. As far as the intangible
"feel" of the game, it's like a cross between Eurocom's Duke Nukem games
that preceded it and the two Rare games I haven't been able to shut up about
in this review. The game follows its source material's plot surprisingly well, and
while it doesn't quite immerse the gamer in Bond atmosphere as much as it
could, I think
The World Is Not Enough is well worth the time of any Nintendo 64, first person
shooter, or James Bond fan.
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| Unfortunately, the film's famous boat chase only appears in cutscene form, but at least it's a good cutscene (all of the game's cutscenes are good) |
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